Previously without comparison, Elder Li knew Ox-Head and Horse-Face were powerful, but he hadn’t expected them to be…

This strong.

Were eight-armed Asuras so insignificant in the Netherworld?

As soon as Ox-Head and Horse-Face appeared, one eight-armed Asura was directly beaten into the ground, and the other three immediately lost their previous cold-blooded killer demeanor.

Whether Asuras were strong or not, Elder Li dared not conclude definitively, but they certainly weren’t weak.

But the Primordial tribal experts were truly fierce!

If spirit path cultivators were powerful, it could be reflected in their pressure and dao rhythms;

The might of body cultivators was mostly hidden in their physical form, merely giving people the impression of being sturdy warriors.

Elder Li appeared completely calm on the surface, but his heart was filled with emotion.

Looking back to those years before the Six Saints emerged, during the chaos of the Ancient Wars between Demon and Primordial tribes, how brilliant that ancient era must have been!

Though it had nothing to do with him.

Ox-Head and Horse-Face using the words ‘pay respects,’ Elder Li felt somewhat inappropriate. Although he and these two Primordial tribal experts were all in the ‘Heavenly Dao Career System,’ they weren’t yet part of the same organization.

Elder Li smiled and said: “Many thanks to both fellow Daoists for lending your aid!

I was just worried these Asuras would harm the mortals in the city, fortunately, you two stepped in!”

These weren’t mere pleasantries; he was genuinely grateful to these two headdress-wearing experts who suddenly descended from the sky.

But when these words reached Ox-Head and Horse-Face’s ears…

The two Primordial men turned to look at the immortal soldiers surrounding the Sea God Temple, then at the group of paper avatars of the old immortal before them…

This Sea God was purely saving their face.

Ox-Head and Horse-Face exchanged glances, their eyes communicating through their masks in an instant.

In Primordial tribal rules, the face was earned through fighting.

Ox-Head clasped his hands and said: “Sea God, please wait, we’ll deal with these Asura remnants! Moo!”

Horse-Face also said: “Usually they hide in the Blood Sea, and we can’t find chances to catch them! Neigh!”

“Thank you both for taking action! Don’t let these Asuras harm the innocent!”

“Got it!”

The two Primordial warriors answered in unison, suddenly turning with fierce gleams in their eyes, two streams of blood qi rising like signal fires, causing heaven and earth to change color!

When the three eight-armed Asuras saw Ox-Head and Horse-Face getting serious, they made their decision almost instantly—

Strategic retreat!

One eight-armed Asura turned to rush out of the Sea God Temple, while the other two directly crashed toward the ground’s cracks!

With a moo and a neigh, Ox-Head and Horse-Face left only after hours as they vanished at extreme speed!

Beneath Elder Li’s avatar, the stone steps instantly turned to powder but only affected an area of roughly ten Zhang square…

Such impressive force control.

Admiration aside, Elder Li’s movements weren’t slow either.

His whisk flicked, going all out!

Underground, over ten paper warriors rushed toward the space transfer formation at the bottom of the crack, blocking the enemy’s escape route.

In the sky, the immortal bean soldiers fired thousands of arrows simultaneously, as pea shooters spat in unison!

Eighteen old immortal paper avatars soared skyward, whirlwinds appeared on the ground, and streams of colorless, odorless poison powder swept into the air.

Elder Li’s spiritual power instantly reached its limit!

In ancient times when the Asura race was at its peak, Asuras were synonymous with fighting to the death and never retreating, steadily ranking at the top of the ‘Just That Tough’ list among second-tier ancient races.

But later, their Ancestor fell, their leaders died, their princesses fled, the Blood Sea dried up, and the cycle of reincarnation was established…

Their current panicked fleeing appearance greatly resembled life itself.

However, only one or two in ten could escape…

The bean soldiers’ saturated firepower was simply too fierce for the four-armed and two-armed Asuras.

Just then, Elder Li suddenly heard several loud booms and saw the ground before the Sea God Temple’s main hall violently shaking, dozens of cracks splitting the earth, causing surrounding civilian homes and courtyard walls to collapse together.

