"Kill!"
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
Boundless Sea of Flowers!
Upon the Heaven-Ascending Stairway, Qi Yuan gripped his sword, every insight from Zanghua now thoroughly his.
In an instant, over a thousand terrifying, blood-red armored figures standing ten meters tall materialized across the entire arena.
A thousand towering Qi Yuans drew their blades in unison, locking their gazes upon a single enemy on the stage ahead.
It was a large beetle, half a meter tall—a mutant of the beetle race, more than a dozen times larger than ordinary beetles.
At this moment, staring at the colossal phantoms filling the sky, question marks practically floated above its head.
Qi Yuan pointed his blade at the giant beetle. "As the saying goes, the nail that sticks out gets hammered down. Who told you not to keep a low profile? Growing into such an overgrown clod—you're practically the Blue Giant of the beetle clan!"
If the half-meter-tall beetle could speak, it would surely retort: *You're ten meters tall! How the hell do you have the nerve to call me, at half a meter, an overgrown clod?!*
Kill.
Empowered by the Boundless Sea of Flowers, the swords of a thousand Qi Yuans converged upon a single point and pierced the giant beetle.
The beetle perished.
A forensic examination would have revealed its inside riddled with holes, without a single scrap of intact flesh to be found.
Having concluded the kill, Qi Yuan took a deep breath.
"My grasp of Zanghua's insights has deepened a bit more."
Today, he had already undergone over a hundred battles, constantly assimilating Zanghua's combat techniques and cultivation experience.
"Right now, I can shamelessly say that nobody understands Zanghua better than me."
"Next round, onwards!"
Dragging his burly form forward, Qi Yuan prepared to step into the next fight.
Presently, he had remarkably reached level 97, his strength attaining an astonishing degree.
"Long Pan is only level 99, which is the peak of the Divine Domain.
Is level 100 a new realm altogether?
Still... does the Divine Domain only span levels 90 to 100?
Isn't that a bit too narrow?
Besides, when merged with Xiao Jia, I can display the power of level 102, yet I haven't felt... that sort of leap between major realms."
Battling relentlessly across the Ascension Platform as his level climbed, Qi Yuan had uncovered many peculiar questions.
The Heavenly Domain spanned level 70 to 89.
Could the Divine Domain really be just level 90 to 99?
When stepping from level 89 into level 90, Qi Yuan had distinctly felt a qualitative transformation in his strength.
Yet when wearing Xiao Jia and forcibly breaking through to level 100, the sensation of explosive growth had not felt particularly intense.
*Could it be that Tong, Long Pan, and Yu aren't actually at the peak of the Divine Domain?* A terrifying conjecture suddenly crossed Qi Yuan's mind.
Yet if they were not at the peak, why did they believe they were?
Could a supreme powerhouse have altered their cognition?
Or perhaps... placed a shackle upon their breakthroughs?
It felt just like someone at the fifth level of Qi Refinement having their perception forcibly warped by an expert, coming to believe that the fifth level of Qi Refinement was the pinnacle of the entire realm.
Then, one day, attempting Foundation Establishment.
What awaited them then would likely be nothing other than death.
Thinking of this, Qi Yuan could not help suspecting that this game world harbored a far greater boss behind the scenes.
He glanced reflexively toward the Ascension Platform and the dense rows of seats above.
*Who used to sit there, watching the battles?*
*The enemies I face now are already level 80. The mighty figures who once fought on this Ascension Platform... what level was the strongest among them?*
In the end, Qi Yuan cast these thoughts aside.
The battle was still ongoing. He resumed his slaughter to grind experience.
***
Five Elements Forbidden Area.
Long Pan rose, gazing up into the firmament at the Ancient Qi Toon Tree. He could not help remarking, "To think that in the blink of an eye, so many years have passed, and it has already grown this large."
Yu also looked up at Long Pan. "The seed of the Ancient Qi Toon Tree was originally retrieved by you from the Five Elements Forbidden Ground and offered to the Heavenly God.
Perhaps it grew so massive only because it absorbed all the obsessive longing of the Bridal Gown Imperial Princess, wouldn't you say?"
Ten thousand years ago, the Heavenly God was defeated, and extraterrestrial demons ran rampant across the mortal realm.
Their fellow daoists fell dead or wounded until only those who retreated into the forbidden grounds managed to rely on the terrain to temporarily evade the extraterrestrial demons.
Yu excelled most at divination. He had divined that the day of the heavenly hound devouring the moon would be the moment the extraterrestrial demons were at their weakest.
From that came the Demon Slaying Assembly three hundred years hence.
"A pity. The Four Great Forbidden Grounds and Two Great Desolate Lands are ancient and mysterious. Even though we have resided in the Five Elements Forbidden Ground for so long, and the Five Ancestors can even be considered its masters, none of us have ever uncovered the true secret hidden within," Long Pan sighed with vague wistfulness.
"The Master of the Robe Division must have gone to the Mortal Domain, right?" Yu asked.
The Mortal Domain referred to the mortal realm outside the Four Great Forbidden Grounds and Two Great Desolate Lands.
