Twin eyes surveyed the heavens and pierced the cosmos!
Wherever that gaze reached, the starry river shone bright. Every living being was shaken to the core—the Supremes who had unleashed the Dark Turmoil, the great ancient clans, and the terrified mortals and cultivators alike.
"What is that? Eyes? Or two great suns?"
"A Great Emperor! Someone has attained the Great Emperor realm! We are saved!"
"Fool! A Great Emperor may be strong, but how could one stir the cosmic starry river into a change like this?"
"Could this age have a Deathless Immortal? No, that cannot be. Only in the Desolate Ancient Epoch did Deathless Immortals dwell in the world. After the Desolate Ancient, heaven and earth seemed to undergo a great change and grow incomplete, and Deathless Immortals were never seen again."
In the void beyond Hongdou Star, Supreme Jiheng and Supreme Shenhua drew back, deliberately opening distance from Yin Fenghai. Yin Fenghai's heart swayed as well, and he did not press forward to keep fighting.
Gazing afar at the pair of eyes that spanned the starry river, Supreme Jiheng swallowed and, for a moment, could not speak.
Supreme Shenhua drew a deep breath, forced down his shock, and said gravely, "A being above a Deathless Immortal?!"
Both had once been Great Emperors of their age, illustrious eighth-rank powerhouses with broad vision. From certain secret histories of high antiquity they had learned a great deal of the Desolate Ancient's hidden lore, and they had a rough measure of a ninth-rank Deathless Immortal's strength.
A Deathless Immortal absolutely could not have done what lay before their eyes!
While the two were shaken in heart and mind, Yin Fenghai gripped the Gold-Traced Painted Halberd. He took the chance to recover his strength, and at the same time stared at that pair of eyes in unsettled astonishment. For no clear reason, the eyes seemed familiar—
"Hua—"
Suddenly, those vast and radiant great eyes blinked once.
In that instant, the boundless sea of stars, and the stars in their trillions, seemed to dim together for a flash, then abruptly grew clear and bright again. As the starry river flared and faded, starlight flowed and nebulae gathered in mist upon the deep, endless cosmic curtain, and together they outlined a face.
The countenance was clear and unworldly. The brows were like distant mountains, sparse and open. The eyes were those vast radiant orbs, now slightly lowered, their light held within, concealing the workings of the cosmos.
The hair was like strands of profound light, flowing of itself through the void, gathering into a topknot bound casually with a plain Dao hairpin. It carried a clear air of natural ease, as if breathing with the cosmos and moving to the same rhythm. A sense of harmony and completeness arose of itself.
That enormous Daoist's face looked down upon the long starry river. With one sweep it surveyed every part of the cosmos, and then that gaze, radiant as a pillar, fell upon the three who had just ceased fighting beyond Hongdou Star.
Supreme Jiheng and Supreme Shenhua went rigid. Their scalps tingled as if a current had passed through them. They did not know why this unsurpassed being had suddenly lowered his eyes upon them.
They ceased even to breathe aloud, fearing that the slightest movement might draw his displeasure.
In contrast to the two, who trembled with dread, Yin Fenghai was struck blank in an instant. He, who had always worn an air of easy calm, stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed.
Because this face—he knew it far too well!
"Fellow Daoist Huang?!"
The words burst out of him. Supreme Jiheng and his companion flinched without thinking and exchanged a glance, both eyes full of dread. Did the two of them know each other?!
"Fellow Daoist Yin, it has been many years since we met. Your bearing is truly as it ever was." A lightly laughing voice rang through the cosmos and shook the starry river.
"It really is you?!" Yin Fenghai's face was a spectacle—shock, doubt, bewilderment—
He had never imagined that his reunion with Huang Tian would be a scene like this!
After his ascension to this world, he had given himself wholly to cultivation. With a deep foundation and exceptional aptitude, he had broken through to the Quasi-Emperor realm quite smoothly. Once he entered that realm, he spent more than twenty years ranging the starry void, challenging many opponents while searching for traces of Huang Tian.
