Blood-energy permeated the air. Bodies lay strewn across the ground. Ye Fan stood alone atop the heap of corpses, silently surveying it all — without words, without movement — like a stone statue.

No one remained nearby. Ye Fan had killed until the assembled heroes had gone cold with dread. Even as Great Sages, they had never witnessed such a bloody scene. All those who had fallen were Great Sages — and yet that man whose clothes bore not a single drop of blood had truly once fought battles across the starry sky and protected an entire land and its people?

Just now, he had clearly been like a Demon Lord, killing until people trembled — fighting until the assembled heroes wanted to scream. It had been too terrifying.

Those still alive did not dare draw near. In this moment, every one of them felt their skin crawl. They were each lords of their own domains — from different star domains, each the strongest within their respective stars. Yet here, they had no dignity. They were this diminished — unable to hold their heads up before that man, able only to prostrate themselves beneath his feet. It was a profound humiliation.

They were retreating. Those who had just moments ago been clamoring to kill Ye Fan had all fallen silent. This place filled them with fear.

At the far perimeter, another group of people were moved to excitement — those who had come with reverent hearts to follow in Ye Fan’s footsteps. Their numbers kept growing, surrounding the battlefield.

They were utterly shaken. They could feel the blood in their bodies boiling, and they desperately wanted to beat their chests and howl to the sky, to give voice to the feelings in their hearts. Three hundred years had passed, and that man had survived with unyielding tenacity — still as formidable as ever.

Some had grown up from childhood hearing his legends, their hearts filled with boundless admiration. They had believed he was the strongest, that had he not perished he would inevitably have become a towering and enduring monument.

In many people’s hearts, Ye Fan had long since been deified — transformed into a driving force that inspired them to press ever forward. That such a miracle should now unfold before their very eyes, that they should witness him still alive — how could they not be overcome with emotion?

Just now they had still been afraid, their hearts anxious and unsettled, dreading that Ye Fan might falter and tarnish the invincible myth they held in their hearts.

Ye Fan’s power made their hearts surge and swell. Even stripped of all Dao fragments — he could still do this. Single-handedly he had swept away all those who had provoked him, looking down upon the assembled heroes with absolute disdain. He was even greater than the Holy Body they had imagined in their hearts all those years ago.

“Attack together and kill them!” Those who had come with reverence in their hearts pressed forward, intending to lend Ye Fan a hand.

Ye Fan shook his head and stopped them.

The enemies who had struck were now frightened and wished to retreat. But Ye Fan cast a cold gaze over them, and in an instant their bodies went rigid. The sensation was deeply uncomfortable.

Before them, corpses were piled like mountains. That man stood atop them — after killing so many, not a single drop of blood on him — looking down at them.

Though so many had died, it had all happened in a matter of moments, so swiftly that many had not yet fully comprehended what had taken place.

Tuoba Mo’s right hand was fractured, fresh blood dripping steadily and falling to the ground. His wild, untamed gaze held something cold and savage, like a primordial beast that had awakened — intensely dangerous.

His joints cracked. The bones of his hand mended themselves. He fixed his eyes on Ye Fan, full of indignation. One palm from his opponent had broken his bones — it was insufferably frustrating.

Over all these years, as a top-tier figure among the rising generation, he had suffered setbacks — but never as humiliating as this. Above all, as a Brahma War Body, his physical body should by rights be able to contest a Holy Body in combat. How had this come to pass?

Boom!

Tuoba Mo made his move again. This time, like a primordial savage beast, he brought trailing afterimages in his wake — moving at the absolute limit of speed. Time itself seemed to fall into disarray.

Everyone was dumbfounded. His speed was too great — even someone who had preserved partial cultivation and had it unsevered should not be like this. Moreover, his blood-energy was as vast as an ocean, cracking the sky.

Tuoba Mo grew faster and faster, so fast he nearly vanished from the world — as though he had stepped into a primordial land, roaming between two streams of time, circling Ye Fan without rushing to strike, seeking an opening.

For the first time, Ye Fan’s expression shifted. But it was quickly suppressed. He sensed it — his opponent had mastered the Mobility Character Formula, and thus possessed extreme speed.

It now appeared that the Nine Secrets had not been entirely concentrated on Burial Emperor Star. Fragments had spread to other star domains, been passed down, and inherited by others.

Boom!