"Our insights and experience can only be tempered through slaughter, or else by walking the mortal realm," Long Pan said. "Foul-mouthed as Zanghua may be, her intentions were genuinely thoughtful."
They knew Zanghua had fought the Master of the Robe Division solely to help him digest his insights and experience.
For Zanghua, the expenditure was immense.
Her strength was being hoarded for the Demon Slaying Assembly, meant for delivering a pinnacle blow.
Every bit of power expended was a bit lost, near impossible to replenish.
All of them were the same: if they could avoid fighting, they would.
Of course, the battle between Long Pan and Tong had been unavoidable.
Otherwise, every one of these old bones would have gladly crawled out of their coffins to act as sparring partners for the Master of the Robe Division.
"Do all that is humanly possible and leave the rest to fate. Three hundred years hence, our generation shall march out together to strike down the demons!"
***
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
Qi Yuan jolted awake from a dream. Cold sweat drenched his back and soaked through his robes, dripping down his forehead as well.
He glanced over; the wooden cat puppet on the bedside sat upright, eyes open, its red and black paint somewhat faded and smeared with age.
Qi Yuan stepped out of the thatched cottage and stood in the courtyard.
The chilly moonlight washed over him, bringing a crisp nip in the air.
"Killing too much really does cause nightmares."
"I'm still too full of positive energy. They were just mere afterimages, after all."
Qi Yuan waved his hand, conjuring a water mirror before him.
He studied his reflection.
Extraordinarily handsome, with a trace of uncanny allure lingering in his eyes, his form was faintly cloaked in a heavy aura of slaughter.
"The slaughter aura is still too thick."
"Grinding a game until you're reeking of killing intent—who'd believe that if I told them?"
Back in his past life, some gamers had probably slaughtered hundreds of millions of wild mobs without developing a shred of real murderous aura.
Qi Yuan resolved that until he refined or concealed this slaughter aura, he would absolutely not step outside.
Even if he did, he must never expose his identity.
With that in mind, Qi Yuan abandoned any thought of sleep. Instead, he retrieved the cultivation manuals he had hauled from the Black Mountain Sect to search for an art that could conceal slaughter aura.
The Black Mountain Sect was steeped in wickedness; some of their cultivators naturally needed to disguise their own killing intent, so methods of that nature were bound to exist.
After searching for a long while, Qi Yuan found three arts suited for concealing slaughter aura:
The *Profound Pure Ethereal Great Method*, the *Nether Ghost Domain Malice-Refining Art*, and the *Concealment Formula*.
Qi Yuan examined them closely. Each had its merits.
However, the first two were higher in grade, classified as arts that could only be practiced at Foundation Establishment or above.
The current Qi Yuan could not cultivate them. Moreover, to his surprise, the second one, the *Nether Ghost Domain Malice-Refining Art*, was not a core cultivation method, but merely a functional technique. Cultivating it even carried the risk of turning oneself into nourishment for some unknown entity.
"The problems with this world are far too severe," Qi Yuan thought with deep concern. "Even daoist arts can't be practiced carelessly."
He turned his attention to the last one, the *Concealment Formula*.
This technique could be practiced by Qi Refinement cultivators.
It could not dissolve slaughter aura, only mask it.
While inferior to the first two, it was still fairly decent.
[This is the Concealment Formula. Modifying 145 places within it may yield unexpected results.]
Qi Yuan pondered a moment, then altered the Concealment Formula strictly according to the prompts his eyes provided.
Once finished, an astonished look crossed his face.
"My eyes really understand me! What I saw suits me so well!"
The newly modified *Concealment Formula* was completely beyond recognition.
Not only could it hide his own slaughter aura, but it could also secretly transfer that aura onto someone else.
Qi Yuan felt that if anyone ever accused him of carrying a heavy slaughter aura and tried to slay him in the name of righteousness, he could boldly turn around and pin the blame on them instead.
***
"Die!"
Upon the Ascension Platform, Qi Yuan, merged with Xiao Jia, was currently weathering a siege by ten Divine Domain powerhouses.
By now, he had ascended to the hundred-thousandth step.
Beyond that threshold, the strength of the foes he encountered had undergone a qualitative leap.
The weakest among them were at the Divine Domain.
Facing an assault from ten level 91 Divine Domain experts, Qi Yuan showed no fear whatsoever.
The blood qi enveloping his body seemed to coalesce into physical substance, making his blood-red armor appear all the more sinisterly alluring.
"I've finally reached level 99 as well."
Even Qi Yuan's voice carried a touch of uncanny menace.
He seemed as though he had stepped straight out of the underworld.
With a single sword strike, the phantoms of the ten Divine Domain experts proved completely incapable of resisting, slaughtered under Qi Yuan's blade in one sweep.
Wearing Xiao Jia, Qi Yuan could unleash the power of level 104.
Such strength was far beyond what these newcomers to the Divine Domain could contest.
Not to mention, Qi Yuan possessed the complete combat experience and insights of all eighty-four Divine Domain powerhouses.
At present, he could unreservedly declare that he understood those experts better than they understood themselves.
Their combat experience and techniques had all merged into his own being.
