Ba

The three avatars of the Lord of the Stars still wore expressionless, robotic faces. They did not even glance at Old Mai, instead turning their heads toward the edge of the arena to look at Ling Tuo. In the tone of a father lecturing his son, he said, "Among the three great authorities of the sun, moon, and stars, the Sun Origin stands exalted above all, while the stars can divine all creation yet are countered by the taiyin. Between the three, the stars are considered the weakest. "In truth, that is not so. The sun, moon, and stars each possess their own unique traits and functions. If the deity who left behind the three great origins were divided into three parts, the Sun Origin would symbolize His power and authority, the taiyin would belong to His darkness and malevolence—the positive and negative, two sides of the same coin—while the stars represent His 'heart' and wisdom. "Power requires wisdom and a 'heart' to command. Without the harmonization of the 'heart,' taking the sun into a taiyin body leads only to certain death." As he spoke, the normal and inverted worlds drew closer and closer together. The authority of chaos grew overwhelmingly powerful, causing even the solar divine power to disintegrate and be assimilated into the chaos, with the taiyin and astral energies suffering the same fate. The Lord of the Stars remained entirely unperturbed and continued, "Ling Tuo, the moment you chose the path of the Taiyin Origin, you were destined to be corrupted by the 'Invaders.' For the taiyin symbolizes yin power, the 'evil' of that entity, whereas the sun is bound to lean toward order. As for the stars..." He did not finish that thought, shifting instead: "Ling Tuo, entering the Sun dungeon with a taiyin body means you are destined to never assimilate the sun. The only thing you can do is prevent me from subduing it, seize it, preserve it, and one day kill me to claim the Star Origin. Only then can you unite the sun, moon, and stars to become the greatest existence in the entire universe." Ling Tuo appeared to be hearing this information for the first time. He hung his head and remained silent for a moment before chuckling softly. "Or I could kill you in this War of the Gods instance, devour the stars first, and then refine the sun." The Mirror World had already descended right above their heads. The spiritual energy in the upper halves of the three avatars was assimilated into a hazy, grayish chaos, while their lower halves barely retained their solar, lunar, and astral powers. The Taiyi Sect Master completely disregarded his precarious situation. Retaining that same devoid expression, his voice boomed in layered, synthetic electronic tones, devoid of emotion: "Then watch closely. Your father will teach you how to fuse the taiyin with astral power. This is also the second spell I comprehended through a full sixty years of bitter cultivation." At last, he looked toward his true opponent, Old Mai, and spoke as if granting an act of mercy: "In my view, once they reach the demigod rank, all classes in both the orthodox and evil factions ought to cast aside items and shift their focus toward comprehending the spells of their own profession—with the exception of the Void." As he spoke, the sun avatar remained motionless, while the star and taiyin avatars were drawn together like magnets, colliding and blending into one another. Brilliant starlight and pitch-black taiyin intertwined. The latter suddenly unfurled like a sheet of pure black velvet, blotting out the sky for four kilometers above the arena. Dazzling starlight adhered to it, transforming into countless stars that flickered brightly and dimly. In an instant, a miniature galaxy descended over the arena, unrolling slowly. An expansive, lofty, and boundless aura poured down across the battlefield, bringing with it a supreme and sovereign will. This kind of might did not stem from mere raw power; it was rank, a symbol. It transcended living beings and individual existence. How could a mere Twisted Realm, a mere Mirror World, hope to imprison an entire galaxy? The Twisted Realm was utterly crushed on the level of rank. A crisp snap echoed through the air as space fractured like glass, cracks rapidly snaking outward. The chaotic energy suffusing the area was enveloped and absorbed by the "astral river," continually diluted until it vanished without a trace. From within