A black-and-red ocean had completely encircled Fengmang, reducing the fortress to an isolated island amid the tide of flame. Black-and-red flame demons had already breached the stronghold at multiple points, leaving the Strength Shamans no choice but to rely on scattered sections of the wall to fend off simultaneous assaults from within and without.
When that Desolate Shaman fled, Ronglong neither roared nor complained; he simply took on the three opponents meant for the deserter in silence.
All the remaining Strength Shamans and Desolate Shamans fought desperately—no complaints, no retreats, and no fear.
Wei Yuan’s ears took in every clash, roar, and agonized scream. Several dedicated avatars of Wei Yuan processed and analyzed the cacophony, extracting the critical details. Wei Yuan then swept his gaze across the ramparts, taking in the entire disposition of his Strength Shamans at a glance. Whenever the analysis identified someone in dire straits, he would instantly charge over to rescue them.
At this point, flame demons pressed in from every direction. Wei Yuan no longer needed to aim; a casual thrust of his spear was guaranteed to impale several of them. Yet the fiends were simply too numerous. Killing them by the handful like this—how long could it possibly take?
Just then, Mad Bull hewed his way out from the swarm of flame demons. In mere moments, his steel armor had already been soaked crimson with blood. Straining to reach Wei Yuan’s side, he yelled, "Boss! Killing them a few at a time like this—when will it ever end?!"
The battle had only just begun, yet even Mad Bull was starting to despair?
Though his own thoughts just moments earlier had mirrored Mad Bull’s completely, Wei Yuan let out a hearty laugh. "Ants can move mountains, and mayflies can shake the mightiest tree! We’ll keep killing them by the handful, year in and year out! No matter how many flame demons there are, there will come a day when every last one is slain!"
Sure enough, Mad Bull rallied, his killing intent surging anew. With one swing of his axe, he cleaved three flame demons in half, then looked back to ask, "Boss, what’s a mayfly?"
"A kind of Strength Shaman!"
"Sounds like a pretty name. Must look good! Pretty shamans really can't fight for shit."
Wei Yuan patted Mad Bull on the shoulder, motioning for him to follow close behind. Then he tore back and forth through the flame demons, regrouping the scattered Strength Shamans one by one. Every time he gathered a dozen or so, he would set off to rally the next band.
The stretch of wall defended by the three hundred Strength Shamans remained relatively stable, but the adjacent sectors told a different story. One by one, Strength Shamans were hurled from the ramparts, submerged beneath waves of flame demons in an instant, and torn to shreds alive.
Soon, the fallen could no longer be seen—only an expanding sphere of black and red, from which bloodcurdling shrieks incessantly rang out until falling abruptly silent.
The captains had already leapt down from the walls multiple times to mount rescues, but as more and more Strength Shamans were dragged over the edge, they could no longer save them all. One captain was gradually swallowed up after jumping down, wrapped within moments into another colossal black-and-red sphere.
Suddenly, an endless brilliance erupted from within the sphere, rapidly dissolving the flame demons in its radiance. In the blink of an eye, the massive ball melted into a pool of bloody water, but the captain was nowhere to be seen.
Not far from Wei Yuan, a sharp cry rang out. A Little Pretty Shaman’s arms faltered; a single downward swing of her axe failed to fell all the flame demons before her, and one seized her leg.
Instantly, the fiends latched onto one another to form a living ladder, dragging the Little Pretty Shaman down the wall! Fortunately, she was clad head to toe in steel armor, leaving the demons able only to tear at her hands and feet, wrenching prolonged screams of agony from her lips.
Without a second thought, several steel-armored Strength Shamans jumped down together. Given their strength, this was practically suicide. In contrast, Tianyu—who had secretly been on the verge of taking things further with the Little Pretty Shaman—hesitated and did not dare leap.
While the courage of those few Strength Shamans was commendable, their might fell short. The moment they landed, they were engulfed in heavy encirclement, unable to reach the Little Pretty Shaman at all and trapped themselves.
The two strongest shamans among the three hundred leapt into the swarm from different directions. But the flame demons were clearly paying closer attention to this sector; a large pack of far more powerful demons, their bodies nearly pitch-black, immediately swarmed in.
Yet the two shamans were inherently formidable and clad in heavy armor, moving like walking tanks. Every strike of their kinetic hammers smashed a dozen flame demons to pieces.
