Within the thick night mist, fierce battles were breaking out in every direction.
Silent and traceless, Qin Ming's spirit wandered into the high sky. He did not make any rash moves, merely looking down upon the scene below.
Did someone want to kill him? Yet he clearly also heard groans from the "Blazing Suns" of the heavens; those people were under attack as well.
This was destined to be a chaotic night. An unknown organization was very likely trying to fish in troubled waters.
Qin Ming remained quietly dormant, biding his time. Perhaps he could also take advantage of the situation to eliminate his adversaries.
"I hope all our people stay safe." Otherwise, he would not mind disguising himself as a member of this unknown organization and hunting through this tumultuous night.
Silently, Qin Ming drew near to the area where Li Qingyun was, preparing to intervene.
As for Yu Gensheng, there was no need for Qin Ming to get involved at all. The old grandmaster had already crushed an ambush attacker to death once—the assailant was suspected to have attacked with an out-of-body Pure Yang consciousness.
"I'm actually a bit nervous, getting ready to make a move against a grandmaster," Qin Ming murmured as he took out the dust-covered supreme demonic treasure. It could serve as a banner or an umbrella, proving exceedingly handy.
"You're not nervous, you're excited!" the yellow imperial parasol corrected him.
Right now it was only palm-sized, and Qin Ming used it as a dainty short spear.
He reminded it, "Old Huang, be careful. Erase all traces so no one can trace this back to us afterward."
In front of a collapsed building amidst ruined walls and scattered rubble, Old Man Li glared at a wraithlike creature, striking repeatedly and clashing with it multiple times.
As a newly ascended grandmaster of the "younger vigorous faction," his combat strength was extraordinary, his various esoteric sect methods subtle and unfathomable.
The shadowy creature gathered and dispersed without fixed form. Though it was at a disadvantage, its skirmishing tactics were quite impressive.
Qin Ming drew near without a sound, his form remaining concealed. Heavenly light wrapped around his consciousness and divine wisdom, clinging to the old cloth as if vanishing through the void.
Controlling the spear as he moved, he arrived in secret. The tip of the demonic treasure was exceedingly sharp, indeed very much like a short spear, and at present it was only the length of a chopstick. By now, he was very close to that ghostly creature.
"Hmm?" Old Man Li sensed something.
At the same time, the shadowy creature also perceived something amiss.
Qin Ming sighed inwardly. As expected of grandmasters—even though he left no visible trace, they could still sense something in the unseen void. Their spiritual perception was truly astoundingly sharp.
By this time he had already crept right up to it, unleashing his full power in an instant.
The chopstick-length dainty short spear flared with dazzling brilliance, more radiant than a Pure Yang flying sword. Like a magnificent divine rainbow slicing across heaven and earth, it shattered ruined walls and blasted rubble to fine powder, leaving deep black fissures tearing through the ground.
The ghostly creature was not human, but a gigantic beast in a shadowy state. Although it stepped lightly and moved swiftly, dodging at the first instant, it was still pierced.
One of its ears exploded, barely sparing its head from a fatal strike. It let out a low, guttural roar, completely detonating the night mist in the vicinity.
Though not of flesh and blood, spiritual substance resembling blood still splattered everywhere. The ferocious beast's face contorted in pain and uncontrollable fury.
Li Qingyun launched a swift, ferocious assault, unleashing methods of the esoteric sect's fifth realm, God Perception. Divine might emanated outward, his aura surging far stronger than before.
Qin Ming steered the chopstick-length short spear like lightning, attacking at high frequency, slashing across the gigantic beast's body several times and spraying forth peculiar blood.
"I'll smash your dog head to pieces!" Li Qingyun bellowed. His inner landscape opened, merging his own spirit with an unseen outer god. Several pairs of golden arms extended outward, their weight seeming to crush and collapse the void.
One of his golden fists smashed squarely onto the beast's head with a thundering boom, caving in a section of its frontal bone and fracturing it instantly.
Having seized the upper hand, Li Qingyun grew even more formidable. His several pairs of golden arms burned like divine fire in the night mist, illuminating the sky. Grabbing hold of the colossal beast, he tore it clean apart.
Qin Ming silently retreated. Through this test of technique, he already knew he could fight alongside or against grandmasters.
As for who would win or lose in a life-or-death battle, that remained hard to say.
The higher the realm, the harder it became to challenge above one's grade. After all, those who could climb to such heights were no ordinary individuals, but elites who had risen from countless cultivators.