In his view, with Huang Tian's gifts, advancing to the Void Realm would not take long, so he ought long since to have ascended to this world through the Gate of Void Origin. Yet over many years he had not heard a single word of Huang Tian, and that astonished him all the more.
He himself had advanced by leaps and bounds straight into the Quasi-Emperor realm and made a great name across the vast starry void. How could Huang Tian, far stronger than he, have remained unknown all this time?
Unless Huang Tian had never ascended at all—
Once he reached that conclusion, he finally gave up searching for Huang Tian and devoted himself wholly to cultivation, striving to attain the Great Emperor realm as soon as he could. He had never expected that, before he could advance to Great Emperor, the Dark Turmoil would suddenly erupt. Still less had he expected Huang Tian to appear—and to appear in a posture of such absolute power—
What had Fellow Daoist Huang gone through? After entering the Void Realm and passing through the Gate of Void Origin, had the world he ascended to not been the same as the world Yin himself had ascended to?
Just as Yin Fenghai's thoughts flew in disorder, the faces of Supreme Jiheng and Supreme Shenhua twitched wildly, and they screamed inwardly: They really knew each other! They were old friends!!
In extreme fear, the two dared neither flee nor move rashly. They only drew in their auras as far as they could, like a lifeless length of rotten wood, hoping to slip through unnoticed.
But just as they hoped to get by, the Daoist looked over and said calmly, "The sort who eat people?"
At those words, both their hearts pounded madly. They no longer held their auras in. The qi and blood and divine power of their whole bodies exploded forth without reserve as they tried to turn into streaks of flowing light and flee at speed.
But alas—
As the gaze swept over, their figures abruptly froze. They could not fly at all. Supreme Jiheng cried out in haste, "Senior, spare—"
Boom! Boom!
In the void, two blood-red fireworks burst open at the same time. Pulped flesh and blood sprayed from the void and shot in every direction.
In the next moment, Huang Tian's gaze shifted. At once, streaks of divine light of the utmost brilliance flew down from beyond the cosmos and plunged straight toward the three Supremes who had launched the Dark Turmoil together with Supreme Jiheng and his companion, and toward this world's Three Great Forbidden Zones.
"Who dares trespass on the forbidden ground?!"
"Has another Great Emperor come to kill us?"
"A whelp who does not know death when it stares him in the face, thinking righteousness makes him invincible! He does not know that in this world, only the fist is the true principle!"
"Who is it that will not let me sleep in peace?"
Within the forbidden zones, the Supremes whose hearts had suddenly stirred with a sense of crisis rose one after another, throwing their coffins open. Then they saw the Daoist's face blotting out the cosmos, and the incomparably terrifying divine light shooting toward them!
"A Deathless Immortal? No—a being above a Deathless Immortal!"
"How is this possible? I have only been sealed away by my own hand for so short a time. How could a powerhouse like this appear in the world!"
"Can't block it! Can't block it!"
"Stick your head out and it's a blade; pull it in and it's still a blade. Better to die in a blaze—Extreme Sublimation!!"
"Senior, spare my life! I have only devoured living beings once—"
"Enough of this nonsense. Extreme Sublimation!"
Of the twenty Forbidden Zone Supremes facing the radiant divine light, eleven, their faces savage, chose Extreme Sublimation at this moment without the slightest hesitation.
What was called Extreme Sublimation could restore them, in a short time, to the battle power they had once possessed as Great Emperors. Only, not long after the sublimation, they would die. But at this moment there was no other choice!
Boom!
Eleven figures, each gripping weapons, stood tall in the vast sky, majestic as primeval divine mountains. Their dreadful might rolled open surging currents of void, and their momentum shot straight into the clouds. Facing the divine light shooting toward them, each unleashed the last tricks kept in reserve and struck with all their strength!
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Divine light collided thunderously with all manner of Great Emperor weapons, bursting forth with unparalleled blinding radiance. Vast aftershocks swept every direction. Across the enormous forbidden zones, blasts of force raged, gorgeous auroras erupted, and the black mist that had originally shrouded them scattered away.