"Watch out!" Wei Yuan bellowed. His roar carried over a hundred feet, shaking the demons before him until they staggered.
One of the captain-level Strength Shamans started, turning toward Wei Yuan. But from his flank, a slender, pale pink thread shot through the air, piercing clean through his steel armor and his flesh alike!
The thread snapped taut, reeling the captain away in an instant across several thousand feet, dragging him before a flame demon more than ten times larger than the rest. The demon's torso suddenly split down the center, revealing a four-lobed maw lined with razor-sharp teeth—easily numbering well over a hundred thousand! In a single gulp, it swallowed the shaman captain whole!
Knowing there was no hope of survival, the captain’s body had already begun swelling the moment he was lifted from the ground, radiant beams piercing outward from his wounds!
A sharp pang pierced Wei Yuan’s heart. He knew that the captain had already detonated his internal organs, flesh, and dharma idol together into a blazing storm meant to annihilate everything around him. Even if he were rescued now, it would be useless; he was already dead.
Having swallowed the captain, the flame demon suddenly swelled several times its size. Yet it slowly contracted back to its original form, whereupon the gaping maw on its torso opened and spat out a clump of black ash mingled with teeth.
An indescribable feeling suddenly welled up within Wei Yuan.
He had actually remembered this captain quite clearly. The man was one of the two hundred Strength Shamans sent over later. By nature, he had been perceptive and calm, yet just like the other Strength Shamans, he was exceptionally prone to being moved and stirred to passion. Even though he had already reached the pinnacle of the Dharma Idol realm, he had still contributed top-tier karmic luck to Wei Yuan.
Regrettably, even the karmic luck reinforced by the Grand Beginning Dao Arts had failed to preserve his life. There were simply too many flame demons. Faced with such an overwhelming tide, the modest karmic luck of a single individual counted for very little—like a candle and a bonfire in a raging tempest, both doomed to last only a brief moment.
Now, Wei Yuan understood: this captain had not been foolish. He had genuinely resonated with Wei Yuan’s ideals from the bottom of his heart, and that was why he had offered his top-tier karmic luck.
Wei Yuan turned his head and locked his gaze onto the colossal flame demon several thousand feet away. This Scenery Command flame demon had originally been the opponent of a Desolate Shaman. But that Desolate Shaman was already covered in wounds, two of his thirteen arms severed at the root. Though he still fought to the death, he had lacked the strength to stop one of his adversaries from breaking away.
Noticing Wei Yuan, the giant demon opened the maw on its torso once more, spitting out a rounded object before catching it in its claw.
Wei Yuan recognized it—the captain’s charred skull.
Wei Yuan had only just raised a hand to stop it when the demon closed its claws. With a crisp snap, it crushed the skull to powder!
With a flick of its arm, the astral winds scouring the battlefield swept the handful of ash away in an instant, scattering it into the world of the Desolate Realm.
Within Wei Yuan’s consciousness, something slender and fragile seemed to abruptly shatter.
Only then did he realize that he did not even know that captain’s name, let alone the story of his life. Unlike Ronglong, who made an effort to remember every Strength Shaman’s tale, Wei Yuan had not memorized a single name among those two hundred.
Wei Yuan’s thinking at the time had been simple: if he did not learn their names or remember who they were, he would bear no attachments or karmic ties when he left. Even if he knew most of them would likely rest here forever, he would not grieve.
In just a few more days, Wei Yuan could have walked away from this place of strife altogether.
Why?!
Why...?
Wei Yuan’s consciousness gradually ascended, growing lofty and majestic. The voice of his thoughts seemed to resonate with heaven and earth: *Why must there always be things in this world that court death so blindly?*
Wei Yuan suddenly pointed a finger. The courtyard where he resided abruptly exploded, blasting skyward the numerous flame demons scavenging through the grounds. From the underground altar rose a spirit of black and red, formed purely of sacrificial power. The spirit lunged toward Wei Yuan, merging directly into his body.
Wei Yuan’s pupils instantly took on a black-and-red sheen. Without a single word, he leapt down from the fortress wall, advancing step by step toward that Scenery Command flame demon!
In days of old, ancient sages had measured the mortal realm with their own two feet; today, Wei Yuan would make a clumsy imitation, using the same method to measure the lives of flame demons and see just how many there truly were!
Upon this battlefield turned meat grinder, time had lost all meaning. Only the ceaseless consumption of life served as a measure.
