Shadow and his companions had arrived long ago. They chose to remain hidden rather than join the battle because, as Third Realm cultivators, they were practically insignificant before a First Realm Bodhisattva. If targeted by the Liuli Bodhisattva with her Practitioner’s Divine Form, they would only become burdens to Shen Shu.
Therefore, after secretly establishing contact with Shen Shu, the Dark Insect Division leader silently concealed himself within Shen Shu’s shadow, serving as an escape method when necessary. This proved remarkably effective.
“Hmph, a group of little mice has arrived.”
Liuli Bodhisattva’s delicate brows furrowed slightly, her snow-white perfect face devoid of emotion. In the next moment, she appeared hundreds of zhang in the sky, surveying the vast earth below. Her gaze swept across, catching sight of the Insect Clan leaders in the far distance.
They hadn’t dared approach the battlefield, suppressing their auras beyond the perception range of the three Bodhisattvas.
Amidst howling winds, Liuli Bodhisattva’s snow-white figure shattered in the wind, reappearing above the Insect Clan leaders’ heads. Her black hair and white clothes billowed fiercely in the wind as her cold pool-like beautiful eyes looked down at them.
She planned to eliminate the Insect Clan leaders first, while Buddha and her two companions would keep Shen Shu occupied.
Long Tu reacted first. The nine-chi-tall warrior’s leg muscles exploded with power, shattering the ground as he charged toward Liuli Bodhisattva overhead. During his charge, his skin turned crimson red as blood mist erupted from his pores.
Already half-step into the Second Realm, he relied on blood sacrifice techniques to burst forth with speed and presence comparable to a Second Realm cultivator.
Poison Insect Division leader Ba Ji’s cheeks bulged beyond human limits as he spewed arrow-like deep purple poison mist toward Liuli Bodhisattva.
Luan Yu, with her slender waist, long legs, and full chest, had a strange light surge in her eyes as she attempted to stir carnal desires within Liuli Bodhisattva. All living beings possess such desires.
Chun Yan, elegant and intellectual in bearing, opened her palm toward Liuli Bodhisattva.
Empathy!
You Shi controlled two corpse puppets beside him, wielding top-grade insect treasure blades as they charged at Liuli, attempting to coordinate with Long Tu.
A blush rose to Liuli Bodhisattva’s beautiful face, but in the next moment, her colorless crystal domain enveloped the Insect Clan leaders.
The airborne Long Tu and two corpse puppets fell back to the ground. The streaking poison mist suddenly slowed, becoming like morning fog, losing its previous ferocity.
Except for Luan Yu’s ability to stir desire, which successfully affected Liuli, everyone else’s techniques proved useless before this First Realm Bodhisattva. Even though Luan Yu managed to ignite Liuli’s desires, making her uncontrollably think of men, it still failed to truly muddle her mind.
Liuli was a Buddhist Bodhisattva who practiced the Chan Master system, naturally possessing extremely strong resistance against the seven emotions and six desires.
A jade knife slipped from her sleeve as her jade-like fingers gripped it. With crisscrossing slashes, waves of intersecting jade-colored blade light swept across.
Long Tu’s head flew off; Ba Ji was cut in half at the waist; Chun Yan’s legs separated from her body and her chest cavity split; You Shi was bisected; Luan Yu saw the sky flip as she watched her headless body collapse powerlessly…
Blood instantly dyed the earth red as broken limbs scattered about.
Fear and despair rose in the hearts of the transcendent insect masters. Except for Long Tu and Ba Ji with their special constitutions, the other transcendent insect masters lacked immortal bodies, their lives rapidly fading.
The only reason they didn’t die instantly was due to the vigorous life force of transcendent realm cultivators, allowing them to survive a few moments longer.
But death was inevitable.
Suddenly, a clear light streaked across the sky, breaking through the colorless crystal domain, and restoring color to the Insect Clan leaders and surrounding scenery.
