“Haa... haa...”
Within the boundless sea, a lone figure stood upright, rising and falling with the surging waves.
His mouth hung slightly open, gasping for breath in deep, ragged gulps.
His originally handsome face now looked thoroughly ferocious.
What looked even more grotesque and ghastly were the dense thicket of wounds all over his body.
From neck and shoulders to arms, waist, belly, thighs, joints, and finger bones, wounds large and small covered him from head to toe, flesh mangled and upturned as blood poured incessantly.
To Luo Chen, this was profoundly unbelievable.
With source power in his body, even when half his physical form had once been obliterated in a single strike by the Nether Earth Dragon, he had been able to consume most of his source power to reconstruct it swiftly.
For his injuries to linger unhealed for so long as they did now, there were only two possibilities.
One was that he had depleted his source power excessively, leaving him unable to mend so many wounds in time.
The other was that the opponent’s attacks carried some unique attribute, rendering the wounds exceptionally difficult to regenerate.
And both conditions were plaguing Luo Chen simultaneously at this very moment.
*She is even stronger than I imagined!*
Luo Chen took a deep breath, pursed his lips tightly, and fixed his already activated Scarlet Eyes and Golden Pupils on his surroundings with unwavering focus.
Through their relentless exchanges, Luo Chen had gradually pieced together the nature of Qingshuang’s body cultivation.
Like him, she was not an orthodox body cultivator, having never taken the path of qi and blood transformations.
Yet unlike his method of consuming vast quantities of external resources and converting them into boundless physical might, Qingshuang’s body cultivation derived its strength from her true form!
Her true form was the divine bird of celestial legends—a qingluan!
Unlike ordinary demon beasts that focused exclusively on qi refinement after taking human form, Qingshuang had not abandoned her physical advantages. While refining qi and comprehending spatial laws, she simultaneously tempered her physique, forging her already incomparably mighty body until it was like an unexampled divine weapon.
As a result, she could command magic power through physical flesh alone. A plain punch or an ordinary kick, when unleashed by her, hit with the devastating power of divine abilities and magic arts, sweeping away all before her.
Deceptively devoid of flourish, she subdued all finesse with sheer, overwhelming force!
Had Luo Chen not mastered dozens of techniques and possessed an endless array of methods, he never would have withstood her successive unadorned strikes.
*She truly deserves her reputation as the foremost beneath the Soul Formation stage!*
Even as praise flickered through his mind, golden light gleamed in Luo Chen's eyes.
The Yuantu Sword held behind his back instantly shifted into brilliant sword light, dividing into five distinct beams that stabbed out simultaneously in five directions: above, below, left, right, and straight ahead.
*Pfft!*
*Pfft!*
*Pfft!*
*Pfft!*
Four phantom-shattering sounds rang out in rapid succession.
Yet the sword tip of the final, substantive strike collided directly with a slender palm.
*Clang!*
Even though her divine technique of spatial evasion had been seen through multiple times by Luo Chen, and even though the void afterimage method she had refined during combat was dispelled as well, Qingshuang still could not conceal the astonishment on her face.
Gripping the Yuantu Sword with one hand, she leaned sideways to close the distance and struck toward Luo Chen’s skull with her other palm.
Meeting those Scarlet Eyes and Golden Pupils with her limpid autumn-water eyes, Qingshuang showed a thoughtful look.
*Is it those eyes?*
Her left hand shifted from an open palm strike, curling two fingers into talons poised to gouge.
Luo Chen flattened his waist and belly, performing a maneuver akin to a mortal iron bridge posture, while the Yuantu Sword spun frantically in his hand under the surge of source power.
*Buzz—!*
The extreme rotational force was impossible to hold.
Wincing in pain, Qingshuang was forced to release the razor-sharp Yuantu Sword, her left claw only managing to tear away two strips of muscle from Luo Chen’s body as he broke free.
“Phew...”
Exhaling a breath of turbid air and glancing at the bone-deep gash on his forearm, Luo Chen experienced a sudden flash of insight. He abruptly understood why she had been able to pinpoint his true form despite having a weaker divine soul foundation than his, bypassing his soul art Devils and Gods Disperse entirely.
*It's qi induction!*
Luo Chen was actually no stranger to this concept.
Wang Yuan had once known how to use it.
The so-called qi induction meant the spirit moving with intent, and intent manifesting through qi.
Every living creature radiated an external aura of qi!
