Above Cloud Sea Square.
The Battle of Dual Bloods, which had dragged on for over a decade, was gradually heating to a white-hot pitch.
Blood Nightmare Moluo and Daoist Jiyuan had joined forces to battle Blood Hermit. They had originally been outmatched, but aided by that blood sword verging on a spirit treasure, they were gradually clawing their way back from the disadvantage.
*Clang!*
Sword light cleaved downward, splitting into myriad phantoms, striking the true body dead-on amid countless overlapping figures.
Blood Hermit's body was sliced straight in two.
Yet in the blink of an eye, the two halves merged back into one.
Seeing this, Blood Nightmare Moluo's expression darkened slightly.
"The Blood Sea Demonic Body!"
"To think that an outsider like you not only refined Nascent Soul stage Blood God Children, but also cultivated the immortal Blood Sea Demonic Body!"
Blood Hermit looked somewhat pale, his gaze intensely wary as he eyed the blood sword in the other's hand.
At his peak, with four Blood God Children guarding him, he would not have feared even a late Nascent Soul great cultivator.
Yet this sword!
Taking a deep breath, he flicked his long whip, letting out a sharp crack in midair.
Blood Nightmare Moluo glanced over and sneered, "A Blood Kiss Demonic Whip forged with my sect's methods—though it possesses the trait of absorbing blood and converting qi, its core materials are far too inferior, and it hasn't been tempered nearly long enough. It's nothing more than a shoddy treasure. How could it contend with this God-Slashing Blood Sword?"
If Diaosou, Luo Chen, and the others were to hear his evaluation, they would surely find it impossible to accept.
This demonic whip had been forged by force using three types of living beings as its core materials: a fifth-tier Withered Blood Vine itself, the inner core of a fourth-tier Soul-Locking Ghost Crow, and a desolate beast Chiwen carrying a trace of true dragon bloodline.
It spanned psychic anomalies, demon beasts, and desolate beasts.
It had cost the Myriad Immortals Association immense manpower and resources to barely craft it.
Yet from Blood Nightmare Moluo's lips, it was dismissed as worthless trash.
Blood Hermit offered no rebuttal.
The other two core materials were indeed not bad in quality, but the desolate beast Chiwen contributed by Diaosou was simply too weak.
Rumor had it that it had been seized from a pseudo-core cultivator who wished to join the Myriad Immortals Association. How strong could a desolate beast controlled by a mere pseudo-core cultivator possibly be?
As a result, the three core materials failed to form a stable structure during refinement, causing its power to fall short of expectations.
However!
"Even if it is a shoddy treasure, defeating you is more than enough!"
Blood Hermit reached backward and clenched his fist!
In the next instant, the Blood God Child currently tangling with Fairy Feileng endured a strike from her and, ignoring its injuries, forcibly flew toward Blood Hermit.
Seeing this, Blood Nightmare Moluo's expression shifted slightly.
"Stop him! He wants to merge god and demon!"
The Blood Sea Lineage of the Yuan Demon Sect possessed many formidable arts.
Among them, the most famous was the fusion of an expert who had cultivated the Blood Sea Demonic Body with the Blood God Child refined from their own mind and spirit. When the two stacked together, their might multiplied!
In the past, the reason Blood Hermit had roamed the Northern Sea without restraint, fearless even against late-stage great cultivators while only in the mid Nascent Soul stage, was precisely that he had four Nascent Soul stage Blood God Children protecting him at his peak.
Merging with just one doubled his power; had all four Blood God Children merged at once, his strength would have undergone an earth-shattering transformation!
Now, although Blood Hermit had lost three Blood God Children, the trio on Blood Nightmare Moluo's side were inherently lower in realm than him to begin with. They had only gained a slight upper hand by relying on their numerical advantage and the pseudo-spirit treasure that was the God-Slashing Blood Sword.
If he truly managed to merge god and demon...
"Too late!"
With a low bark, Blood Hermit shuddered all over as rich, thick blood light flared brilliantly.
His hair and beard whipped in the wind, his eyes turning vicious as he glared at the enemies closing in from three directions.
The old Daoist from Penglai, the young matron cauldron, and the Yuan Demon remnant!
With not a hair's breadth to spare,
He grinned malevolently and lashed out with his whip!
*Snap!*
The void trembled, and at that moment, it seemed as if a crow wailed and an evil dragon roared.
The blood sword cut cleanly through the air, cleaving the Blood Kiss Demonic Whip in two with a single slash, yet it could not sever that eerie wailing and roaring.