Even though Qin Ming was an anomaly, he still felt the difficulty imposed by the suppression of major realms.
He breathed a sigh of relief. Knowing his own people were unharmed, he began scanning all directions.
"Why shouldn't I go on the offensive?" He wanted to take proactive action now.
Such a wonderful night—how could he let it go to waste? He could completely take advantage of the chaos to eliminate some of the people who harbored deep enmity toward him.
"For instance, the Cui family."
He frowned. Where had the Cui family's great dragon gone?
When the chaos erupted, he had seen Cui Chongxiao fade into the night mist, seemingly intending to make a move. Yet why was there no trace of him now?
"Why are the attackers all strange and monstrous? There are hardly any humanoid creatures." Qin Ming felt something was amiss.
Soon, he heard miserable shrieks coming from the vicinity of the crowd from the heavens. Grandmaster-level monsters were on the prowl, and certain prodigies were slain on the spot.
A grandmaster-level melee immediately erupted in that area, with multiple figures joining the fray.
Qin Ming's heart shivered. In such an unfavorable overarching environment, several grandmasters had suddenly emerged. Tonight's events were clearly far from simple.
"Yujing has vanished—is this a probe on the eve of an invasion by a supreme civilization? Are they hunters from the depths of the night mist world...?" Amid the chaos, Qin Ming caught whispers from Lu Zheng, Zhou Tiandao, and others.
Hovering high in the night sky, he finally spotted Cui Chongxiao in the night mist, speeding away as fast as he could.
"Fleeing that fast?" Qin Ming gave chase.
Earlier, Cui Chongxiao had realized things were wrong; many of the monsters were unseen aberrations. He quickly cloaked his presence, slipped away from the chaotic scene, and rushed toward the Cui family's temporary residence by the Shuyu River.
Qin Ming attached himself to the rag, crossing the vast sky.
Because he was moving too fast, the old cloth fluttered and snapped loudly, detonating the night mist along his path with sonic booms.
This was a drawback: the old cloth was a physical object, and when cleaving through the air at high speed, it roared like thunderclaps.
"Hmm?" Lu Zheng looked up and raised a finger to strike. Blood qi emanating from the Extreme Dao Golden Body merged with sword light, soaring skyward with astonishing killing power.
Following his motion, a grandmaster beside him actually threw a fist toward the sky.
Qin Ming knew that in his haste, he had caused too much commotion. Although he was invisible, the surging turbulence created tremendous noise.
Furthermore, that grandmaster's Pure Yang consciousness left his body and soared upward to intercept him.
"Friendly," Qin Ming said in a low voice. Instantly, he went silent again, slowing his pace. As the air currents ceased to violently churn, he vanished once more.
Delayed by this interruption, Cui Chongxiao was nowhere to be seen.
Slightly irritated, Qin Ming refused to give up and followed the direction, discovering Cui Chongxiao outside the Cui family's encampment.
By now, the Cui family grandmaster had led members of the clan outside and stood there side by side.
They had not yet departed from the Dayu imperial capital, wanting to wait until Cui Chonghe's injuries improved slightly before setting out.
"Chongxiao, what happened?"
"An unknown faction made a night raid... creatures suspected to be from beyond the lands ruled by Yujing," Cui Chongxiao quickly reported the situation.
"Hmm... can we take advantage of the chaos to get rid of the abandoned son?" a noted elder of the Cui family transmitted secretly.
Qin Ming had already arrived nearby, and using his resonance method, he intercepted the transmission clearly.
The Cui family grandmaster looked extremely grave and said, "Do not stir up trouble tonight. Wait quietly for Dayu to quell the turmoil. None of you are to act rashly now!"
Just then, he seemed to sense something and looked toward the night sky.
That was because Qin Ming was quietly closing in, not far from them, and an unusual aura had been caught by the grandmaster's sharp divine perception.
"Who is it?!" It had to be said that those who could become grandmasters were extraordinary figures; their spiritual premonition was exceptionally strong.
With a bang, Qin Ming, wrapped in the rag and steering the short spear, streaked past him. Though the strike missed, it threw the area into turmoil.
Not far away, in the Proximity to Dao Ground of the Dayu imperial capital, sky-piercing radiance erupted. A great grandmaster awakened and made a move with thunderous momentum.