Unless one's mastery over their body reached absolute perfection—a state of flawless containment where nothing leaked—they could not mask their qi aura.
An accomplished martial artist, even without divine sense, merely needed to extend their own qi aura within a certain radius to perceive any foreign qi aura distinct from their own.
Such a method did not require a particularly formidable divine soul foundation; one only needed to compare the perceived foreign qi against their own aura to react with ease.
Luo Chen had not expected that Qingshuang, an unorthodox body cultivator, would possess this trick as well.
And it happened to counter his Devils and Gods Disperse perfectly.
After all, Luo Chen had not achieved the Flawless Golden Body and could not entirely seal off every trace of his qi.
*In that case, maintaining this soul art is just an unnecessary burden.*
With a single thought, Luo Chen dispersed the layers of illusions surrounding him. When he struck out again, he no longer pursued delicate agility, but transitioned instead to bold, sweeping attacks.
Seeing this, Qingshuang grasped his intention.
With her divine technique of spatial evasion exposed and the battle taking place on the edge of the Yellow Springs Sea, many of her methods were constrained. Thus, she tacitly met him in a head-on clash.
*Crack! Crackle! Clang! Clatter!*
Punches, palms, kicks, shifting fingers and claws, slashing swords, and flashing silver fists.
Fighting in sweeping, brutal arcs, they exchanged wounds in the purest test of endurance.
The drain on their respective reserves grew increasingly swift.
After another violent headbutt, the two staggered apart. Blood poured down their foreheads, leaving them looking battered and disheveled.
This time, neither rushed back into combat, choosing instead to stand in place and recover their breath.
For two combatants possessing source power as vast as Luo Chen's and magic power as fierce as Qingshuang's to actively seek a moment to recover showed just how draining this battle truly was.
Yet as they caught their breath, the battle atop Broken Soul Cliff reached an extreme pitch.
The grand formation enclosing the eight-hundred-li Soul Island trembled violently, its radiance fluttering unstably.
Boundless spiritual light expanded and surged in all directions at an unimaginable speed.
In the next instant—
*Skre—!*
A world-shaking phoenix cry resonated across heaven and earth.
A fiery-red silhouette leaped out of the grand formation and brought a palm down behind her.
*Boom!*
The grand formation, already strained past its breaking point, collapsed with a thunderous crash.
Not only that, but the shockwave of the formation's collapse tore through all six combatants engaged in battle.
Monarch Qixia suffered the brunt of the backlash. Her previous peerless dominance had vanished; she now staggered through midair, appearing thoroughly disheveled.
Yet despite taking the heaviest impact, her profound foundation carried her through it.
The Five Elders of Tianyuan fared far worse.
Sovereign Chunyuan, who had been constantly pinning her down, suddenly ignited without warning, letting out a bloodcurdling scream.
“Junior Sister!”
“Senior Sister!”
Desperate shouts erupted from Mo Shouzhuo and the others, but they were powerless to help.
In merely a breath, Chunyuan's physical form was reduced to ashes.
A Primordial Spirit matching her original proportions fled outward in sheer panic.
Yet the golden flames clung to it like a shadow, granting her no room to escape.
Standing in the void, an elegant and noble figure looked down upon the scene, wiped the blood from the corner of her lips, and flashed a savage smile.
“To force me to detonate my spirit treasure, the Myriad Beasts Chart... you have earned the right to be proud.”
“Now, prepare to die!”
As she spoke, she raised both hands.
*Whoosh!*
A golden-red phantom of a phoenix manifested behind her, standing thousands of zhang tall, exerting a suffocating pressure over Broken Soul Cliff.
In the distance...
Catching sight of it from the corner of his eye, Luo Chen was profoundly shaken.
He had seen this phantom once before during the great battle in Mingyuan.
Back then, he had not understood what this phoenix phantom signified, mistaking it for a mere magic art or divine ability.
Only after witnessing Divine Lord Youli's ascension not long ago did he finally realize what it was.
A virtual idol!
Otherwise known as a dharma idol!
Moreover, Monarch Qixia's dharma idol was even more tangible than Divine Lord Youli's, almost indistinguishable from a flesh-and-blood entity.
The moment the phoenix dharma idol emerged—
Heaven and earth changed color; mountains and seas shook.
The already tumultuous Yellow Springs Sea turned even more violent.