Tuoba Mo struck. His momentum climbed to its absolute peak, and with that extraordinary speed he unleashed his combat power to the fullest, driving it forward in attack. He merged with this stretch of heaven and earth, even his breathing and pulse falling into rhythm with it, borrowing the will of the cosmos to suppress Ye Fan.

Yet in that moment, Ye Fan took only a single step — and in an instant the entire great momentum was dissolved. The earth heaved violently. Tuoba Mo’s rhythm broke, as though someone had planted a foot upon his heart!

Who was Ye Fan? In his time, a maniac for battle — one who had refined the Mobility Character Formula to an extreme pinnacle. He broke Tuoba Mo’s rhythm with effortless ease.

The blow landed — heaven and earth collapsed and the earth cracked. The bones of Tuoba Mo’s hand gave a cracking sound and shattered outright. And this time, his entire arm was deformed — completely and utterly twisted.

He let out a wild beast’s howl. As a Brahma War Body, how could he have come out weaker in a contest of physical bodies? He refused to accept it. He could not accept it.

But the facts were before his eyes. He could only retreat with hatred burning in his heart. He resolved to temper his flesh and blood to a higher and deeper realm, then return for battle.

Yet the Mobility Character Formula was useless before Ye Fan. Ye Fan was a supreme grandmaster of that path, able to see through everything. The moment Tuoba Mo took a step, Ye Fan’s foot disrupted his rhythm entirely.

Thud!

Ye Fan swung his leg, sweeping it horizontally across the war body — who had no way to avoid it — forcing him to cough up great mouthfuls of blood. Sounds of cracking bone rang through his body, and he tumbled into a pool of blood.

Ye Fan then took one step forward and planted his foot on Tuoba Mo’s back — like a mountain, pinning him utterly immovable, until even his breath was on the verge of stopping.

Tuoba Mo had once boasted that the Holy Body was old and unfit for battle. Yet now he was suffering this humiliating situation — trampled beneath Ye Fan’s foot in full view of everyone.

“You…”

The veins on Tuoba Mo’s forehead bulged. Yet he could not break free. Ye Fan’s single foot held him down, and despite exerting his entire body’s strength, he had no way to resist.

Thud!

Ye Fan stamped down. Tuoba Mo — that demonic young man — had every bone in his body shattered. His fundamental essence was injured, and all five great secret realms were simultaneously struck. He was completely paralyzed, no longer capable of struggling.

Yet he had not died.

“Why… why did you not kill me?” Tuoba Mo had been fearless before, but at this moment he felt his hair stand on end, profoundly alarmed. He sensed that Ye Fan keeping him alive would be something far more terrifying — it filled him with a great and consuming dread.

Ye Fan glanced at him, said nothing, and looked toward the others. There were still a number of factions with enough fighting strength remaining.

“Fellow Daoist friends, at this juncture do you still intend to hold back? Can you escape his pursuit? There is nothing left now but to fight it out here!” Mo Wentian of Yao Guang’s lineage spoke in a voice that was not loud, yet carried authority and cold resolve. They were going all out.

Two people from their lineage had already been killed in battle. And though he himself had not yet made a move, he knew — Ye Fan was still as powerful as he had been three hundred years ago, as impossible to shake as ever.

Yao Guang’s lineage had six or seven people present in total. However, only Mo Wentian was Yao Guang’s direct disciple. The rest, though they observed the master-disciple rites, were more accurately described as followers — originally the most powerful experts from other star domains who had been subdued. They had received half of the Heavens-Devouring Demonic Art and were cultivating this supreme technique.

Ye Fan swept his gaze over those people and felt a sorrow for them. He knew that some of them were destined to become Yao Guang’s “great medicine” — Yao Guang would use them to gather the great medicines of the mortal world, and then Yao Guang would devour these very people.

In those past years, Hua Yunfei had been exactly this — his existence was to fulfill Yao Guang’s ends, inescapable from that predestined fate. But he had been killed by Ye Fan first.

Killing intent permeated the air, and the battle began again. Someone brought out a forbidden weapon, and within the Immortal Ascension Battlefield it was deployed without being suppressed.

Brilliant radiance instantly flooded this stretch of heaven and earth. The mountains and rivers in the distance were all evaporated and turned to ash. This was an attack of absolute and worldly terror.

Clearly, this was no ordinary forbidden weapon. Otherwise, it would not have been able to unleash its might here. It was deeply shocking.

