Battle Begins: Who Gave You the Courage?

Above the vault of heaven, that figure stood proudly, looking down on all creation with supreme arrogance. Faint specks of starlight tumbled from the sky. Heaven and earth seemed to weep as an inexplicable rain of blood fell. "The weak possess no qualification to resist! "Death alone is your proper destination!" Great Sage Blood Sun was insufferably imperious, her eyes overflowing with disdain and desire. Her gaze locked onto the north, and her tongue swept across her lips in a sudden flick, as if staring at an exquisite delicacy. *The Devouring Primordial Physique... If I obtain it and combine it with this innate world, to what height could I grow?* It was unimaginable! "Submit to me, and I shall make you my consort!" Great Sage Blood Sun's gaze pierced across ten thousand li, falling upon Origin Celestial Venerable in Feiwu City. A helpless expression appeared on Qi Yuan's face. "Don't you know that interrupting someone while they're eating at a funeral banquet is terribly unethical? "You're showing far too little respect for the dead. Watch out, or Venerable Milun might crawl out of the netherworld to take revenge on you!" Having visualized the Three Pure Ones and acquired the Devouring Primordial Physique, Qi Yuan had reached a terrifyingly formidable state of strength. Ordinary Mythologicals could be wiped out with a casual wave of his hand. The moment he spoke, his voice reverberated across the four seas and eight wildernesses. Every inhabitant of the Mortal Heart Realm heard the words of the legendary Origin Celestial Venerable. Hope sprouted in their hearts—hope that Origin Celestial Venerable could slay that horrifying figure perched high in the firmament! Even so, they knew such hope was an extravagant wish. At that moment, the devouring body of Great Sage Blood Sun swept her gaze toward Feiwu City. Every Ancient God was reflected in her eyes. A flicker of emotion and astonishment flashed across her gaze. In ten thousand years, this was the first time she had been shaken like this. Because those Ancient Gods... every single one of them appeared to possess boundless prospects. Not only that, but every Mythological seemed capable of suppressing her when she had been at the Mythological realm! She was a favored daughter of heaven, a deity who had stepped into the Yang God realm! Yet what was she witnessing here? Her body could not help trembling before giving way to ecstasy. "Haha! The Devouring Primordial Physique... All of it is mine! "These Ancient Gods shall all become my nourishment! "The gods you have visualized shall all serve me!" She naturally assumed that Qi Yuan had achieved all of this by relying on the Devouring Primordial Physique. Only the Devouring Primordial Physique could explain it! "A mere clone dares to spout such wild talk!" What Qi Yuan faced was merely an avatar of Great Sage Blood Sun. Back then, the Holy Mother of Inedia had only confronted a projection of an avatar. "This is my past body!" Great Sage Blood Sun flared with wrath. To become a Yang God through the Seven Steps of Sky Treading, one had to complete all seven steps, sever their past body, and achieve their present body! A newly ascended Yang God's past body was inferior to their true Yang God self, yet it remained at the pinnacle of the Mythological realm, capable of obliterating a Mythological in the snap of a finger. Great Sage Blood Sun's past body was more than enough to suppress the entire Mortal Heart Realm. Not to mention, it had already devoured the Heavenly Dao. There might be many Mythologicals before her, but given enough time, Great Sage Blood Sun could slaughter them all! After all, a Yang God's past body was not something mere Mythologicals could compare to. "And here I thought it was an avatar. Turns out it's just a dead person!" Wasn't a past body essentially a dead person? As Qi Yuan's words rang out, he struck, and the profound mysteries of the Three Pure Ones erupted. "Courting death!" Great Sage Blood Sun's past body flew into a furious rage. A mere Mythological dared show her disrespect! She opened her mouth, and her colossal jaws split continuously until they tore back to her ears. Immediately after... Nothing remained across the entire sky except a gaping, bloody maw. "I will swallow you whole to complete myself!" The bloody maw snapped shut violently, as though blanketing heaven and earth entirely. The world plunged into darkness. All Qi Yuan