Beat the Imperial Monarch to Death!

Xu Ying held a steamed bun in each hand, walking toward Emperor Changsheng as he ate. The buns steamed by Good-for-Nothing Qingxuan were soft, sweet, and fragrant with wheat. Xu Ying devoured one in two or three bites, craning his neck to swallow it down, before stuffing the last bun whole into his mouth and chewing voraciously. Darkness surged outward behind him like a billowing black mantle. Within the dark, jointed patterns fluttered, carrying waves of soul-seizing weeping. Towering forms of ancient gods loomed within the blackness, their oppressive presence mounting with every breath. With a loud splash, the Nine Great Treasures—the Twelve-Storyed Mansions, the Jasper Pool, the God Bridge, and the rest—soared up from the depths of the Heavenly Sea, sending cascades of water crashing down. The nine treasures returned behind Xu Ying, aligning in an arc suspended in the air from top to bottom. The Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler flew over, drifting into the Ruyi Great Luo Heaven hovering above Xu Ying's head. Yingzhou stood upright, shaped like an ouroboros ring, suspended between the Nine Great Treasures and the Great Luo Heaven—larger even than the Luo Heaven itself, and fathomless within. The white-robed Xu Ying and yellow-robed Xu Ying continued pushing the spectators back, shouting at the top of their lungs, "Everyone below Heavenly Monarch, leave the field immediately! Do not watch the battle under any circumstances!" The crowd surged back, though they did not take the warning to heart. The previous clash between Xu Ying and Emperor Changsheng had been fierce enough to blow many onlookers away to parts unknown, but those who remained were powerful enough and stood at an ample distance. Even if the one who had fought just now was merely an avatar of Xu Ying and the one stepping forward now was his true body, they figured he could not possibly be that much stronger. The slight retreat they made was only because of the shoving from the white-robed and yellow-robed Xu Yings. Just then, someone caught a faint sound drifting from the darkness behind Xu Ying. It sounded like the wind, yet also as if something were whispering within the gale, mingled with sorrowful weeping. Those who heard this bizarre sound suddenly found their Dao methods spiraling out of control, the Daos they cultivated rapidly unraveling. Dao backlashes followed immediately. On the spot, people spat blood, their primordial spirits disintegrating and their souls evaporating. Bystanders hurriedly grabbed them to flee, yet could not budge them in the slightest. The victims stood dazed where they were as their Daos rapidly disintegrated. Suddenly snapping their jaws wide, they too emitted that bizarre sound—this Dao Cry spread as easily as a plague. Pouring from their mouths, it infected in every direction. Those who heard the Dao Cry quickly fell prey as well: cultivations unraveled, primordial spirits collapsed, and even their flesh and blood began to decompose. Frozen in place, they opened their mouths one by one, releasing piercing wails. One infected ten, ten infected a hundred, a hundred infected a thousand. In an instant, chaos erupted on all sides. Seeing this, those further away fled for their lives. Only beings whose cultivation was profound enough to surpass Heavenly Monarchs—such as the Eight Emperors of the Nine Heavens, the Evil Golden Immortal, and their peers—remained where they were, unaffected by the Dao Cry. They had already attained Great Luo and possessed sufficiently deep cultivation. Beside them stood Ning Zhong. Xu Jing's own Dao fruit involuntarily emerged, radiating brilliant rays under the impact of the Dao Cry to keep it at bay. Yuan Qi's Diamond Bracelet was triggered by the Dao Cry, whirling midair as its radiant light shone down, shielding the people around him. Young Master Ningqing's Returning Dao Jade Plate also flew out in response, blocking a swathe of the Dao Cry. The Returning Dao Jade Plate and the Diamond Bracelet—one was a Supreme treasure, the other a Wonderful Realm treasure. The Dao Cry emitted by Xu Ying was merely an outward leak of aura, not intentionally directed at them, so these treasures could easily deflect it. As for Good-for-Nothing Qingxuan selling steamed buns by the ferry, he was completely unaffected by the Dao Cry, though many immortals gathered around him were shivering with terror at the eerie sight. Emperor Changsheng's face changed abruptly. The scene reminded him of an ancient legend—the Dao Cry. Emperor Taixiao's trembling voice confirmed his suspicion. Emperor Taixiao's face was ashen. Emperor Changsheng was too young to have experienced