the galaxy, a brilliant, dazzling beam of starlight plummeted down, encasing Old Mai the God of Wine. Trapped within the starlight, Old Mai raised his staff formed of grapevines, wheat ears, and nuts, churning his grayish spiritual energy of chaos in an attempt to twist the properties of the starlight and break free of the lock. Yet the moment the grayish spiritual energy leaked from the staff, it was drawn away by the starlight connected to the galaxy, diluted into the vast, boundless emptiness. Above the lofty, expansive astral river, starlight coalesced into a colossal deity whose features were blurred. He wore a robe woven of starlight, a pitch-black crown atop his head, and his eye sockets were filled with thick, black energy condensing a profound darkness. The deity slowly lowered his gaze to Old Mai, who was shrouded in starlight. The darkness within his eye sockets formed deep vortexes, exuding a terrifying and invisible pulling force. Bound by the starlight, Old Mai's entire body went rigid. A nearly tangible figure was slowly pulled out from the top of his head—Old Mai's Origin Soul. This Origin Soul wore a panicked, furious expression as it struggled violently, attempting to sink back into the body, yet it steadily detached from the physical vessel against its will. In the end, he was powerless against a force aimed directly at the soul. Pulled free bit by bit, the moment its feet left the physical frame, the Origin Soul shot upward rapidly through the starlight, sucked directly into the mouth of the blurred deity. The vast, boundless galaxy began to collapse. The starlight coalesced back into an avatar, while the deep, vast "curtain" reconstituted into the taiyin avatar. The two rejoined the sun avatar, which had been watching like a bystander from start to finish, and stood side by side. All supernatural phenomena vanished. Only the three avatars remained in the arena, alongside a two-meter-long staff and a grayish crystal ball containing an inverted, chaotic depiction of oceans, blue skies, and continents. *** Mount Shu. Zhang Yuanqing summoned a yin corpse and controlled it to step into the main hall, stopping before the bronze coffin. Commandery Princess Yinyao silently crept behind her lineage junior brother, raised her mini megaphone, and whispered, "Quickly put me back in Little Red Riding Hood. A Level 9 yin creature could swallow me in one bite. Not only will I be of no help, but I might end up as nourishment for the enemy—a disgraceful act of aiding the foe!" Zhang Yuanqing turned around and snapped, "What good are you, then!" Commandery Princess Yinyao urged, "I think you could summon Master over to help fight the boss." Zhang Yuanqing scoffed. "With the old crone's domineering and unyielding temperament, if she said she wouldn't help me clear the dungeon, she definitely won't. Otherwise, everything she said before would just be hot air." "She hasn't passed hot air for over a thousand years anyway," Commandery Princess Yinyao said. Watching the yin corpse inside the hall attempt to push the coffin lid open, she urgently pressed, "Hurry and put me away." Zhang Yuanqing brought out Little Red Riding Hood, waved it, and stowed Commandery Princess Yinyao inside. She was right. In a dungeon of this caliber, Level 7 yin corpses and spirit servants were useless. His leveling speed was simply too fast, and his corpses and servants could not keep up. If he were given another year or two, he might be able to refine corpses and spirit servants of a matching level and would not have to fight alone. While his thoughts flickered, a loud crash echoed from the main hall as the heavy bronze coffin lid slammed to the floor. A surge of dense black smoke erupted from the coffin, like a volcanic eruption that had been pent up for centuries. The black smoke swiftly devoured the yin corpse, enveloped the hall, and poured out through the doors and windows. It formed a thick blanket of clouds over Mount Shu's main peak, obscuring and concealing everything. Without hesitation, Zhang Yuanqing activated Sunrise and his Blazing Sun God of War form. Pure, radiant golden light dispersed the dark clouds, restoring clarity to the main peak. He could not afford to fight a Level 9 yin creature in a domain suffused with yin energy; that would be pure suicide. Sunrise and Blazing Sun God of War lasted for thirty minutes. He had to