Evidently, mysterious experts had breached several crucial locations in Dayu—such as the imperial palace, the heaven-worship grounds, and the Proximity to Dao Ground—triggering bloody turmoil.
Clang! A jade bell was struck, its distinctive sonic waves penetrating straight into the Nine Heavens. This was both an alarm and a plea for aid from above.
"Things have blown up this big?" Qin Ming was startled. After launching several surprise attacks against the Cui family grandmaster, he pulled back, worried that an Earth Immortal might personally descend to the surface.
Although figures of that level dared not act casually—since doing so could easily prove fatal—if matters reached an extreme crisis, what scruples would they have left?
After one final strike, Qin Ming evaded the grandmaster and charged toward Cui Chongxiao.
With a rumble, the Cui family grandmaster propped up a curtain of light, enveloping Cui Chongxiao within and pulling him to his side.
Puff!
A Cui family expert had his head pierced through by the short spear, dying on the spot as his soul was harvested by the demonic treasure. This deceased figure was none other than the noted elder who had suggested taking advantage of the chaos to kill the abandoned son moments before.
With tonight being so chaotic, Qin Ming was not in the least worried that suspicion would fall on him.
At the same time, he sighed softly. Grandmasters were indeed troublesome and difficult to deal with.
"Brother Cui, is everything all right on your end?" someone shouted from a distance, approaching swiftly.
Evidently, this was an expert close to the Cui family.
"Fellow Daoist, come help me slay the enemy!" the Cui family grandmaster called back.
At this moment, from the depths of the Dayu imperial palace, an astounding pressure swept outward in all directions, rolling across all of Chongxiao City and illuminating the entire night sky.
"An expert of the quasi-sixth realm!" Many people's hearts trembled.
In times like these, was there actually a figure on the verge of becoming a patriarch seated in the imperial palace?
"It's the Emperor of Dayu! Who could have imagined he would break through so quickly? After Night Province was unified, he truly reaped the greatest benefits. In just this short time, he is about to fully surpass the fifth realm."
In the Dayu imperial capital, countless people felt their spirits tremble.
"As expected, he will eventually become an Earth Emperor—a true powerhouse of the seventh realm!"
In the darkness, some elderly men near the end of their lifespans had bloodshot eyes, filled with jealousy and envy. One truly could not compare one person's fortune to another's.
Qin Ming slipped away silently. Along the way, he stopped multiple times to strike at those nonhuman monsters from the outer domain.
"They are creatures from outside Yujing's sphere of influence—in all likelihood, a probe from another supreme orthodox tradition. Tonight could be very dangerous; we should return to the heavens and let the surface dwellers hold them off first."
On his way back, Qin Ming actually intercepted such scoundrelly words through his resonance technique.
He glanced to the side—it was none other than Lu Zheng.
Qin Ming felt it necessary to teach this descendant of Tianzun a lesson—one who usually acted all lofty, yet showed zero backbone when it mattered most.
Blending into the night mist, he approached stealthily and struck with explosive fury.
It had to be admitted that as the prominent heir of the strongest body-refinement lineage above the Nine Heavens, Lu Zheng was indeed exceptionally formidable. Possessing profound cultivation, he actually sensed the mortal peril in the nick of time, dodged the fatal blow, and began to counterattack.
Trading genuine blows, he clashed with Qin Ming several times.
During the clash, he circulated the Extreme Dao Golden Body Scripture, unleashing a trump card—the Flick-to-Shatter-Heaven Technique.
For a moment, the night sky seemed blasted apart, turning blurry, twisted, and hazy as that finger appeared capable of piercing the firmament.
Yet Lu Zheng groaned in pain, his face turning pale as he retreated in haste. He felt a piercing, agonizing pain—his right middle finger was dripping with blood.
When he flicked his finger, it had collided with the tip of the yellow imperial parasol. His finger was pierced and severed, a section of his middle finger sheared clean off.
"Ah...!" The pain reached right to his core, and Lu Zheng cursed aloud in sheer agony. As a descendant of Tianzun, he had never suffered such a grievous loss before—to actually have a finger severed down on the surface!
A grandmaster drew near, stepping in front of Lu Zheng, and unleashed a booming palm strike forward.
Qin Ming withdrew silently; there was no need to wage a life-or-death battle here.
He traversed the night mist, slaying several monsters along the way—some were silver-furred bats steeped in dense baleful blood, others human-faced birds bearing golden horns.