As if provoked, boundless waves crashed in from the distance, rearing upward thousands of zhang into the sky and surging straight toward Monarch Qixia's phoenix dharma idol.
Caught within the Yellow Springs Sea, Luo Chen and Qingshuang instantly lost control of their bodies, swallowed whole by the colossal waves.
Divine fire erupted, and azure light flickered, but beneath wave after crushing wave, the two figures seemed so minuscule that they could not struggle at all.
Confronted by this backlash from the Yellow Springs Sea, Monarch Qixia's surprise quickly gave way to fury.
“Vile beast, even you dare oppose this seat?!”
The phoenix dharma idol let out a piercing shriek and took flight. As its wings beat, immeasurable Nirvana Holy Fire rained down, its long tail feathers carving an empty void across the sky.
Wherever it passed, the waves of the Yellow Springs Sea evaporated completely.
Below, the surviving elders of Tianyuan saw that the opportunity had arrived and unleashed their divine abilities toward Monarch Qixia in unison.
Monarch Qixia's eyes blazed with divine radiance, her voice booming like thunder.
“Insignificant ants, you dare think you can fish in troubled waters?!”
She swooped downward, fearless as she took on four adversaries at once.
Yet her enemies were not limited to the Five Elders of Tianyuan and the waves of the Yellow Springs Sea.
Broken Soul Cliff, which had stood towering and immovable for tens of millions of years, began to tremble violently as well.
A flesh doll was cast out.
Spectral light rippled outward, instantly enveloping the corpse of Ghost Immortal Tower that had been washed down to the cliff base.
The blank-eyed flesh doll returned to the body once more.
In an instant—
Two clusters of ghost fire flared up within its hollow eye sockets.
The colossal Ghost Immortal Tower swept across the land and sea, turning traitor mid-battle to charge straight at Monarch Qixia.
Locked in a fierce clash, Monarch Qixia snapped her head around and thrust a palm across the void toward Ghost Immortal Tower, blasting a terrifying hole directly through its midriff.
“Useless trash, you dare... Wait, it isn't you!”
Monarch Qixia froze. Watching Ghost Immortal Tower continue charging without slowing in the slightest, her gaze fell upon the solitary thousand-zhang cliff beneath her feet.
In a flash, someone as intelligent as her saw straight through the scheme of the Five Elders of Tianyuan.
The true killing move was never the coalition of the Five Elders, but rather this apex Great Desolate of the Mountain Sea Realm, said to be born ignorant and dull-witted.
The Diaohun Desolate!
The so-called Yellow Springs Sea was not a sea at all.
It was the creature's manifest dharma idol, which was why it could temporarily hold down her own dharma idol.
And now, it had detached a portion of its consciousness to commandeer Ghost Immortal Tower’s body to battle her.
In this manner, Monarch Qixia, already riddled with wounds, had to face not only the siege of the Five Elders of Tianyuan, but also the suppression of the Mountain Sea Realm's supreme desolate beast. Her situation became perilous in an instant.
Yet who was Monarch Qixia?
A phoenix, lord of all feathered kin, emperor of myriad demons!
Upon her face, exquisite and radiant as a peony, an uncharacteristic fervor emerged.
“Come then, come!”
“Let this seat see what you can do to me!”
“Even if the Mountain Sea Realm is exhausted, I can still achieve nirvana and be reborn. Today, every last one of you shall go to hell with me!”
*Boom!*
Boundless golden flames erupted wildly around her as the epicenter.
Every place they touched turned into an ocean of fire!
It vowed to incinerate the world and burn all creation to ash.
……
Across a continent erupting with endless magma, streaks of fleeing light darted back and forth.
Whenever a figure looked down upon the ruined landscape below, their eyes were filled with sorrow and rage.
Yet beneath that grief and fury lay an unmistakable terror.
This landmass was the Central Plains, yet it was not the Central Plains.
Strictly speaking, it was merely a southern remnant of what had once been the Central Plains.
After that cataclysmic, world-destroying war, the colossal Central Plains had shattered into five distinct continents of varying sizes.
During that great collapse of the Central Plains, countless clans and great families had been reduced to ashes.
Renowned regions such as the Muting Grassland, the Upper Commandery, and the Lanyan Mountain Range had all plunged into the boundless deep sea.
And all of this was owed to that woman.
The demon phoenix, Monarch Qixia!
The Tianyuan Dao Sect would never rest until she was dead!
Of course, while every cultivator of the Dao Sect thought this way, precious few dared to act upon it.