Amidst the collapsing earth and shattering stones, fist, and leg shadows flashed explosively as the four muscular eight-armed Asuras were beaten skyward!

[Netherworld Rising Ox Dominance], [Earth Horse Meteor Kick]!

These four beaten eight-armed Asuras had powerful force coursing through their bodies;

But all this force burst skyward, clearly showing that Ox-Head and Horse-Face had grasped Elder Li’s guiding principle of ‘not harming mortals,’ controlling their force in the vertical direction.

Immediately after, two afterimages flickered gently from the ground, instantly appearing a hundred zhang in the sky, intercepting these four figures again.

Ox-Head’s iron fists, Horse-Face’s flying kicks.

The two Primordial tribal experts seemed to throw punches and kicks casually, yet produced countless fist and leg shadows throughout the sky, accompanied by rhythmic shouts of “moo” and “neigh.”

The four eight-armed Asuras weren’t completely powerless to resist…

Initially, these four eight-armed Asuras each burst out with powerful auras, struggling desperately, but the gap in their attack speed and power compared to Ox-Head and Horse-Face was very obvious!

How could the Primordial tribal battle methods be famous for nothing?

Once suppressed, there was no chance for recovery!

In the blink of an eye, the two Primordial tribal experts had executed countless moves, space constantly fluctuating, high clouds dispersing, as the four eight-armed Asuras’ bodies were gradually torn apart…

Ox-Head’s voice came from above:

“Lord Sea God! Do you want them alive or dead!”

“You two, eliminate evil thoroughly!”

“What does that mean…”

Elder Li: “Kill them!”

“Alright!”

Ox-Head answered with a great laugh, appearing in the sky with Horse-Face, one on the left, one on the right.

Then, Ox-Head stamped his foot while Horse-Face flipped, the two Primordials charging forward fiercely, their movements seeming slow but actually fast, their fists and kicks carrying great power and momentum!

Shortly after, blood rain exploded across the sky as the four eight-armed Asuras were quickly torn to pieces by the two Primordial tribal experts…

The scene was rather brutal.

Paper warriors immediately began busying themselves, quickly gathering and merging these blood chunks and the remnants of the other Asuras.

Ox-Head and Horse-Face weren’t idle either, their figures directly charging upward like tigers among sheep, swiftly clearing the Asuras surrounded by bean soldiers in the sky, while destroying those sixteen vortexes along the way.

Elder Li looked up at these two figures…

For body cultivation supremacy, seek Primordial generals in the Netherworld!

Moments later, Ox-Head and Horse-Face jumped back, their clothes unstained by blood, their fists and kicks unharmed, grinning at Elder Li.

Elder Li smiled and said: “Please sit inside the hall for a moment, let me deal with these corpses and settle the aftermath, and then I’ll properly host you two.”

Ox-Head hurriedly said: “Please attend to your business!”

Then, Ox-Head and Horse-Face obediently headed toward the front hall;

However, they had only taken two steps when they heard two creaking sounds as the Sea God Temple’s front hall swayed like a drunk, holding on for several moments before collapsing with a boom!

A cloud of dust rushed toward them, causing Ox-Head and Horse-Face to freeze on the spot.

“Ox, what do we do, the hall’s foundation seems to have been accidentally damaged by us earlier.”

“Shh! Keep your voice down!

How dare we admit to this, could you afford to compensate?”

Elder Li quickly said: “This hall was old and in need of repair, it was going to be rebuilt anyway, don’t worry about it, please wait here for a moment.”

Fortunately, the back hall remained intact, probably protected by the Taiji Diagram.

Elder Li immediately began cleaning up the aftermath, using eight avatars to lead the sky full of bean soldiers toward the South Sea to aid the dragon protectors;

Meanwhile, four paper warriors stood before the mountain of corpses, raising their hands to spray streams of Three-True Flames, simultaneously beginning the standardized corpse-handling procedure.

As the Three-True Flames rose, dozens of soul-catching pearls spun around, while paper warriors took out clappers, soul-summoning bells, and wooden fish, striking and ringing them while chanting scriptures.

Due to increasingly tense relations with the Western Religion, Elder Li had replaced the往生咒 with the Jade Pure Soul-Pacifying Incantation.