An ancient engraving knife pierced through the domain, embedding itself in the ground.
Besides the knife, clear light rose as Zhao Shou appeared, wearing a scholar’s cap and crimson official robes. He waved his hand and declared:
“No killing shall be permitted here!”
Pristine light wrapped around Liuli Bodhisattva’s body. This light wouldn’t harm her, but as long as she harbored killing intent, it would hinder her movements.
Knowing this brief control wouldn’t truly restrain Liuli Bodhisattva, Zhao Shou chanted:
“Do not move!”
Another beam of clear light descended, transforming into iron chains that bound Liuli Bodhisattva.
Has he lost his mind? Rather than anger, bewilderment first arose in Liuli Bodhisattva’s heart.
A mere Third Realm Confucian dared to restrain her like this? Even with the scholar’s cap and engraving knife bearing part of the backlash, these two commands alone would cost Zhao Shou half his life.
“Whoosh!”
A piercing whistle suddenly rang out, bursting eardrums as a magnificent sword light shot forth, striking toward the immobilized Liuli Bodhisattva.
Without seeing the flying sword’s owner, Liuli Bodhisattva knew Luo Yuhen had arrived. Besides her, besides this First Realm Immortal of the Human Sect, no one else could summon such terrifying, magnificent sword qi.
She was about to break free from Zhao Shou’s restraints to dodge the flying sword at greater speed.
At this moment, a gray-haired Daoist priest arrived riding a flying sword from afar. From a great distance, he opened his palm toward Liuli Bodhisattva and made a grabbing motion, as if taking something away.
At the same instant, Chun Yan, on the brink of death, gathered her last trace of consciousness to use empathy on Liuli Bodhisattva.
This time, she succeeded.
Golden Lotus Daoist had taken away most of Liuli Bodhisattva’s fortune, turning her into an unlucky person.
Under empathy, her survival instinct instantly vanished. Like the current Chun Yan, her heart is filled with despair and helplessness, passively awaiting death.
Under successive controls, Liuli Bodhisattva lost the initiative and was pierced through the chest by that magnificent golden light.
This country-toppling beautiful Bodhisattva’s body split into pieces, crimson blood spraying as her primordial spirit rapidly dissipated.
The sword destroyed her physical form while the heart sword destroyed her soul!
The Human Sect’s heart sword specifically countered primordial spirits. Even fellow Daoist cultivators didn’t dare directly face the Human Sect’s heart sword, let alone a Buddhist Bodhisattva.
At that moment, boundless Buddhist light bloomed in the distance, transforming into a hundred-zhang-tall magnificent golden body. This golden body held a jade bottle, eyes full of compassion, as dazzling golden light surged from the bottle’s mouth like a great river, engulfing Liuli Bodhisattva and the others.
Bathed in the golden light, Liuli Bodhisattva’s scattered body rapidly healed, while the three dying Insect Clan leaders regained life.
Only Zhao Shou thoroughly suffered the rules’ backlash, an injury the Medicine Buddha’s divine form couldn’t heal.
This reversal didn’t surprise Zhao Shou at all. Rather, everything had been within his plans.
When he finally reached the battlefield and assessed the situation, he knew the Insect Clan leaders would certainly die, with no one able to save them. Using his scholar’s intellect, he immediately focused on the Buddha’s Medicine Master divine form.
To force Buddha to use the Medicine Master divine form, Liuli Bodhisattva had to be drawn in.
At such a great distance, with numerous Great Feng transcendents and Shen Shu blocking the way, Buddha couldn’t save only Liuli without indiscriminately covering everyone.
This was exactly what Zhao Shou wanted.
Therefore, as soon as he appeared, he restrained Liuli Bodhisattva regardless of the cost, hoping to convey his thoughts to his companions through such drastic means. Fortunately, Luo Yuhen and Golden Lotus Daoist were extremely intelligent people who immediately understood his plan.