After all, the demon phoenix’s might was not something they could challenge at present.
Their only choice was to clean up the ruins, cultivate diligently, and strive to reach the Soul Formation stage as soon as possible so they might stand against her.
“Yet with the Central Plains shattered and so many spiritual veins severed, do we even still have a chance of cultivating to the Soul Formation stage?” an older cultivator murmured in despair.
A visibly younger disciple beside him had not yet surrendered hope, speaking encouragingly instead. “Before the Sect Master and the others departed, they issued a summons. Sect cultivators scattered across the four continents are returning one after another. When the time comes, we will still have the chance to rally our forces and make a comeback.”
The elder shook his head, his face the color of dead ash.
“You do not understand. In the face of absolute individual might, numbers hold no meaning whatsoever.”
The young junior opened his mouth to argue, but the moment he looked toward the distant sea, his gaze filled with sudden dread.
His trembling hand pointed far into the distance.
“What is that?”
His senior abruptly turned his head, his pupils reflecting a vast expanse of muddy yellow.
The immeasurable Yellow Springs rushed from the south toward the west, grazing past a corner of what had once been the Central Plains.
Under this apocalyptic tsunami, the already battered continent proved as fragile as loose sand.
A solitary cliff rose high like a sharp sword, cleaving straight through the continental plate without a moment's pause.
By the time this unnamed fragment of the broken Central Plains sank beneath the ocean waves, the black, solitary cliff had become even darker and purer, ghost light swirling around it incessantly.
Suddenly—
*Skre—!*
A phoenix cry pierced the heavens as a golden-red figure attempted to break free from the Yellow Springs Sea.
Yet having absorbed replenishment, Broken Soul Cliff had no intention of letting her escape. Bolstered by spectral light, massive waves transformed into chains that dragged her back down.
The Yellow Springs Sea continued westward, grinding continents and mountains into dust wherever it passed.
No living being could escape the sweeping waves, each consumed and made part of the surge.
In the sky above, dark clouds gathered as thunder roared and lightning flashed, lingering for months on end.
Torrential rain poured relentlessly down, as though ancient gods and immortals had unleashed a great deluge to purge the world.
Only after a long time did the golden light within the Yellow Springs Sea fade into dimness, until it vanished entirely.
Only then did this moving ocean of yellow cease its rampage, gradually disappearing from the eyes of mortal men.
Along with it, that proud, solitary cliff sank into the depths of the sea.
……
A blazing, reddish-gold sun hung high above, resembling an overturned smelting furnace. The clouds had long been vaporized into pale shreds by the blistering heat, while the sky cracked in fissures extending to the edge of the horizon.
Waves of scorching heat distorted everything in the world beyond recognition.
Only the occasional shadow of a vulture wheeling across the sand lent this desolate realm a faint shred of life.
From a massive sand dune shaped like two hands pressed together in prayer, a sudden tremor echoed forth.
A vulture turned its eyes and swooped downward.
Yet before it could draw near, a strand of sword qi lancing from within shredded it into a cloud of blood mist.
Suddenly, the sand collapsed, and two figures shot into the sky, clashing fiercely before separating in an instant.
“Stop!” a man's hoarse voice called out, entirely devoid of its usual mellow calm.
Not far away, the battered woman in green wore a look of rare ferocity on her face.
“It can't be stopped!”
Forming a hand seal with two fingers, she held them before her pale, delicate lips and uttered a clear cry.
“Manifest!”
In the next instant, a piercing gale howled through the rolling heat waves.
A colossal azure bird beat its wings, slowly taking flight from the horizon. Even the scorching sun could not eclipse its dazzling azure radiance.
The man let out a sigh, yet not a shred of retreat showed in his eyes.
“The Yellow Springs Sea restricted you, but did it not restrict me just as much?”
He brought a palm down onto the earth, drawing the dense fire-attribute spiritual qi from all around toward him.
Chanting an incantation while forming hand seals, a fire phoenix soared into the air.
More than that, the man opened his mouth and spat out a wisp of golden flame, which wound itself around the fire phoenix.
Empowered by the golden flame, the fire phoenix took on an even more majestic presence, appearing virtually indistinguishable from a true phoenix.
Seeing this, the giant azure bird grew all the more enraged.
“Using the Nirvana Holy Fire taught to you by Sister to fight me... Luo Chen, you truly deserve to die!”
Chapter 979