Fast and Slow

The moment the Void Swords emerged, everyone clearly felt a horrifying sharpness so piercing that nothing could withstand it. "Smash it!" divine sense rippled from God Emperor Yinghuo. The other three God Emperors deployed their methods as well, surging toward Yaoguang with techniques to interfere, weaken, and suppress. Even so, the first Void Sword to slash forth still shattered the Scarlet Flame Streamer—the Dao art God Emperor Yinghuo had unleashed with full might. Before his second Scarlet Flame Streamer could fully coalesce, the second Void Sword followed the shattered wake of the first and slashed directly into his divine body. Although a protective Dao artifact instantly manifested over him and barely managed to block the second sword, the energy within it transmitted through, jolting into his Divine Kingdom. For Yinghuo, who was already strained to his limit under the forbidden art, the interior of his Divine Kingdom began to collapse. Yaoguang maintained this deliberate rhythm, launching his next volley without haste. Not only that, but he also summoned the Heaven-Sealing Stele. Using its power to suppress Yinghuo's Scarlet Flame Streamer, he laid bare the trajectory of the Dao art, making it plainly visible so he no longer had to rely solely on Void Flicker to evade as he had at the start. Under this subsequent round of Void Swords, God Emperor Yinghuo's protective Dao artifact shattered, forcing him to expend a life-saving talisman. Yet before he could even catch his breath, a fresh barrage of Void Swords bore down upon him. The offensive was simple. The tactic was utterly straightforward, but it was precisely this simplicity that exerted a suffocating oppression and despair. Because... The Void Swords were simply too powerful! They were so mighty that only the combined might of all four God Emperors could break a single sword. And Yaoguang unleashed two at once. It was like two nations at war: no matter what economic strategies, psychological warfare, or tactical maneuvers one side employed, the other responded with only a single move—launching nuclear warheads, two at a time. Under such circumstances, the side without warheads stood no chance at all. By only the fourth round, God Emperor Huiguang and the other God Emperor were the first to buckle. Having ignited their forbidden arts, their Divine Kingdoms violently shook, on the verge of collapse. Seeing this, Yaoguang found an opening to flick a blast of Great Annihilation Sword Qi at each of them, sending their bodies flying backward out of the battlefield. As for the remaining two... Or more accurately, God Emperor Yinghuo, the only one capable of exchanging a few blows with him—his aura suddenly plummeted off a cliff. Yaoguang felt a momentary curiosity, wondering if Yinghuo was scheming something, but upon closer inspection, he realized that this God Emperor had relied entirely on refining true god essence to clash head-on with him. And now... The energy of that true god essence was exhausted. *I was wondering how this God Emperor was so fierce. Aren't the God races supposed to be weakened once they leave their Divine Kingdoms? If he could still withstand half my offensive even while weakened, then if he were in his Divine Kingdom... wouldn't I have had to use my full power against him alone?* Snapping back to the moment, Yaoguang slashed downward with another pair of Void Swords. This time, God Emperor Yinghuo could endure no longer. His entire divine body, along with his Divine Kingdom, was cleaved clean through by the successive strikes! "Flee! Scatter and run! Save whoever can be saved!" This God Emperor's divine sense rippled with mingled fury and terror. "We were all deceived! His strength far exceeds what he showed! Forget the top ten of the Dao Lord Candidate List—even Kong Xuan and Tianxiao might not be stronger than him! Only Destruction God Lord standing in an earthly divine kingdom could face him! I will buy you a final sliver of hope—run!" In the next instant, the energy contained within his Divine Kingdom unleashed entirely, churning toward Yaoguang like an incomparable deluge of destruction. This was... A self-detonation! With a thought, Yaoguang activated Void Flicker, vanishing from this patch of starry space in a flash. Nowadays, the self-detonation of a peak Void Shattering expert could not harm him in the slightest; at most, it only reduced the spoils he could claim. Meanwhile, the remaining three God Emperors did not hesitate for a fraction of a second. Transforming into three streaks of light, they surged in separate directions. "Flee? Do you think you can?" Techniques for wielding the Grand Dao of the Void that belonged to Dao Lords flashed across Yaoguang's mind. He abruptly raised his right hand and tapped the air toward the Heaven-Sealing Stele above his head. A visible ripple of void power erupted from this high-grade Dao artifact. Instantly, the three God Emperors shooting outward as streaks of light froze in place, like insects trapped in amber. As the void ripples settled and the power of the Grand Dao of the Void faded, the process... Just as receding seawater draws back grains of sand, the three God Emperors were dragged backward by the dispersing power of the Grand Dao of the Void. Such exquisite application of void power scared the three God Emperors out of their wits. Straining their Divine Kingdoms to the absolute limit, they attempted once more to turn into light and escape. Yaoguang simply repeated his earlier motion. He suppressed the three with void power, then harnessed the "reversion" force that smoothed space as the Dao faded, dragging them back once again. After several repetitions, not only had the three God Emperors failed to escape the Heaven-Sealing Stele's suppression, but the two weaker ones broke first. "No!" Amidst desperate, unwilling ripples of divine sense, their Divine Kingdoms collapsed one after the other. "Yaoguang, does your Heavenly Dao Sect truly intend to wage all-out war against our Light God race?" God Emperor Tianqin cried out in despair at the sight. Yaoguang cast him a peculiar look. "Shouldn't your real worry right now be whether your Light God