After all, they were all for dealing with remnant souls.

This scene was naturally a trivial matter for Elder Li, but Ox-Head and Horse-Face watched with great interest from the side.

Ox-Head folded his arms and muttered: “Lord Sea God’s handling this… quite ceremonially, moo.”

Horse-Face, combing his sleek mane with his little comb, said, “The Asuras are getting restless again, seems they’ve recovered their strength, we should remind the tribe later.”

“Don’t worry, how could the Great Tribal Sacrifice not know? We’ll just gather some brothers and take a few trips through the Blood Sea.”

“True.”

Elder Li walked over, smiling: “Is there still warfare between the Blood Sea and the Netherworld?”

“About once every ten thousand years we fight,” Ox-Head rubbed his big hands, chuckling as he told Elder Li about the Netherworld’s battles.

Before long, the true flames had gradually extinguished.

Elder Li placed most of his attention on the paper warrior that had been waiting aside, gently pushing with his hand…

This feeling, this slight resistance of the air, this softness of sleeves brushing against arms as they moved, this sense of steadiness and peace as the ashes drifted upward.

Ah, satisfying.

…

“Great Primordial?”

In a corner of the South Sea, at the edge of an underwater volcano, Golden Cicada sat in the mountain’s shadow with eyes closed and brows furrowed, his delicate features showing slight confusion.

How did this Sea God have connections with the Primordial tribe?

As a primordial fierce beast, a species once hunted by the Primordial tribe, Golden Cicada held an indescribable aversion to them, along with some trepidation.

He clearly remembered that period when the Dragon tribe was suppressed in the Four Seas by the Heavenly Dao, the Phoenix tribe was nearly extinct, and the hundred ancient races were just beginning to rise—how formidable the Primordial tribe was, how fierce, how…

Voracious!

Many fierce beasts that dwelled on the Primordial Earth in ancient times were forced by the Primordial tribe to flee into the Chaos Sea.

Now, the Northern Continent’s Primordial tribe was half-defunct, with powerful Primordial experts remaining only in the Netherworld’s Dark Office…

“Could it be that the Netherworld also intends to side with the Heavenly Court?”

Golden Cicada pondered carefully.

The Sea God’s importance to the Heavenly Court was self-evident;

If he could find the Sea God’s true body and deal with it without anyone knowing, the Heavenly Court would have far fewer threats, and there would be more opportunities for him to achieve merit…

However, this Sea God was hidden too deeply and had Supreme Pure Saint’s protection, so this idea could only remain an idea, difficult to put into action.

Golden Cicada looked through the endless seawater at the vast army of bean soldiers arriving in the South Sea sky, coldly snorted, stood up, casually parted the seawater before him, and his figure quickly vanished from the volcano’s edge.

This probe yielded little, seeing only flashy displays.

‘I don’t believe it.

Sea God, you might hide for now, but you can’t hide forever!’

…

The sudden great battle in the South Sea came and went quickly.

When the Dragon tribe’s powerful experts came to assist, with bean soldiers flanking from both sides, the Asuras who had ambushed the true dragon protectors in the South Sea were swiftly annihilated.

The Dragon tribe was naturally furious, but the Four Seas were far from the Blood Sea, and they couldn’t send troops to the Netherworld at this time. They could only repeatedly apologize to Elder Li, saying their guards arrived late and so on.

Elder Li instead comforted the Dragon tribe elder who led the group, merely showing the tragic state of the Sea God Temple;

The Dragon tribe elder made an immediate decision—rebuild the Sea God Temple, increase its scale tenfold, arrange various protective formations, and send a large group of Dragon tribe craftsmen to help tomorrow!

Even so, Elder Li still suffered some losses.

The consumption of thirty thousand bean soldiers, poison pills, and powder, in exchange for merely four Blood Killing Treasure Zhenzhus…

—These were purified from the eight-armed Asuras’ blood-killing energy, which even the Three-True Flames couldn’t burn.

If Elder Li hadn’t deduced through his pill dao that these four pearls could be refined into poison weapon artifacts effective against Golden Immortals, he would truly have suffered a great loss…

After talking with Ox-Head and Horse-Face for a while, Elder Li also ruled out the possibility of the Netherworld plotting this matter.