In Dayu's Proximity to Dao Ground, there were not only imperial experts, but also senior figures of other orthodox lineages who had borrowed the grounds for secluded cultivation. At this moment, they all emerged.
Aside from the Emperor of Dayu, several great grandmasters appeared, immediately suppressing the entire city.
A number of monsters were swiftly slain. These outer domain creatures had actually been driven here by someone who cared nothing for their lives.
After striking, several great grandmasters all coughed up traces of blood, swiftly chasing the attackers outside the imperial capital.
Outside the city, Yun Jianyue fought fiercely with a silver-haired young man, pursuing him all the way to a luminous portal.
"Hiss... To fight so intensely against a core disciple of Yujing, there's no doubt about it—that young man must be a saint of some supreme orthodox tradition!" Some onlookers felt their hearts surge with excitement.
The great grandmasters of Dayu's capital held the line and did not attack further, because on the opposing side stood beings of the same level, who wiped the blood from the corners of their mouths and smiled toward them.
In the end, those figures retreated and slipped into the portal of light.
The portal slowly closed, and the beings from the depths of the night mist world vanished.
This night was extraordinarily chaotic.
Only when the shallow night arrived did Chongxiao City regain its peace, with all remaining monsters eradicated.
Envoys descended from the heavens to appease and reassure those on the ground.
"Fortunately, there were many experts in the city, so the losses weren't too severe. But the ramifications are terrible—creatures from an outer domain actually managed to invade Dayu's imperial capital."
"Yun Jianyue is truly powerful. Compared to when she was split into the Heavenly Immortal and Heavenly God individually, her cultivation has surged tremendously. She severely wounded that saint from the outer domain."
However, those who knew the inside story harbored gloom in their hearts. The lands of Yujing might already be viewed as prey by some supreme domain in the depths of the night mist world.
Yet on this side, even the city of Yujing had vanished! What confidence could the living beings of this realm have left to resist those terrifying hunters from afar?
"Don't be afraid! Dictated by the overarching environment, they don't have high-end combat power either. Didn't you see they only deployed sickly great grandmasters?"
"That's true. This is an era where Earth Immortals and patriarchs are all declining. The older generation of experts is in their twilight years and may even wither away. In an environment where everyone is worsening, who's afraid of whom?!"
"Exactly! The great grandmasters who came out of seclusion last night all coughed up blood, and the grandmasters who took action were all pale-faced. In the end, it still comes down to us of the younger and middle generations to carry the banner. Now is the time for our generation to rise!"
No one expected that while panic had initially gripped the city, that sense of unease and hesitation was swept clean away that very day. Many young experts were actually thrilled and excited.
Some of the more radical among them even shouted, "Open those ancient Mist Gates! We want to pioneer new frontiers, venture deep into the night mist world to seize resources, and rapidly elevate ourselves!"
Even Qin Ming, Jiang Ran, Li Qingyue, and the others felt their blood stir with excitement upon sensing this atmosphere, feeling the urge to journey far into the outer domain.
Once they calmed down, they grew somewhat lost in thought.
"This holds some truth. An Earth Immortal explained the current situation: life might not be easy for that distant supreme orthodox tradition either. They seem quite 'starved,' which is why they came to probe Yujing's domain."
"After Yujing vanished, many felt as if the sky had collapsed. But that distant orthodox tradition might not have it any better than here—their situation could be even worse!"
The peerless Earth Immortals from the old mountain strongholds above the heavens analyzed the situation with grave expressions, and the Sage, the Old Barbarian God, and the peerless powerhouse of the esoteric sect, Chu Canglan, all agreed in turn.
The Dayu imperial capital completely regained its calm, the atmosphere shifting faster than anyone could have anticipated.
"There is a saying that Yujing's Heavenly Gods only achieved their status after venturing deep into the night mist world. While that might not be entirely reliable, it does show where one should look if they want to find opportunities."
Believing that the younger and middle generations had to carry the banner, they all advocated opening the ancient Mist Gates as soon as possible.
Li Qingyue whispered softly, "This time, if the path isn't blocked, Jiang Ran and I really are leaving."
At this moment, she was walking side by side with Qin Ming along the banks of the Shuyu River. The weeping branches of silver willows brushed gently against their hair, and the shimmering, crystalline river reflected their youthful faces.
"Will you come back?" Qin Ming turned and took hold of one of her slender hands, asking.
Right behind them, Jiang Ran appeared and asked, "Do you not plan to leave Night Province?"
Chapter 498