Instantly.
As if struck by a massive blow, Blood Nightmare Moluo crashed onto the square, kicking up a heavy thud.
*Boom! Boom!*
Blood Hermit unleashed two successive palm strikes, knocking back Daoist Jiyuan and Fairy Feileng with peerless tyranny, then looked down at Blood Nightmare Moluo lying on the square.
From Blood Nightmare Moluo's body, numerous resentful souls and ferocious ghosts bizarrely welled up, beginning to gnaw and feast upon him.
Although a deluge of blood light surged back, attempting to suppress these resentful spirits summoned forth by the Blood Kiss Demonic Whip, the effort was utterly feeble.
Seeing this, Blood Hermit, who was just about to pursue, froze.
"Backlash from resentful souls, demonic qi running in reverse..."
He seemed to realize something and suddenly burst into loud laughter.
"Haha! And here I thought the Holy Land's rules were sacred law! To think a traitor would emerge trying to merge all three lineages in defiance of the ancestral precepts!"
Having laughed, his face turned cold.
"The power of the Blood Sea Patriarch—I shall take it!"
Swooping downward, he slammed a palm onto the crown of Blood Nightmare Moluo's head.
A domineering power, beyond Blood Nightmare Moluo's control, was forcefully wrenched out and channeled into Blood Hermit.
Beside them, Daoist Jiyuan and Fairy Feileng watched this in dread, shrinking back and not daring to advance.
Not far away, a crowd of powerful figures watched silently from the sidelines, not daring to disturb in the slightest.
Suddenly!
Blood Hermit looked up at the sky.
Amid the Fourteen Palaces of Mingzhao, a sudden gleam of light dimmed.
*Hum...*
Amid a muffled rumble, the grand doors of one palace slowly swung open.
Then, a graceful figure strode out.
Looking down from high above like a fairy from the moon palace, she watched the mortals below with an amused expression.
First at her old acquaintance Blood Hermit, and then her gaze locked onto Fairy Feileng.
The latter trembled all over and reflexively lowered her head.
"So, my dear little sister came too..."
Moon Hermit's mocking voice gradually deepened. Furrowing her brows, she instinctively looked toward the Alchemy Hall closest to the Slave Hall.
There, a terrifyingly bizarre power had actually pierced through the hall's suppression, slowly radiating outward.
Other people could not sense this power.
Only she, who had likewise received the complete Slave Dao legacy of the Heaven Refining Demon Lord, could faintly discern a trace of it.
"Could it be the treasure cauldron the artifact spirit spoke of—the one even stronger than the Myriad Beasts Diagram?"
***
Within the Alchemy Hall.
Time seemed to have ground to a halt.
Droplets of blood hovered in the void.
Chunks of minced flesh lay evenly scattered.
Shattered fragments of bone were arrayed in all four directions.
As time trickled by, Tianxuan, her heart originally steeped in dead silence, gradually began to sense something amiss.
"Master... he doesn't seem dead?"
Black King, who had been immersed in a mix of grief and liberation, was stunned.
"How could that be? The slave mark on my divine soul dissolved on its own."
For cultivators and spiritual pets, unless they had signed a contract binding their lives together in death, the contract's restrictions would automatically unravel when one party perished.
That was precisely why Tianxuan had previously concluded that Luo Chen had fallen.
Yet right now!
Tianxuan felt a shred of doubt, recalling the days and nights spent sparring with Luo Chen.
Earlier, she had merely lost the spiritual connection with her master, but his aura remained long and continuous, as though that terrifyingly strong-bodied man were still breathing right beside her ear.
No!
Not breathing!
A heartbeat!
*Thump! Thump! Thump!*
Amid the countless pieces of minced flesh, a bright red heart was beating vigorously and powerfully.
Amid that scalp-numbing heartbeat, an anomalous phenomenon abruptly manifested.
Droplets of blood began to coalesce, the minced flesh was budding, and fragments of bone squirmed as they tried to reassemble.
"Could it be?" Black King's eyes twitched. From his inherited memories, he vaguely recalled something.
It was a legend belonging to ancient desolate beasts—immortal and indestructible, capable of rebirth from a single drop of blood.
*Whoosh!*
The giant plantain fan swept out from Tianxuan's hand, barring Black King's path.
Seeing this, Black King flared with rage. "Tianxuan, what do you think you're doing?"
Tianxuan looked back coldly. "It's not what I'm doing; it's what you are thinking!"
"I... I..."
Black King's voice faltered. Across his ferocious flood dragon visage, a humanized look of shame surfaced.