The earth split. High mountains crumbled. The forbidden zones, larger than a thousand stars, jolted once, then with a rumbling crash were blasted to pieces!
Countless fragments and dust shot into the pitch-black deep void. Many agonized screams rose, then cut off short.
"How did it end?" On distant stars, cultivators watched with fixed attention.
"Forbidden zones that have stood since time immemorial were blasted to powder! Dreadful! Terrifying!"
"Those Supremes—are they dead?"
Countless people held their breath, gazing from afar at the Three Great Forbidden Zones under the bombardment of divine light.
"Weng—"
The void trembled. Slowly, the glaring light drew back and revealed a soul-shaking scene. In the void, twenty corpses that rivaled the stars hung quietly, then quivered once and all turned to drifting powder.
The Great Emperor weapons in their hands were smashed along with them, snapping and falling apart. Some were struck straight into nothingness.
"Dead! They are all dead! We have survived!" A cheer rose, and countless people wept.
"Those who fall into the demonic path of eating people will, in the end, be slain by others!"
"One casual blow, and twenty Supremes were wiped out. Too strong!"
Amid the countless cheers, the light of Huang Tian's eyes shone bright and stabbed straight into the depths of the cosmos. "Still not coming out?"
The voice poured down through the vast void and drew astonishment from countless people. Yin Fenghai was startled and doubtful as well, and he looked where the gaze pointed.
There, in the depths of the boundless starry river, a middle-aged man in a golden robe slowly revealed himself. His face was solemn. The rhythm of the Dao and immortal light flowed about his body, and golden lotuses drifted down. He looked extraordinarily sacred.
Studying the golden-robed middle-aged man, Huang Tian said with keen interest, "Truly, the world is vast, and nothing is too strange to exist. I never thought that today I would meet one who possessed the Heavenly Dao—a man of alternative Dao integration."
With his true secret laid bare by Huang Tian, the golden-robed man's face changed drastically.
His name was Demon Lord Kongming, and he came from beyond this world. While roaming Chaos in search of a chance to attain the Dao, he had happened upon a secret art of possession. This secret art could possess not only humans, gods, immortals, and demons, but even a Heavenly Dao, setting his own body in place of the heart of heaven to complete Dao integration!
It had taken him more than three hundred thousand years to comprehend this secret art to the full. Just then he came upon this world. Overjoyed, he believed fate was guiding him, and so he slipped in unseen and cast the secret art to possess the Heavenly Dao!
At the start it did not go smoothly. Although this world's Heavenly Dao had not given birth to a clear consciousness, its instinctive resistance still made the possession advance slowly. More than two million years passed before he gradually widened his advantage and grasped a portion of the Heavenly Dao's authority.
After that, by every means he could, he quietly influenced the mere three or four Deathless Immortals of this world, planting in them the thought of traveling far into Chaos to seek opportunities. A full one hundred and ninety thousand years passed before those few Deathless Immortals at last all departed.
Once they were gone, Demon Lord Kongming judged that no one would easily threaten him again. And as the authority in his grasp increased, he began to alter the rules of the Heavenly Dao, shearing away the lifespans of high-rank cultivators and absorbing their blood essence and life-spirit to strengthen himself.
Thus Quasi-Emperors and Great Emperors, who had originally lived on without death, found their lifespans growing shorter and shorter.
These powerhouses sensed that something was wrong and tried to leave this world, only to find the cosmic membrane grown incomparably solid. Forced to remain trapped within the world, they could only wait in vain for death. Only by the so-called Path to Immortality was there a chance to depart the cosmos—
But the Path to Immortality was a road of death, for at the end of that road stood Demon Lord Kongming!
By this day he had grasped nearly all the authority of the Heavenly Dao, and was about to complete the work of possession and Dao integration, attaining the stature of a pseudo-Daluo!
And yet, on this very day—
He looked toward Huang Tian beyond the world, and his heart grew heavy. This man had at least the battle power of a pseudo-Daluo. He might even be a true Daluo existence!!