the Dao Cry, but Taixiao had lived through it six hundred thousand years ago. It was precisely the Dao Cry originating from the various great cave abysses that had destroyed the rule of the Ziwei Immortal Court and severed the reign of the Last Lord of Ziwei. It was also that Dao Cry that had shattered the deeply entrenched powers of the various ancestral courts. In the thousands of years following the catastrophe, one could still see rotting Heavenly Monarchs wandering among the mountains and rivers of the Ancestral Court, spreading the Dao Cry everywhere. Aside from those Heavenly Monarchs, one could also see decaying skeletons—stripped of flesh and blood, reduced to bare bones. They roamed by night, pillaging and hunting any living creature that could make a sound, becoming the nightmare of that era. In that cataclysm, the Old Dao disintegrated, countless perished, corpses piled into mountains, and blood flowed into rivers. Wherever one looked, desolation reigned. After all this time, Emperor Taixiao had never imagined he would encounter the Dao Cry again, nor hear that unfathomable, eerie sound. The world was on the brink of collapse; all manner of monsters and demons were emerging. Although he had survived that Dao Cry back then, the price had been devastating. His fellow disciples had all perished, his kin and friends were all buried, and he himself had narrowly escaped death several times. If not driven to desperation, who would have rebelled? It was precisely because he could not survive in that era that he had embarked on the path of overthrowing the Old Dao and embracing the New Dao. Now, hearing the Dao Cry once more, the fear deeply rooted in his memory surged to the surface. The other emperors felt the same. The destruction that the Dao Cry had inflicted upon the Ziwei Immortal Court had been far too great. In just a few short days, it had destroyed the foundation of an Immortal Court at the height of its prosperity, and its poison lingered for millennia, wiping out an entire era. Yet how could Xu Ying possess the Dao Cry? They were utterly bewildered. Emperor Changsheng, however, recalled something else. Back in the Wuzhuang Temple, the two Dao boys Qingfeng and Mingyue had fallen into a half-dead state. Though their physical bodies were preserved, their insides harbored a terrifying Dao Cry. Causing havoc in the temple, they had slaughtered the avatars and incarnations of Changsheng, the Eastern King, and others, inflicting heavy casualties. Back then, Changsheng had rushed over and obliterated Qingfeng and Mingyue with a single finger. From that moment on, he knew the Dao Cry had never truly vanished. In hidden corners of this world, the Dao Cry still lingered in bizarre ways. Could it be that Xu Ying had visited some secret realm and gathered some of the Dao Cry? No sooner had the thought crossed his mind than clouds and mist swirled behind Xu Ying, spreading out like wings to gather back the Dao Cry that had invaded the crowd's bodies. Having narrowly escaped death, the immortals were gripped by terror and fled in all directions, daring not linger to watch. The surroundings fell into a rare stillness, leaving only the surging darkness behind Xu Ying and the statuesque ancient gods standing motionless within it. Emperor Changsheng was filled with suspicion and dread; the spectacle sent a shiver of fear through him. Xu Ying's action demonstrated that he had neither merely found the Dao Cry in some hidden realm nor simply refined it to wield as a weapon. He had clearly comprehended the underlying principles of the Dao Cry and developed it into a divine ability! People always harbored an inexplicable terror toward the unknown. Although Emperor Changsheng held the exalted status of a Daluo Golden Immortal, he was not immune to such feelings. Yet in the next instant, that fear vanished from his heart. Whether the power Xu Ying commanded was the Dao Cry or not, it still required cultivation as a foundation and support. Beyond cultivation, it also required divine abilities as the vehicle. He had already verified Xu Ying's cultivation and divine abilities moments ago. While the green-robed Xu Ying had probed his strength, Changsheng had likewise fathomed Xu Ying's methods. Had that green-robed Xu Ying not deployed the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler earlier, he would not have lasted nearly so many exchanges—at most three moves before dying by Changsheng's hand. "Xu Ying, without the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler, you are nothing!" Emperor Changsheng sneered. He still harbored some wariness toward Xu Ying, unable to make sense of those bizarre jointed patterns