He could confirm that the Western Religion was behind this mischief again.

They probably wanted to kill the chicken to scare the monkey, giving him some hard times by destroying his temple and eliminating his avatar;

But they hadn’t expected two sturdy warriors to appear halfway, easily defeating this group of Asuras.

The paper warrior accompanying his grandmaster and master continued pretending to be in seclusion;

The Crossing Immortal Gate’s disciple selection journey had now reached the mortal world, observing the character and talents of his senior uncle’s reincarnated body…

That side didn’t need much of his attention, just maintaining vigilance was enough.

In the Sea God Temple’s back hall;

Elder Li chatted and joked with Ox-Head and Horse-Face, catering to their interests by ordering returned divine envoys to find the city’s ten best chefs to prepare a feast of meat dishes.

Faced with spirit stones, precious materials, and pills that Elder Li gave them, Ox-Head and Horse-Face politely declined, repeatedly saying “This is what we should do,” “Lord Sea God, you’re too kind,” “We have no use for these things anyway, our divine power is innate.”

But when dishes prepared by roasting, grilling, frying, and deep-frying were served…

Their headdresses became wet…

Half a day later, ten mortal master chefs collapsed before the stoves, while the two Primordial experts patted their round bellies, letting out satisfied sighs.

Ox-Head chuckled twice, somewhat embarrassedly saying: “Well, Lord Sea God, please attend to your business.

If there’s nothing else, we’ll take our leave now.”

Elder Li smiled and said: “Why don’t you two stay here and feast for several months? The mortal realm has countless delicacies!”

Ox-Head muttered: “Though this flavor is good, the texture still isn’t like…”

Horse-Face beside him kicked Ox-Head, who immediately started chuckling.

They had originally just come through the well mouth without notifying the Netherworld, and indeed couldn’t stay long outside.

Elder Li was quite grateful to the two Primordial experts in his heart. When Ox-Head and Horse-Face were leaving, he ordered divine envoys to buy large amounts of meat ingredients that could be simply barbecued, filling several storage treasures.

Though the Primordial tribe had weak primordial spirits, they could still open ordinary storage treasures.

When Ox-Head and Horse-Face received this weighty gift, they were instantly moved to tears, immediately treating the Sea God as a heart-to-heart brother, a true life-and-death friendship!

“Lord Sea God, if you need anything, just call through the City God! We’ll come right away!”

“We’ll watch the Blood Sea carefully, absolutely won’t let them come disturb Lord Sea God again!”

Elder Li could only express thanks, not knowing what else to say.

He had previously promised Ox-Head and Horse-Face to visit the Primordial tribal groups in the North Utmost Continent and needed to put that on the schedule soon.

Sometimes he was a bit too cautious, but he still had some conscience.

After seeing off Ox-Head and Horse-Face, Elder Li continued busy with the Sea God Temple reconstruction matters and began planning in his heart how to strike back at the Western Religion’s peripheral forces.

Courtesy demands reciprocity!

The kind-hearted get bullied, and the benevolent beasts get ridden by immortals!

If he appeared too weak, it wouldn’t suit the current situation.

Well, their Sea God Religion solemnly promised that under normal circumstances, they wouldn’t use weapons of mass destruction like ‘Old Man Zhao.’

If Elder Li remembered correctly, the Western Religion still had a group of deep-sea great demons as subordinates…

The Heavenly Court also needed to boost its prestige.

However, what Elder Li hadn’t anticipated was that the two Primordial experts he’d just sent off took a turn…

Flying toward the East Victory Divine Continent.

“Ox, how can we find the Sea God’s friend Li Changshou, why didn’t we ask the Sea God about this earlier? Neigh!”

“Horse, how could we tell the Sea God, I wrecked your temple, ate your food, took your gifts, and now want to exploit your friend? Moo—”

“But, we’re just looking for some seasonings…”

“Do you think such delicious seasonings would be cheap? First, think about what we have that could trade for these treasures.”

“Fast-track reincarnation passage?”

“Hmm, that’s not bad…”