He badly wanted to roar and curse. He had trudged the Sea of Chaos for a full six hundred and thirty million years and had met only one who had achieved Dao integration. As for a Daluo existence, he had not seen so much as a hair!
How was it that now, at the very threshold of his own Dao integration, he had suddenly met a figure like this?
Bitterness rose in him, but his expression settled into gravity. "Your divine abilities are without measure. I admire them— This man is an old friend of yours. You may take him away. How about it?"
Yin Fenghai, thus indicated, looked toward Demon Lord Kongming and understood at once. Possess the Heavenly Dao? So this man was the source of the great change of heaven and earth in the Desolate Ancient Epoch, and also the root of the Dark Turmoil and the devouring of blood essence—
"The man, I will take. You must die as well!" The indifferent voice poured down through the void and set the vast starry river quaking!
Hearing this, Demon Lord Kongming was furious to the extreme. "What arrogance! I stand within this world, joined with the Dao, like heaven itself— Do you truly think I fear you!"
The words had barely fallen when the entire cosmos roared and boiled!
Hundreds of millions of millions of bolts of deep-purple, white-hot lightning condensed from countless nebular vortices. Roaring in fury, they merged into a brilliant river of light spanning the sea of stars, and with a momentum that would annihilate all things they thundered toward Huang Tian, who stood beyond the world!
At the same time, countless meteors of the deep void were drawn by a mighty force, wrapped in raging divine fire. They tore through the darkness like a tidal tsunami, following close behind the lightning, meaning to drown Huang Tian completely.
Boundless light! Endless fire! Brilliance to the utmost! The sea of stars overturned!
Endless splendor was reflected in his eyes. Huang Tian's expression was composed. He raised one palm and pressed it down!
In the palm, black and white qi circulated: one wisp of the utmost clarity and lightness, one wisp of the utmost turbidity and weight.
The two colors of divine light chased and spun about each other, and in a flash formed the phantom of a slowly turning millstone.
The Yin-Yang Millstone grew ever larger, grinding straight toward the oncoming flood.
"Hua—"
The moment the raging river of lightning-light touched the millstone, it melted away like ice and snow, without so much as a ripple. The tsunami of meteors, striking the millstone, broke apart and dispersed outright, turning to endless powder and vanishing without a trace.
Even then the Yin-Yang Millstone had strength to spare. Vast and mighty, it ground into the cosmos, shoving aside nebular dust and the waves of the void, and bore down heavily upon Demon Lord Kongming.
"How is this possible!"
Demon Lord Kongming was aghast and tried to draw back, but this stretch of void had been fixed by the Yin-Yang Millstone. Even though he held most of the Heavenly Dao's authority, he still could not break free.
"I don't believe it!!"
He roared, raised his right hand high, and took up a golden bell. With a shake, the golden bell burst forth with endless light. Then he hurled it. The golden bell flew up, growing larger and larger, its divine might stern and imposing, and crashed into the millstone!
Yet, just as before, there was not even the sound of impact. The golden bell was ground into nothingness.
"Impossible! Impossible!" Demon Lord Kongming's eyes strained as if they would split. His hands moved, and seas of lightning surged from all sides, linking into a boundless ocean of thunder-dragons and lightning-serpents to stand before the descending millstone.
"Weng—"
The Yin-Yang Millstone easily ground through the boundless sea of lightning and, at last, smashed down upon his head with a boom!
"Puh—"
Flesh and soul burst apart together beneath the millstone's grinding, and were then ground to powder.
At the same time, in every corner of the cosmos, the bodies of hundreds of thousands of cultivators and mortals burst open at once and died.
All of these people were Demon Lord Kongming's clones and incarnations. So long as the clones did not die to the last, he would have a chance to return in force. But alas, drawn along by karma, his true body and every clone died in a single instant—
"The trifling business is finished. Fellow Daoist Yin, come back with me to the Five Directions Realm, and rejoice together with our friends—"
Chapter 227