and fearing that Xu Ying's true cultivation might rival his own, unleashing even greater power from the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler. "Tch." Xu Ying gave a soft scoff and put away the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler. Casually retrieving his Nine Great Treasures one by one, he stored them into his Realm of Xiyi. The white-robed Xu Ying and yellow-robed Xu Ying transformed into white and yellow streams of qi, whooshing back into his body. Emperor Changsheng's eyes lit up. *Still too young, falling for a cheap provocation,* he thought. With a low shout, the Dao wheel surfaced behind him, twelve rings spinning. Twelve external avatars flew out of the Dao wheel, brandishing Nether Purple Sabers as they charged Xu Ying in unison! At the same time, Emperor Changsheng gripped a plum branch, wielding it as a blade to charge directly ahead. Plum blossoms danced from its tip, forming resplendent Dao wheels. The move he unleashed was the exact technique he had used to slay the green-robed Xu Ying earlier: the Twelve Dao Scenes Plum Blossom Illustration! The plum blossoms and snow were pristine and exquisite, brimming with potent Dao rhymes. Within the Dao wheel behind him, the Extinction Immortal Array condensed into a massive saber that cleaved the sky and shattered the firmament, its might overwhelmingly ferocious and capable of wiping out everything in existence. The Extinction Immortal Array had originally been a killing move developed specifically against Undying True Spirits. Ostensibly created to deal with Xu Ying, its true target was Heavenly Venerable—and its ultimate objective was the Immortal Emperor Supreme. To achieve the Supreme Realm, the obstacles he needed to eliminate included not only Xu Ying and Heavenly Venerable, but also the Immortal Emperor Supreme himself. He had refined the array into a blade precisely to shatter the Undying True Spirit and Undying Primordial Spirit of a Supreme, sunder their Supreme physical body, and cleave through Supreme treasures and divine abilities! Yet just as the Nether Purple Sabers struck forth by his twelve external avatars drew near Xu Ying, an abrupt anomaly occurred! Those jointed patterns drifted out from the darkness behind Xu Ying like a swarm of insects emerging from mist, colliding with the Nether Purple Sabers. In an instant, that alien power drastically deteriorated! Xu Ying reached out with his bare palm to meet the Extinction Saber Qi hacking down from the Dao wheel. In the darkness, countless jointed patterns danced, parting to the left and right like two clouds of black qi that sprouted outward like dark wings, following Xu Ying's palms on either flank. They met the Extinction Saber Qi head-on! Boom! The power within their divine abilities detonated. Across the sea's surface, beams of extinction saber light and dark radiance surged in all directions, driving the Heavenly Sea to swell outward and obliterating everything in their path. Wherever the shockwave passed, undersea mountains and ancient ruins collapsed into rolling torrents. Xu Ying flipped in midair and slammed his palm downward—another deceptively simple martial divine ability. Yet the moment he flipped, an imagery never before seen in the Earth Immortal Realm burst before Emperor Changsheng's eyes. He saw the silhouette of the Earth Immortal Realm! Under Xu Ying's palm strike, countless Heavenly Dao runes surged, forming the exquisitely intricate silhouette of the Earth Immortal Realm in all its myriad majesty. Worlds like Yuanshou, Taichu, Taishi, Yongkang, Longxing, and Jianwu merged together, intersecting with the Immortal Realm and connecting with the Ancestral Court. Mount Kunlun, Mount Sumeru, the Heavenly River, the Heavenly Sea, and the divine bridge bridging the Realm of the Great Void all materialized in crystal clarity. Yet what horrified Emperor Changsheng most was that the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths were merely the tip of the iceberg of the Earth Immortal Realm! Xu Ying's palm print seemed to carry the majestic Dao authority of heaven and earth from the Earth Immortal Realm, crashing down upon him in crushing momentum. Yet Emperor Changsheng saw more than just the Earth Immortal Realm. Between Xu Ying's surging palm postures, long dragons soared like a river of spirit light, churning and surging—another realm more than twice as vast as the Earth Immortal Realm! This too was a seal technique—the second seal following the Earth Immortal Seal was already prepared! *His seal techniques are born of the Heavenly Dao; they have yet to reach the heights of the Immortal Dao!