Tianxuan watched him coldly, her tone growing even firmer.
"Master never treated me poorly, and he was even more generous to you. Emperor's Flowing Syrup, demon beast flesh, bones, and inner cores, magic treasures, and medicinal pills—he even helped you awaken your inheritance, and bestowed upon you the corpse of that Cliff Snake that failed to advance to the Nascent Soul stage."
"Even if our slave marks with him have vanished now, he is still our master!"
"Whatever little thoughts you have in your head, I advise you to drop them."
Black King snapped in indignation, "Don't you spit blood and slander me! I, Black King, am utterly loyal to Master!"
"So you still remember your name is Black King! Even that name was given to you by Master." Clutching the Nine Winds Plantain Fan, Tianxuan's magic power showed signs of unleashing in its entirety. "I have only one thing to say: unless you kill me, I will not let you take a single step near Master!"
Black King was both furious and ashamed.
Furious that his companion looked down on him, and ashamed that for a fleeting moment, the thought of betraying his master really had crossed his mind.
Just as he was about to explain, his pupils contracted.
Tianxuan noticed the change as well.
Behind them, in the grand hall, the flesh and bones were trying to reassemble.
However!
The process was progressing with extreme difficulty.
Suddenly.
A surging power began to gush from the minced flesh and bones.
It was a blood-colored power.
Though an eerie crimson, it carried no evil or perverse aura whatsoever, appearing instead as a power born from the very source of living beings.
With the diffusion of this blood-colored power, it gradually enveloped all the flesh and blood.
In an instant, the speed of reassembly abruptly accelerated!
Not only that.
In this process, a faint golden flame instinctively blossomed, gently scorching every newly formed part of the body.
Under this scorching, the newborn pieces of flesh did not char black; instead, they faintly took on an ethereal, transcendent aura.
However, the golden flame was simply too feeble.
As it burned bit by bit, the golden flame grew ever fainter, finally revealing a shivering azure fire tree.
Just as the golden flame was about to be utterly extinguished, the azure fire tree stirred slightly, its myriad branches enveloping a single golden mote of light and swallowing it whole.
"Nirvana!"
A familiar voice echoed in the hearts of the two beasts, reverberating like thunder throughout the hall.
At this command, countless fragments of flesh and bone abruptly snapped together as one.
Amid the swirling blood light, a naked, powerfully built figure gradually emerged within the hall.
At the same time.
The cauldron sitting nearby seemed to sense something and began to tremble.
Luo Chen, having completed the physical nirvana of his body, remained seated cross-legged on the floor, his eyes tightly shut, not opening them for a long time.
A violent, turbulent power suppressed to the extreme was stirring restlessly inside his body.
Suddenly!
The massive cauldron rose from the floor and shot straight toward the ceiling!
It looked as if it were trying to flee from Luo Chen, who was currently radiating a formidable aura.
It was the lingering impact of the battle between Heaven Refining Demon Lord and Monarch Qixia!
Luo Chen had completed the physical nirvana right in front of the Heaven Refining Cauldron using Monarch Qixia's cultivation art; how could the remnant artifact spirit's consciousness tolerate such a thing?
Even if it disregarded the Demon Lord's inheritance, it would never allow Luo Chen to claim it.
However, in doing so, the power sealing that grey light was dispersed.
With a thunderous boom.
The Heaven Refining Cauldron broke through the hall and rocketed into the sky.
Outside.
Moon Hermit was the first to act. A white jade plate appeared in her hand, casting down toward the black cauldron.
On Cloud Sea Square, Feiyunzi looked delighted.
"A spirit treasure!"
Without hesitation, he flew toward the Heaven Refining Cauldron while tossing out a net-like magic treasure, trying to capture the black cauldron.
The others, except for Blood Hermit who was busy devouring Blood Nightmare Moluo's power, also sprang into action.
However!
"Something's wrong!"
Moon Hermit's expression shifted slightly. In her mind, the artifact spirit of the spirit treasure Myriad Beasts Diagram sounded an alarm.
She instinctively backed away.
She even abandoned the white jade plate without looking back.
The others were a beat slower to react.
A world-shaking detonation rang out!
*Boom!*
Under the watchful eyes of the crowd, above the Fourteen Palaces of Mingzhao.
The battered black cauldron exploded!
The Heaven Refining Cauldron, once a Heavenly Spirit Treasure, no matter how dilapidated, no matter that no one was driving it, still unleashed unparalleled might when it shattered.