saw was endless black. Surprise flickered in his eyes. "Daring to swallow even the Three Pure Ones... who gave you the courage?" The true essence of the Three Pure Ones erupted fully at this moment! The Dao produced One, One produced Two, and Two produced Three! Behind Qi Yuan, three horrifying phantoms manifested one after another. Dense, majestic auras of the Primordial, Chaos, and Xuanhuang swept across the realm. The Mortal Heart Realm trembled. It was a primal terror and awe directed at a higher plane of existence. They seemed to sit enthroned in the past, the present, and the future. These three were none other than the gods Qi Yuan had visualized: Yuanshi Celestial Venerable, Lingbao Celestial Venerable, and Daode Celestial Venerable. The supreme deities of Daoism! As recorded in the *Classic of the Great True*: From the Great Luo arose the three energies of Xuan, Yuan, and Shi, transforming into the Three Pure Heavens. Formed from the Shi Qi was the Jade Pure Realm of Pure Subtlety Heaven; Formed from the Yuan Qi was the Upper Pure Realm of Yu Yu Heaven; Formed from the Xuan Qi was the Supreme Pure Realm of Great Crimson Heaven. Just as the adage went: One Qi transforms into the Three Pure Ones! "Break!" Qi Yuan reached out, making a fierce grasping motion toward the pitch-black, murky sky. The three phantoms behind him extended their hands at the very same instant. The three energies of Shi, Xuan, and Yuan seemed to arrive from the beginning of eternity. Instantly, the three energies wound around Qi Yuan's palm. In that breath, heaven and earth abruptly blazed with radiance! All darkness was driven away. Qi Yuan caught sight of a streak of bloody light as a fissure split open in the dark, and light from the firmament poured down through the gap, landing squarely in Qi Yuan's palm. The illumination fell upon Qi Yuan's face, making him look exceptionally heroic, like a heavenly god. The bloody light expanded, and the fissure widened wildly—it was not simply tearing open, but being propped apart by sheer force. "No!" Accompanied by a miserable shriek, Great Sage Blood Sun's past body... detonated with a thunderous roar! "How is this possible? What is that?!" Before the explosion, the eyes of Great Sage Blood Sun's past body had been glued in terror to the three phantoms behind Qi Yuan. She could not comprehend what manner of existences they were! She was already a Yang God, yet when her past body merely tried to swallow their phantoms, it was annihilated in an instant! "Is that all?" Qi Yuan's figure appeared high in the heavens as he called out loudly, "Even if Fish Leong gave you courage, it wouldn't do you any good!" Even without relying on the phantoms of the Three Pure Ones, he could have effortlessly slain this past body! Every god fell into stunned, terrified silence. A Yang God's past body had been burst apart from within by Origin Celestial Venerable! "Victory to the Celestial Venerable!" "All hail the mighty Celestial Venerable!" Within Feiwu City, several thousand deities shouted in unison. After all, the first clash had concluded with Origin Celestial Venerable's total victory. Yet right at that moment, a hysterical voice rang out. "You destroyed my past body and wasted a hundred thousand years of my time! Your crimes are unforgivable!" This voice was more than a hundred times more terrifying than Great Sage Blood Sun's earlier voice. Everyone involuntarily raised their heads toward the vault of heaven. The sky had cracked open! Above the canopy of heaven, a pale hand reached out and ripped a gash across the sky. A gigantic pupil peered through the breach, gazing down into the Mortal Heart Realm. What could be seen through that breach was less than one ten-thousandth of the pupil. What kind of eye was that? Vast, bottomless, and filled with a dense swarm of compound eyes. As the tear grew wider, more and more of the pupil was exposed to everyone's sight. The pupil seemed boundless; even if the entire sky of the Mortal Heart Realm were stripped away, one still would not be able to behold the whole thing. A single pupil was larger than the entire Mortal Heart Realm! That eye locked onto Qi Yuan. In an instant, Qi Yuan felt countless invisible hands reach out from the unseen corners of the world, gripping his body tightly! *Is this a Yang God?