After an unknown span, the space before Wei Yuan suddenly cleared. The Scenery Command flame demon stood right before him. Compared to this monstrous creature that rose a full hundred feet, Wei Yuan seemed as tiny as an ant.
The Scenery Command flame demon abruptly split open its maw. Wei Yuan instantly took root through both feet, merging as one with the earth. Yet no tongue shot from the demon's mouth, nor was there any suction; instead, it exhaled a gale laden with countless microscopic particles!
Caught in the wind, sparks burst relentlessly from Wei Yuan's body as his flesh turned withered and parched, flaking away in sheets. The armor forged of desolate steel was scored with countless scratches, vast swathes stripped away at the slightest brush of those particles. Deceptively harmless at a glance, the particles shaved through desolate steel like a knife through bean curd—evidently a formidable fiendish art.
When the foul wind ceased, the armor upon Wei Yuan had been stripped entirely bare, and his body was riddled with a thousand gouges and holes. In certain places, a full inch of flesh had been shorn away. Only the long spear in his grip remained as pristine as ever.
From its maw, the flame demon spat out a massive, transparent net that descended from above, trapping Wei Yuan in its center. Wei Yuan felt no sensation against his skin and could see no threads, yet his body felt glued to the earth. To lift his foot would feel like pulling up the entire world alongside it. Such crushing weight could no longer be described in mere thousands of jin.
Wei Yuan found it difficult even to raise a hand. The sensations coursing through him told him that he was not merely bound to the earth—his own body had grown extraordinarily heavy, magnified by several hundred times!
The flame demon spewed another blast of foul wind from its maw, stripping away more sheets of flesh from Wei Yuan. Yet from the places where the flesh had fallen away most, a burst of seven-colored rainbow light suddenly blazed forth!
Wei Yuan stared at the flame demon and said slowly, "Did you think stripping my armor would finish me? What I rely on has never been armor, but—"
He abruptly leapt into the air! The force he exerted was so tremendous that his flesh flew outward, exposing more and more of the seven-colored rainbow light.
Yet the power of this leap was like the dawn of a mighty star, utterly irresistible—surging upward and dragging the surrounding earth along with it!
When ten thousand feet of land all around had buckled upward by dozens of feet, the giant net finally buckled under the strain and shattered with a resounding crash.
Wei Yuan had become a dragon bursting forth from the abyss, soaring straight into the heavens!
He soared a hundred thousand feet high, then plunged toward the earth like a blazing meteor. His spear swept through a full arc, bringing it crashing down onto the Scenery Command flame demon’s head!
This strike possessed the weight of a mountain and the speed of light. Whether it bore an edge or not was now entirely the same.
A ten-thousand-foot crater violently gouged into the earth. Sweeping from head to foot, Wei Yuan’s spear cleaved the flame demon down the center before plunging into the ground.
This cleave extinguished all forms and emptiness, severing karma—as if the flame demon was always meant to be split in two, its soul always meant to be shattered, meant never to enter the cycle of reincarnation, and as if a colossal crater was always meant to be carved into the earth.
With a single spear strike unleashed, the Great Dao bestowed its name: Should Be Thus.
This was the second spear technique Wei Yuan had comprehended in his lifetime.
Wei Yuan stood with spear in hand, the flesh on his body entirely sloughed away to reveal a glorious, radiant Dharma body. With the broad back of a tiger and the slender waist of a wasp, it was hideous to the absolute extreme, yet pure to the absolute extreme.
Raising his spear to point at the slowly parting halves of the Scenery Command flame demon, Wei Yuan let his voice shake heaven and earth: "What I rely upon is my Dharma body alone!"
As if grasping his words yet not quite understanding, the flame demon’s parted eye-slits flickered with conflicting light before it collapsed into silence, extinguished.
Spear in hand, Wei Yuan plunged once more into the boundless sea of flame demons.
Across the Desolate Realm, within the endless ocean of black and red, bursts of seven-colored rainbow light erupted from time to time, soundlessly dissolving countless flame demons in their wake.
From the Desolate Shamans down to the Strength Shamans, all quietly turned toward another direction and fought on to the death, none looking at the burst of rainbow light. Yet every shaman felt their spirit soar like a rainbow, knowing that no matter how many were sacrificed, even if only a single shaman remained, this battle would end in victory.
Just like that spear descending from the heavens: Should Be Thus.
Chapter 914