The immense explosion formed an unrivaled storm of origin qi, sweeping across Mingzhao Heaven!
"I can no longer protect you," the black-robed Nascent Soul muttered, retreating madly, abandoning Cave Master Moyun entirely.
Leaving him to be pulverized into dust by the storm.
Haijiao Tianmu panicked. Not only did she summon a massive turtle-shell shield, but she also revealed her true form to forcibly withstand the terrifying storm.
Feiyunzi, having charged the fastest, took the brunt of the impact. His net magic treasure shattered instantly, sending countless shards flying back at him.
His eyes went mad. He spat out a round pearl that enveloped him.
Yet that pearl, too, shattered inch by inch in the storm.
"This is a treasure I painstakingly acquired from the Artifact Realm, on par with a spirit treasure!"
Amid boundless heartache, he continuously unleashed the treasures he had accumulated over the years, desperately trying to survive this horrific storm.
On the square.
Blood Hermit frowned, forced to abruptly interrupt his actions.
Beneath him, Blood Nightmare Moluo, having gained a moment to catch his breath, gripped the God-Slashing Blood Sword with one hand.
"Piss off!"
Then, he unleashed all the remaining power of the Blood Sea Patriarch.
The other two made their moves as well.
Fairy Feileng unfurled a scroll painting—a portrait depicting a woman's profile.
Daoist Jiyuan summoned the paramount treasure he had brought from his sect for this journey to defend himself.
In short, before the terrifying storm whipped up by the spirit treasure's explosion, everyone fought with all their might to preserve their own lives.
Meanwhile, at the very epicenter of the blast, in the Alchemy Hall beneath the black cauldron:
Formations activated on their own, layers of spiritual light enveloping the structure.
Yet under the sweeping storm, these defensive formations were shattering layer upon layer.
Amid the boundless surge, Tianxuan flapped the Nine Winds Plantain Fan with all her might, trying to carve out a pocket of safety for Luo Chen.
Yet before that vast might, such an effort was like trying to stem a tide with a twig.
Just then.
A dark shadow darted forward from behind.
"Black King, what are you doing?!" Tianxuan's eyes nearly split with fury as she watched Black King charge toward Luo Chen.
Ignoring her attempt to stop him, he opened his bloody maw and swallowed Luo Chen, who had barely reassembled his body, in a single gulp, then swept his tail to fling Tianxuan into a corner by a pillar of the hall.
Then, Black King glared toward the heavens, letting out an enraged roar.
Only, that dragon roar, which once could have shaken heaven and earth, sounded completely silent amidst the booming storm.
A long while later.
The storm gradually died down.
Of the Fourteen Palaces of Mingzhao, only thirteen remained suspended in the void like stars.
The Alchemy Hall, which had previously radiated dazzling brilliance, was now a ruin of broken walls. The tall purple jade pillars had collapsed, and precious rubble floated like fine sand upon the vast cloud sea, trickling down with every gentle gust of wind.
*Crunch!*
The sound of footsteps echoed.
In a corner of the ruined hall, Tianxuan lay in her true form, her disheveled azure feathers soaked in terrifying blood.
Utterly weak, she forced her eyes open, and a figure was reflected in her pupils.
"Mas... Master?"
"Mm."
With a soft hum, Luo Chen took the Xuanchen Armor from her hands and donned it, then looked back at the pitiful black flood dragon curled on the ground.
That colossal body that had once measured nearly a hundred zhang was now less than a tenth of its former size.
A demon core faintly gleamed with pale light through a jagged hole in its flesh.
"You two worked hard."
Luo Chen formed an incantation gesture, storing the heavily injured Tianxuan and the black flood dragon—whose life and death hung in the balance—into his spirit beast pouch.
Then, his calm gaze turned toward the sky.
Up there, a streak of grey light wandered quietly through the clouds.
Another stumbling figure was pushing upstream against the turbulent currents, hurtling toward the grey light.
"Hmph!"
With a cold snort, Luo Chen stomped against the floor of the hall.
Instantly, an explosive boom rang out!
Under this stomp, the already teetering Alchemy Hall collapsed completely.
Yet Luo Chen's figure arrived first despite moving second, crossing hundreds of zhang to appear directly in front of the grey light that had been sealed by the Heaven Refining Cauldron's artifact spirit.
Turning around, he threw a punch!
Mountain Cleaving Stance!
With just a single blow, the approaching figure flew backward at an even greater speed.
Luo Chen's eyes were cold and sharp as he quietly gazed at the grey light before him.
"This belongs to me!"
Chapter 698