* Just as the thought flashed through Changsheng's mind, Xu Ying's Earth Immortal Seal crashed into his Twelve Dao Scenes Plum Blossom Illustration! Boom! The Heavenly Sea shook violently as the full power of their divine abilities erupted. The plum branch in Emperor Changsheng's hand blasted apart, its petals withering away. He dropped into a deep crouch, his hair bristling with rage, and bellowed, "Dao fruits, rise!" Within his bodhimanda, the two unripened Dao fruits on the plum tree suddenly soared, spinning rapidly. In an instant, the terrifying Dao power stored within the Dao fruits erupted! The bodhimanda flared with blinding radiance as countless Dao chains wove together into an intensely dense defense. Xu Ying raised his other hand, blasting the Human Realm Seal forward! The interwoven black-and-white spectacle formed by the Human Realm, the Human Heavenly Dao, and the Dark Heavenly Dao instantly blasted through Emperor Changsheng's layered bodhimanda defenses. The horrifying force crushed against Emperor Changsheng's body, hurling him backward. Emperor Changsheng's twelve external avatars were dragged along as well, trailing his hurtling body like twelve human kites flying backward. The initial shockwave of their clash had already whipped up monumental waves tens of thousands of feet high, rolling outward for thousands of li across the distant waters. But in the next instant, with a deafening crash, Emperor Changsheng's hurtling body pierced clean through the surging wall of water, splitting the great waves in two! His feet landed on the sea surface yet continued sliding backward at breakneck speed, hissing and churning as they plowed a deep trench across the waters, parting the sea to either side. By the time Emperor Changsheng steadied his stance and brought his twelve hurtling avatars to a halt, jointed patterns were embedded all throughout his bodhimanda. Those jointed patterns had even impaled the faces and bodies of his twelve avatars, and weeping akin to a woman's meaningless chanting seeped in through his sundered bodhimanda, ringing in his ears. Emperor Changsheng's heart sank as he instantly experienced the horror of the Dao Cry that had annihilated the ancient era six hundred thousand years ago. His own Grand Dao was actually beginning to unravel, and his cultivation was steadily tumbling! Even as a Daluo Golden Immortal, this was happening to him—one could easily imagine the sheer horror the people of that bygone era had endured. "Third move: Heavenly Immortal Seal!" Xu Ying's voice pierced his ears. Emperor Changsheng snapped his head up, only to see towering waves tens of thousands of feet high surging toward him at blinding speed. Such tidal waves were merely collateral damage from the aftershocks of their clash and could not harm him in the least. But in the next instant, the massive wave burst apart, and a higher world surpassing even the Earth Immortal Realm leaped into view! Xu Ying appeared, towering like an inescapable nightmare, enveloped in rolling darkness with monstrous ancient gods flanking him. "I will not be defeated!" Emperor Changsheng roared. Behind him, the Dao tree erupted with boundless light soaring into the heavens. The two Dao fruits spun around one another, and Dao flowers cascaded from the plum tree to meet Xu Ying's earth-shattering blow! Heavenly Immortal Seal! Not to mention the Heavenly Immortal Realm, even the Human Realm had long become stuff of legends. Emperor Changsheng had no idea how to counter it, let alone how to block it! He could only watch as this seal fell, crushing his Dao flowers until their petals withered and fell, shattering his Dao fruits until they burst into pulp! His Dao tree broke and collapsed, his Dao chains detonated, his Dao wheel was annihilated, and his external avatars turned to ash one after another! His Nether Purple Sabers snapped, and his Extinction Immortal Array was torn to shreds. Emperor Changsheng stood dazed and trembling, drenched in blood, staring wide-eyed at Xu Ying descending from the sky. He still tried to fight back, but the moment he raised his hand, Xu Ying seized him by the throat and bore down on him! Looking down from above, Xu Ying opened his mouth and unleashed a furious Dao Cry, pouring it straight into Changsheng's face and body! It was as if he were venting the bitter hatred of having his flesh carved and his bones flayed forty-eight thousand years ago, releasing all the humiliation endured across forty-eight thousand years! The Dao Cry surged into Changsheng's body, tearing through his flesh, ravaging his primordial spirit, destroying his Realm of Xiyi, and shattering his bodhimanda! This bone-deep hatred was finally unleashed to the full in the howling of the Dao Cry!