* Qi Yuan's gaze grew heavier than it had ever been. The scalps of all the Ancient Gods of the Mortal Heart Realm went numb; they did not dare look directly into that eye. "Its... its eye is larger than the entire Mortal Heart Realm!" "How could an existence above True God be this strong?!" "How... how can we even fight this?!" The Mortal Heart Realm was an innate world, and its strongest native beings were Mythologicals at the Seven Steps of Sky Treading. As for the realm above True God, there were no records of it whatsoever! Otherwise, the strongest in the Mortal Heart Realm would not have been True Gods, but Yin Gods! The gods of the Mortal Heart Realm had once theorized how powerful an existence above True God might be. Back then, the Holy Mother of Inedia had held off a clone of an existence above True God for twenty breaths. Thus, the Mythological Plan had seemed somewhat feasible—having a Mythological step forward to draw the entity's attention while the seeds of hope escaped. Yet now that a massive breach had been torn in the sky, they finally saw what a Yang God truly was. A Yang God's eye alone seemed larger than the Mortal Heart Realm! How could anyone fight such a horrifying entity? How could anyone possibly win?! Though rumors claimed that a Yang God could swallow stars, the Mortal Heart Realm was an isolated, enclosed world, so they had no concept of how massive a star truly was. Fear gripped the hearts of all the inhabitants of the Mortal Heart Realm, and their will to fight vanished. Who wouldn't be terrified before such a spectacle? Qi Yuan, however, remained relatively calm. A powerful aura surged around him, and the unseen chains binding him snapped simultaneously. From beyond the breach, a vast voice boomed. "Do you dare come out and fight?!" Great Sage Blood Sun roared. Her true body could not squeeze into the Mortal Heart Realm, for doing so would shatter the world itself. She had not finished devouring the Heavenly Dao; the Mortal Heart Realm could not be destroyed just yet. Qi Yuan's expression remained tranquil, even aloof. "Why wouldn't I dare?" Facing an enemy like this, there was nowhere to run! In that case... there was only a fight to the death! Within Feiwu City, fighting intent surged in every Ancient God. "I am willing to follow the Celestial Venerable to slay this evil god!" Great Venerable Shenlei roared, shaking heaven and earth! "I am willing to fight!" Ancient God Wangsong bellowed, his expression ferocious! "I dare to fight!" Shi Chongshan's voice was as heavy as mountain ranges. "We are willing to die for the Celestial Venerable!" These were not empty words; they were the solemn pledges of Ancient Gods. If heaven collapsed, the world fell, and the Mythologicals perished, Origin Celestial Venerable was their only hope. How could these Ancient Gods ever abandon their sole hope?! "Fight!" "Fight!" "Fight!" Their voices rose like thunder and roared like tidal waves. Nearly five thousand Great Venerables roared, their combined might eclipsing a million heavenly soldiers. The entire Mortal Heart Realm echoed with their cries! Not a single one shrank from battle! Even though they faced a Yang God—a Yang God capable of swallowing the entire Mortal Heart Realm alive. At this moment, none of Qi Yuan's people hesitated. Every single one soared into the sky! Among nearly five thousand innate deities, not a single one was below the Great Venerable level. They followed closely behind Qi Yuan, charging fearlessly toward that rift in the firmament. With an expression as deep as the sea, Qi Yuan slipped through the breach in the sky, appearing within the boundless chaos outside. Behind him, the five thousand Great Venerables radiated terrifying auras, every one of them regarding death as nothing and ready to battle a Yang God. Each of these Great Venerables would be considered an apex expert in any ordinary world. Furthermore, given enough time, every single one of them had the potential to step into the Yang God realm. Such was the terrifying nature of innate beings, and the terrifying nature of the gods Qi Yuan visualized! At this moment, Qi Yuan looked at the horrifying entity in the distance. He could not see where it began or ended with a single glance. It was boundlessly vast, as gigantic as a star. And there was not just one such entity—there were two! How could one fight opponents like these? Yet Qi Yuan's eyes remained extraordinarily calm as he said coldly, "Back in Foundation Establishment, I dared to swallow a star! "Now that I'm at the consummation of the Origin Core realm, what does slaying two evil gods matter?"