"In the battles to come, I should also fuse all this combat experience and technique, truly making it my own."
"Besides, can't I also learn from the combat experience and techniques of my enemies?"
"There are still more than twenty thousand battles left!"
"How many enemies would that be?"
"At least twenty thousand Divine Domain foes, right? Or maybe... two hundred thousand?"
"Won't that burst the Concealment Formula at the seams?"
Qi Yuan dove right back into the game to continue slaughtering.
Time flew past.
One day in the game equaled one year upon the Ascension Platform. Later on, a single day in the game could even span a decade or a century upon the platform.
The golden-armored divine general had not disclosed this latter detail to Qi Yuan.
Perhaps because the divine general had never imagined that Qi Yuan could climb to such heights.
Or perhaps he assumed Qi Yuan would be like past challengers, falling in some battle, soaking the arena with blood to become part of the trials themselves.
Qi Yuan slaughtered tirelessly inside the game.
He had lost count of how many living beings he had slain.
Now standing before him were fifty level 93 Divine Domain powerhouses.
Had this been before, Qi Yuan would have turned tail and run at the sight of them.
Yet now, he harbored not the slightest fear.
Having weathered tens of thousands of battles, thoroughly assimilating the combat experience of the eighty-four Divine Domain experts while absorbing the combat experience of the trial guardians, he had reached a terrifying realm.
Like a ghost dancing upon blades, he held his blood-red sword, weaving among dozens of Divine Domain powerhouses.
Every stroke of his blade seemed formed by nature itself.
Every strike, every evasion, every release of a martial dao divine ability was refined to absolute perfection, defying fault from even the harshest critic.
Qi Yuan's towering frame and vibrant armor grew ever more striking, the blood-red barbs bristling with chilling dread.
Right now, he looked more demonic than the extraterrestrial demons themselves.
When his blade felled the last of the enemies, a string of experience poured in.
Qi Yuan narrowed his eyes. "Still level 99? I can't level up to 100?"
Qi Yuan could not remember how many Divine Domain experts he had slaughtered.
Yet his experience bar remained stuck at level 99, refusing to budge.
It was as though an invisible hand shackled him firmly at level 99.
"At least the experience is still accumulating." The only consolation was that the experience was not lost.
There was merely a shackle preventing him from leveling up.
Once that shackle was broken, he would be able to advance.
Qi Yuan wondered what level he would shoot up to when that happened.
At least level 110, surely?
And there were still ten thousand steps left, holding even more Divine Domain foes.
"This place really is a paradise for grinding mobs!" Qi Yuan thought for a moment, then stepped off the Heaven-Ascending Stairway.
He had slaughtered for long enough; it was time to log off.
Though Qi Yuan had fought countless battles here, only half a month had passed in reality.
Over these two weeks, the conversion of Water and Fire qi within Qi Yuan's body had been completed.
When the Water qi finished converting, rain had poured across the entire Divine Light Sect.
However, likely owing to Qi Yuan's own slaughter aura, that rain had fallen blood-red.
Any cultivator touched by the downpour suffered nightmares the moment they fell asleep.
In their dreams, they saw a colossal scarlet silhouette engaged in wholesale butchery across the world.
That towering figure radiated an aura of sheer horror, chilling to the core.
As a result, many ordinary disciples of the Divine Light Sect were deprived of sleep, some even waking in tears, crying that they had seen a devil in their dreams.
Such claims amused the Foundation Establishment and Origin Core cultivators.
What was there to fear from a mere dream?
Hearing the disciples describe that terrifying blood-red figure as an evil god only made them chuckle more.
Qi Refinement disciples and common mortals were simply narrow-minded, calling any random cat or dog an evil god.
Curious, several Foundation Establishment and Origin Core cultivators who had long abstained from grain purposely went to sleep to investigate. Yet upon seeing that terrifying scarlet silhouette, their reactions were no better than those of the Qi Refinement disciples and commoners.
Moreover, because they possessed broader horizons, they understood the terror of that blood-red figure far more profoundly, leaving quite a few of them severely rattled in spirit.
For several days straight, the Qi Refinement disciples of the Divine Light Sect dared not sleep at night, cultivating with dark circles like panda eyes. Only after five days did everything return to normal.
Meanwhile, the various strange occurrences in the Divine Light Sect had already spread throughout the Great Shang, drawing many watchful eyes.
At this moment, Qi Yuan opened the chat interface. Arm around Xiao Jia's slender waist, he settled into a comfortable posture and chatted idly with Jin Li once more.
"Sigh, there are way too many enemies in Tianjue. Killing day after day after day—I'm getting sick of it," Qi Yuan grumbled, venting a bit of negative energy to Jin Li.
In the past, he rarely aired such grievances.
Now, after every grueling battle, he always sought out Jin Li to chat for a while, soothing the turbulence in his heart.
Of course, even without undergoing intense combat, he had already grown accustomed to chatting idly with her.
Jin Li was exceptionally considerate, listening at times and sharing thoughts of her own at others.
"I feel like in another half month, I'll be able to clear Tianjue completely," Qi Yuan sent over.
Chapter 68