Yu Xian held the Book of the Primordial God as arm after arm emerged behind his back.
He discovered that the Eye-Snatching Demon truly was the lowest of scum. The demon possessed an innumerable number of arms, and the vast majority weren't weak either, making it plain just how many atrocities he had committed.
Then, with a shift of his thought, one shapely leg after another appeared around him.
This was the ability of Mister Foot.
The problem was that this dog of an Eye-Snatching Demon had collected legs that all belonged to women—and every single one was long, fair, and shapely. Was that something a decent human would do?
Yu Xian felt that the Eye-Snatching Demon was definitely a foot fetishist—a perverted one at that.
He put the legs away and went on to test the abilities of Mister Key and Mister Eye. Sure enough, both were just as freaky. Mister Key's power allowed him to forge countless keys, each corresponding to different doors.
For instance, a portal of space: the moment it opened, he could flee to any world he had marked. It was fair to say that unless one ambushed him like Yu Xian had done, killing the Eye-Snatching Demon in a head-on clash would be extraordinarily difficult.
Moreover, Yu Xian's own strength accounted for only ten percent of the ambush's success; the remaining ninety percent belonged to the Zhen Realm.
Had the Zhen Realm not helped compress his abilities and continuously accelerate the Sea-Calming Divine Needle, Yu Xian never could have unleashed such a strike.
"Ah, my Golden-Hooped Rod!"
Yu Xian suddenly remembered that he hadn't retrieved the Golden-Hooped Rod he had launched.
Unless struck by a transcendence-grade attack, that Golden-Hooped Rod would not be obliterated so easily. The Eye-Snatching Demon hadn't even had time to use any transcendence-grade items at the very end, so the rod had to be completely intact.
He immediately left the Zhen Realm and sped off in pursuit in the direction where the Golden-Hooped Rod had vanished.
It was too far away.
The distance had already exceeded the bounds of his capabilities.
If it were close enough, he could teleport it right before him in an instant. But this time, the rod had flown so very far—far enough to leave him at a complete loss.
Mighty Ones were not Transcenders; their abilities still had limits, after all.
Yu Xian's current limit was roughly enough to influence a single branch of the Tree Universe; anything farther was beyond his limit.
Of course, certain abilities were exceptions.
For example, causal abilities and certain rule-based abilities could reach across far greater distances.
Take Yu Xian's "All Heavens and Realms, Divinely Clear"—its range was immense. Even across a distance of dozens of branches, as long as someone uttered his name, he could sense them.
That was an exceptional ability, but for the vast majority of offensive abilities, he could at most blast through a single branch.
The only reason the Sea-Calming Divine Needle had flown such a vast distance this time was due to the boost from the Zhen Realm's power. Without that boost, it never would have traveled so far, and Yu Xian could have recalled it with a mere thought.
Yu Xian flickered constantly across the Tree Universe, moving in the direction he remembered the Sea-Calming Divine Needle disappearing.
In truth, traveling via the Zhen Realm would have been faster and covered greater distances. The problem was that he had no idea where the needle had flown; overshooting or falling short could cause him to miss it entirely, potentially wasting even more time.
Besides, Yu Xian didn't really like lugging the Zhen Realm everywhere. He preferred roaming the worlds freely on his own.
Time was truly cheap to Mighty Ones. Many people might assume that the struggle for Calamity Origin would conclude within a year or two, but in reality, Yu Xian alone would spend over a year just searching for the Sea-Calming Divine Needle along the way.
In fact, the vast majority of Mighty Ones thought in terms of gathering enough Calamity Origin within a single cosmic annihilation epoch. Everyone was vying, searching, and collecting, but the time span involved was actually wildly exaggerated.
Many Mighty Ones were indeed active, yet after bustling about for over a year, they had not encountered a single peer or stumbled upon a speck of Calamity Origin.
The Tree Universe was vast enough to accommodate every conceivable existence, every impossibility, and every miracle.
After flying for a year and a half, Yu Xian completely turned into a salted fish.
So he conjured a bubble, curled up inside it, let the bubble carry him forward, and continued watching the battles of other Mighty Ones.
Although he had left the Zhen Realm, it remained firmly under his control, able to broadcast everything it recorded over to him whenever he wanted to watch.
Li Zhenlong was still scouring all the worlds for the Eye-Snatching Demon. Unaware that Yu Xian had already slain the demon, he assumed the fiend was hiding somewhere.
Meanwhile, Nora's side had seized another portion of Calamity Origin, though that battle had been perilous.
Their opponent possessed a miraculous item; upon clashing, everyone's items were neutralized, and it took Zhougelasi stepping in to handle the adversary.
This made Nora and the others realize they could not rely too heavily on miraculous items and soul treasures, so each of them began diligently cultivating once more.
Truth be told, after watching the footage of Nora and the others nearly coming to harm, Yu Xian had almost turned back. Even if it meant being drained dry by Nora, he still wanted to protect everyone.
Yet at the thought that his own strength wasn't actually that formidable, he held back.
Although he now possessed the Eye-Snatching Demon's powers, his mastery over them was not yet proficient. Besides, powerful as the Eye-Snatching Demon was, he had been nowhere near invincible.
Across the myriad heavens and realms, there were many experts like Li Zhenlong. Had the Eye-Snatching Demon encountered any one of them, he wouldn't stand a chance, able to do no more than protect his own hide.
Yu Xian wanted to protect everyone, not merely protect himself.
And so, learning from this bitter reflection, he decided to hunt down a few more Mighty Ones, refine them into Legacy Pills, feed them to the avatars of the Dimwitted Puppy, and finally seal the puppy avatars into the Book of the Primordial God.
That way, he could cheat his way to rapidly boosting his strength.
However, Mighty Ones were not that easy to kill.
For instance, the Eye-Snatching Demon hadn't actually been wiped out cleanly. His power had merely been seized by Yu Xian's gourd, but his spiritual spark still retained a tiny sliver of Mister Monster's power, meaning he would likely seek someone to possess and reincarnate. Even if reborn, it would be an amnesiac version, since everything he had was taken by Yu Xian, leaving only an empty husk of a spiritual spark. Reviving in that state was virtually no different from entering reincarnation.
Yet this went to show that the vitality and survival capability of Mighty Ones were extraordinarily potent.
Under normal circumstances, unless one fought for several cosmic annihilation epochs, completely extinguishing a Mighty One could only be done with transcendence-grade items.
With the urge to grow stronger now firmly in mind, Yu Xian began screening targets in earnest, a process that ate up another five years.
Mainly, though there were many Mighty Ones, not all of them revealed the full extent of their strength, and many possessed absurdly monstrous survival abilities.
As for the weak Mighty Ones, needless to say, they had perished in conflicts long ago.
Furthermore... Yu Xian was very covetous of Li Zhenlong's power.
Yet after watching several recordings of Li Zhenlong instantly countering ambushes, as well as his bizarre survivability when ganged up on by multiple Mighty Ones, Yu Xian gave up on that idea right away.
Li Zhenlong truly had no shortcomings; he couldn't be messed with for the time being.
Chapter 692