race will be slaughtered to the last for provoking me? After all... even if the Dao Integration expert behind you comes, it certainly won't be within the next century or two. And never mind a century or two—if I make a move, within twenty years at most, every single member of your Light God race at or above the Void Refining realm will be slaughtered by my hand." At these words, God Emperor Tianqin's pupils shrank violently. "You..." "It is over," Yaoguang said, flipping his hand to deliver four blasts of Great Annihilation Sword Qi. "One day, the great God Sovereign will avenge me—" "Completely unoriginal." Yaoguang pressed down with an ethereal hand. Imprisoned and immobilized by the Heaven-Sealing Stele, God Emperor Tianqin was instantly swallowed by the Great Annihilation Sword Qi. In truth, this God Emperor shared the exact same disposition as God Emperor Suoka before him. Even their threats were virtually identical. Both thought to intimidate him with the Light God race and the Dao Integration being backing them. However, since God Emperor Suoka had already branded him with a streamer mark, wiping out the Light God race—and, if conditions permitted, slaying that Radiant God Sovereign—seemed to be the only permanent solution to avoid endless pursuit in the future. Under such circumstances... Naturally, before putting that plan into action, he had to weaken the Light God race's resistance as much as possible. With that in mind, he executed a Void Flicker, shooting straight toward the divine battleship. Sensing disaster, the Void Refining gods aboard attempted to pilot the vessel away, but how could they outrun Yaoguang's Void Flicker? As waves of terrifying energy deluges ravaged this starry expanse, the battle quickly came to a close. Having cleared out every divine being in the vicinity, Yaoguang glanced at the Dao Lord secret treasury he had uprooted, lingering no longer. Flashing through the void, he soon made his way toward the battleship carrying Li Hanqiu and the others. Before long, his figure flashed directly inside the vessel. "Sect Master!" Seeing him appear, everyone bowed in greeting. "Let us leave. This patch of starry space will soon grow turbulent. Depart before the spatial fabric collapses and return to the Heavenly Dao Sect," Yaoguang ordered. "Understood!" Li Hanqiu swiftly went to work at the helm. The ship's detection instruments had already picked up the violent tremors from that direction. Yet even traveling at the speed of light, those energies had an inherent delay relative to Yaoguang; though the battle was already finished, the destructive shockwaves had yet to diffuse across this region of space. The battleship resumed traversing the void nodes. Yaoguang reviewed the course of the battle in his mind. This fight... It had been even easier than his earlier clash with Qiming, God Emperor Suoka, and the rest. The intensity had not even matched his battles against Demon Lords like Tianyu and Guiye. Yet in truth, both Tianqin and Yinghuo were vastly superior to Demon Lord Tianyu. God Emperor Yinghuo in particular was the Light God race's trump card, a figure groomed to counter True Monarch Jinghong. Even outside his earthly divine kingdom, his overall strength was likely not inferior to Zhen Xuanyuan's, and perhaps even half a step above. *Within the Void Shattering realm, I should have no rivals left. Even facing an encirclement of eight or ten Void Shattering experts, I could emerge victorious... In other words, setting aside Dao Lords, I already possess the capability to wipe out a top-tier sect single-handedly, even if they are guarded by a fourteenth- or fifteenth-rank grand formation. After all, my [Formation] skill has broken through to rank sixteen; breaching a fifteenth-rank formation is merely a matter of time.* Yaoguang smiled faintly with composed confidence. Of course, when wiping out a top-tier sect, how could one truly set aside Dao Lords? After all, a Dao Lord was the standard fixture of any top-tier force. Moreover, he could not guarantee that some top-tier factions did not possess quasi-Dao Lords like Venerable Golden Book. When such figures cooperated with a fifteenth-rank grand formation, even an incoming Dao Lord would find it a headache. *Next... four God Emperors, two damaged high-grade Dao artifacts, three intact Dao artifacts, twelve damaged Dao artifacts...* Tallying the gains from this battle, Yaoguang turned his attention to the glazed treasure tree within his spiritual world. *The Merchant branch actually performed quite well too?* With that thought, he channeled all the energy accumulated in the [Demon Hunting] and [Merchant] branches straight into the [Dao Integration: Void] branch. Under this infusion of energy, the branch grew slightly at a sluggish pace, and then... Nothing. Yaoguang focused on the progress value, which remained hovering at one in ten thousand, and frowned slightly. *It probably increased by roughly four in one hundred thousand.* And of that four in one hundred thousand, the four God Emperors... They accounted for about 0.0025%, while the other 0.0015% was provided by the two damaged high-grade Dao artifacts and the collection of ordinary Dao artifacts. "Far too little," Yaoguang sighed softly from the bottom of his heart. Yet a moment later, another realization struck him. A Dao Lord's might was boundless; even hundreds or thousands of Void Shattering experts joining hands might not necessarily contend with one. And across all of Beihai Star, there were eight hundred if not a thousand Void Shattering experts in total. Calculating by this proportional growth, it would take only a hundred-odd thousand Void Shattering cultivators to complete the [Dao Integration: Void] stage of cultivation... That could practically be described as advancing by leaps and bounds. *Looked at that way, it isn't actually that much. I just wonder if these gains will experience diminishing returns as my cultivation rises.* Pondering this, Yaoguang soon immersed his mind in the insights brought by the newly gained four-in-a-hundred-thousand progress. He hoped this progress... Would grant him meaningful breakthroughs in his cultivation methods.