settle the battle within that window. As the dense yin energy was purified, the scene inside the main hall came into view once more. Zhang Yuanqing saw a pale, slender hand rest against the edge of the coffin. Immediately after, a pale woman sat up. She possessed delicate, beautiful features. Aside from her corpse-like pallor, she looked no different from an ordinary human. The typical traits of a yin corpse—rot, oozing pus, blackened veins, bulging eyes, or withered hair—were nowhere to be found on her. Her eye sockets were filled with thick, black energy that covered both the whites and the pupils. Her upper body was completely bare, exposing the graceful curves of her figure with a strangely captivating allure. Atop her head rested an exquisite golden crown, from which strings of beads dangled like a veil. She rose from the coffin, wearing a knee-length beast-skin skirt around her lower body. She looked around the hall and remained still for a long time, as if acclimatizing to this unfamiliar environment. The domineering, pure golden light shone over her without causing the slightest harm, as if she were merely basking in ordinary sunlight. She stepped out of the bronze coffin, crossed the threshold, and stood at the entrance of the hall, her black eye sockets gazing toward Zhang Yuanqing from afar. "I have slumbered for endless ages. You are the first person to step foot into this place. You are a believer of the Golden Crow... No, in this era, people like you are called 'Golden Crows,'" she conveyed through mental waves. Zhang Yuanqing shook his head. "I am not from that era either. To us, the Golden Crow is an ancient, distant title. I am a Day Wanderer." *Day Wanderer...* The woman mulled over the term. "Have you seen a Golden Crow?" Since she had chosen to communicate rather than attack immediately, Zhang Yuanqing was naturally happy to keep talking. "Never!" the bare-chested, exquisite woman conveyed. "In the primeval era, the Golden Crows went on a rampage, scorching the earth until Empress Wa subdued and sealed them. The living beings on the islands of the Eastern Sea worshipped the Golden Crows at the sealing grounds, absorbing the spiritual energy that leaked out. Those people were the believers of the Golden Crow." "Why did the Golden Crows run rampant?" Zhang Yuanqing asked. The woman replied, "To destroy all living beings; to save all living beings." *Destroy all living beings, save all living beings?* Zhang Yuanqing was mystified. "What does that mean?" The woman gave no answer, merely shaking her head slightly. "Who are you?" Zhang Yuanqing asked next. "Ba..." the woman said. "I was a warrior of the Youxiong clan, slain in the Battle of Zhuolu. The Youxiong clan sealed my body in a place of extreme yin, turning me into a corpse in the hopes that I might continue fighting for the tribe. Yet when I woke, thousands of years had passed, and the rulers were the Tang!" *She really is the legendary Drought Ba. According to myth, the Drought Ba should be fire-attributed. Was this woman a Fire Master in life?* Zhang Yuanqing mused inwardly. After pondering a moment, he asked, "Senior, this place is the Spirit Realm, and the era I live in is more than a thousand years past the Tang dynasty..." He briefly explained the nature of the Spirit Realm to her, before voicing his proposition: "Now that you have regained your freedom, the Spirit Realm is vast, and you may roam it freely. There is no enmity between us. I am a descendant of Yan and Huang, an offspring of the people your tribe nurtured for thousands of years. Could you do me a favor and depart from this place?" His main quest was to eliminate the yin energy cloaking Mount Shu. So long as the Drought Ba—no, Lady Ba—left Mount Shu, the quest would be completed. If Lady Ba agreed, he would gladly perform a full kowtow to show his gratitude. Lady Ba stared at him without expression. "I cannot leave! A battle between you and me is unavoidable." *Cannot leave? Ah, so only peak Dominators can freely roam the Spirit Realm, or perhaps only a Level 9 peak Day Wanderer can do it. The old crone truly is unique!* Zhang Yuanqing sighed. "Then please excuse my offense!" Zhang Yuanqing formed a bow and pulled back the string, his fingertips spitting forth solar divine power that condensed into an arrow. *Whoosh!* Golden light cut through the air, striking Lady Ba dead in the chest.