Among the Insect Clan, only the heart insect master Chun Yan saw through Zhao Shou’s intentions and cooperated.
Of course, if Buddha had been unwilling to use the Medicine Master’s divine form, trading several Insect Clan transcendents for a Buddhist Bodhisattva would still have been profitable.
Liuli Bodhisattva flashed back to Garo Tree and Guangxian’s side, back to Buddha’s side, her snow-white perfect face showing a trace of annoyance.
Golden Lotus Daoist rode his flying sword to land beside the Insect Clan leaders, stroking his beard as he smiled:
“Rest and recover for now, leave this place to us.”
As his words fell, several streaks of light successively arrived: Duer and Hengyuan riding golden Buddhist light; Li Miaozen on her flying sword; Yang Gong stepping on his hijacked mount; Sun Xuanji arriving through a transmission array.
As well as Master Kou of Kouyang Prefecture, who rushed from Sword Prefecture to the battlefield using the most basic wind-riding technique.
Except for Asura who was still in seclusion, all Great Feng transcendents qualified to participate in battle had arrived.
…
Overseas, in the Returning Void.
In the center of an island comparable to a small continent, that black hole that devoured all things had gradually weakened over the past three days, beginning to contract, until today when it finally disappeared completely.
What the black hole left behind was a bottomless abyss a hundred li in diameter, with spider web-like fissures extending in all directions from its edge.
One could imagine that if this continued, this small continent would fragment due to the “black hole.”
“Boom, boom, boom…”
Deafening sounds transmitted from the abyss, causing the outer fissures to expand, creating earthquake-like effects.
Before long, a sheep-bodied human-faced monster crawled out from the abyss. It was completely black, without fur or scales, its eyes amber-colored with cold, emotionless pupils, and six slightly curved horns atop its head.
Its body size rivaled mountains, its eyes like amber-colored small lakes, its horns as tall as city walls.
Since the beginning of heaven and earth, only ancient gods and demons nurtured by heaven and earth could grow to such exaggerated sizes.
Huang raised its head, gazing at the azure sky through narrowed lake-sized eyes.
“After endless years, I have finally returned to my peak.”
Its voice thundered and echoed through heaven and earth.
The sky’s weather changed as ink-like clouds surged forth, blocking out the sun and sky as thunder and lightning rolled.
Apocalyptic winds swept across the sea surface and island.
The return of an ancient god-demon triggered exaggerated heavenly phenomena.
After enjoying a moment of free air, Huang opened its eyes and slowly said:
“The world hasn’t changed, I’ve awakened just in time.”
Then its amber pupils suddenly contracted, revealing fierce light.
It focused its attention on one of its horns, speaking in human language with majestic dignity:
“Overseer, regardless of who you are or what background you have, it doesn’t matter.”
As it spoke, the horn sealing the Overseer suddenly expanded into a vortex that devoured everything.
Except for ancient gods and demons, among today’s various cultivation systems, transcendent realm practitioners only utilized rules, while only super-realm practitioners could control and influence rules.
The spellcaster system had no super-realm, and in Huang’s view, the so-called “Great Feng won’t perish, the Overseer won’t die” was merely a utilization of rules.
Now that its spirit essence had recovered, its innate divine abilities were unstoppable, giving it full confidence in devouring the Overseer, ignoring the characteristics of the spellcaster system.
After all, in ancient times, it could even devour other gods’ and demons’ spirit essence.
And spirit essence was transformed from heaven and earth’s rules.
If it could devour rules, what was a mere fate master?
Amidst rolling vortexes, a weak clear light lit up, like a candle in a storm, flickering and drifting, seemingly about to extinguish and be swept into the vortex at any moment.
But as time passed second by second, the clear light somehow persisted, never consumed by the vortex.
Obvious emotion flashed through Huang’s amber pupils.
“Heh…”
From within the horn came the Overseer’s low laughter.