“Go and die!” Mo Wentian revealed a cruel smile.

In his hand appeared a scroll painting. He deployed it as well — it detonated and blazed at the center of an already boiling battlefield. Another powerful forbidden weapon had taken effect.

“Whoever has a forbidden weapon, bring it out. Use everything. Hold nothing back!” Mo Wentian bellowed.

As a result, another terrifying forbidden weapon flew out and landed at the center of the battlefield. Heaven and earth collapsed!

These were special instruments forged specifically for use in this kind of environment — requiring boundless rare and precious treasures of heaven and earth to complete.

Light — it swallowed Ye Fan’s position entirely. The assembled heroes rallied with excitement. Battle cries shook the heavens once more. They did not believe that Ye Fan — at the lowest point of his life, stripped of every trace of cultivation — could withstand such powerful attacks from Dao principles.

Yet when the radiance withdrew and heaven and earth returned to stillness, they saw a silhouette like a Demon Lord still standing at the center of the field, one foot still planted on Tuoba Mo’s back.

“How is this possible?!” In that moment, everyone was shaken — even Mo Wentian, who had been the first to declare that three hundred years later the human race’s Holy Body no longer existed, felt his courage shatter. He could not help but tremble.

That man stood atop countless corpses — upright amid blood and bone. His black hair hung loose, his eyes deep as the starry sky. He was nothing short of a supreme and unmatched Demonic Lord!

“Without a power at the Quasi-Emperor level, do not dream of tearing apart my flesh,” came the only simple reply — and the next moment, the blood slaughter began!

Ye Fan moved — swift as a thunderclap.

Crack!

He sent one palm flying, and a powerful figure from Yao Guang’s lineage was instantly reduced to a pulp. Then Ye Fan seized a long spear from that position and bored it through two more people’s bodies, leaving them drenched in blood.

In the midst of this, Ye Fan caught sight of the Overlord’s followers roaring as they charged toward him to destroy him — and he could not help but think of that one who had achieved the Great Accomplishment Overlord Body in those years of dark chaos.

Crack!

He swung the war spear in a wide arc. Every single one of those people was shattered apart. Many were cut at the waist and blown apart before the fragments could even scatter. Blood sprayed in every direction.

Then Ye Fan faced three stone men. He brought his full and absolute strength to bear, shattering them until they exploded into fragments, their blood shooting to the sky.

In that moment, Ye Fan’s blood surged and boiled. The Great Accomplishment Overlord Body, the Stone Emperor — who had washed the starry sky in blood — and their related races had never once made things difficult for him. Yet he had suffered this fate.

Many people cried out that three hundred years later, there was no longer a Holy Body Ye Fan of the human race!

Hearing these words, he had at first felt a flicker of anger. But very quickly, he went calm again. On the other shore of the starry heavens, he had long since grown accustomed to things like this — there had been far too many such occurrences.

Old soldiers begging in the streets. Some of the very people driven away by the blood and lives of former martyrs now sat once more in seats of prominence — merely wearing a different face, in fine and elegant dress, sanctimonious and self-righteous.

The human heart. Human nature. All of this was ordinary.

Ye Fan once again became without joy and without worry, his heart still and silent, reaping lives among the Great Sages here. The corpses at his feet grew ever more numerous.

In the end, everyone collapsed. Even Mo Wentian nearly had his courage shattered entirely. With a thunderous sound, the black vase that he had formed through enlightenment of the Dao was slapped apart by Ye Fan — dissolving into a sky full of dark light.

Thud!

Ye Fan’s foot stamped him down into the earth, side by side with Tuoba Mo. All five secret realms were struck through. He could not so much as twitch.

Boom!

Finally, Ye Fan’s fist pulverized Yi Ming’s blue-gold dragon sword. The fragments of the shattered blue sword flew back, piercing into Yi Ming’s own body. He let out a cry and toppled into the pool of blood — lying face-down alongside Tuoba Mo and Mo Wentian.

And all the others were dead — slain by Ye Fan alone!

The ground was soaked in blood. Red mist drifted through the air. The stench of blood was thick. Everywhere were the remains of the dead. It was a scene like something out of the underworld.

In the distance, only the reverent ones remained, and their numbers kept growing. They had all witnessed this world-shaking outcome.

“Both human, and divine, and demonic… unmatched beneath the heavens!”