Chapter 552

Wu Tie almost ran forward, closely hugging the ground, with a fugitive chief whose limbs were all shattered on his back.

Terrifying, utterly terrifying.

Truly a super-terror never seen before.

Battles in the Divine Manifestation Realm completely exceeded the limits of imagination of the Embryo Storage Realm. In the Embryo Storage Realm, body cultivators in close combat simply hack and slash wildly; spell cultivators at a distance merely unleash various thunderstorms and gales.

And in the Divine Manifestation Realm, their every move brings about heavenly phenomena, sea-turned-to-field, and one unimaginable scene after another. The sea floats in the sky, the earth becomes a black hole, stars collide across the heavens, and all kinds of strange things proliferate.

Ao Chi and eighteen terrifying experts who appeared from nowhere caught the descending gods off guard, on the spot killing seven divine spirits and seriously wounding twelve. Afterwards they formed a strange formation and fought the dozens of descending divine spirits into a melee.

Linghu Qingqing was the first to shout.

The four elders of the Linghu Clan protected Old Master Hu, Hu Tu, and others, closely following Linghu Qingqing as they fled.

Over a thousand fugitives, dozens of chiefs each leading hundreds of confidants fled at breakneck speed; only a small unlucky fraction were obliterated by the battle's aftermath, while most chiefs, fortunate, escaped with their subordinates.

Wu Tie, however, was curious and glanced back while fleeing.

Merely a glance, and some divine spirit of unknown lineage let out a piercing wail; instantly heaven and earth overturned, yin and yang scrambled, the five phases and six unions turned into a thin gruel, and Wu Tie immediately spat blood from his seven orifices, his divine fetus nearly shattering.

A strange divine-soul attack left Wu Tie gravely wounded; panting, he bore aloft a fugitive chief stunned by the shock and floating beside him, fleeing with all his might.

Aside from the Hu clan people taken by Linghu Qingqing and the four elders, aside from the dozens of fortunate chiefs and their hundreds of confidants nearby, the great army that Linghu Qingqing and Old Master Hu brought was utterly annihilated.

Wu Tie, carrying the unconscious fugitive chief who kept vomiting blood behind him, sprinted toward the Northern Border of the Great Jin Divine State, muttering lowly: "Brother, I just happened to save your life… hey, you owe me this favor."

The reason he saved that fugitive chief was that Wu Tie knew full well that such chiefs were the Hu clan's true confidants; if he fled alone, meeting Old Master Hu later would be hard to explain his whereabouts.

Carrying this half-dead fellow provides a living witness, saving much trouble.

All the way, gradually distancing themselves from Ao Chi's battlefield, the howling winds and thunder faded, the terrifying magical undulations vanished; looking back, only a faint glimmer could be seen on the far horizon.

Here, the distance from Ao Chi's battlefield is already immense.

Wu Tie set down the fugitive chief he had been carrying, gave him a casual blow to the back of the head to ensure he wouldn't wake for three to five days. Standing atop a great mountain, he gazed inexplicably toward the direction of Ao Chi's battle.

Wu Tie still couldn't fathom how Ao Chi and his companions had set up their ambush and trap.

Their ambush target must have been those gods descending from the heavenly vaults; Wu Tie wondered how Ao Chi and company had laid this trap. Following Old Master Hu on this quest for secrets and innate treasures, they had seen a few of the strange primeval beings—drought demons, corpse hounds, Great Master Fang, and the like—but none were as bizarre as Ao Chi's gang.

The sun gradually set westward, and Wu Tie stood on the mountaintop, dazed.

He wondered what results Ao Chi's ambush had yielded. Alas, with his present strength he didn't even qualify to watch up close.

Wu Tie drew a deep breath and then exhaled heavily, as if to vent all his resentment and gloom.

"Resentment, and anger?" a dry voice suddenly sounded in his ear.

Wu Tie startled, leapt up, and turned to look behind him—there, Ao Chi, covered in blood, stood shoulder‑to‑shoulder with two handsome youths whose bodies were covered in scale‑like wounds.

Before Wu Tie could land, a round of moonlight shone upon the void; his body felt light, then suddenly heavy, and then he heard the roar of surging tides and smelled a strong fishy odor.

"Yo~~~oh~~~"!

A lofty whale song echoed from afar; Wu Tie turned his head and gazed into the distance.

Here sky and sea were one hue, the heavens azure, the ocean azure; gazing out, blue stretched above and below. In this world, aside from sky and sea, the air was dry and clear, with nothing else.

Only at the far edge of sky‑sea could several colossal, whale‑shaped great kun be seen, their fins spread, emitting a lofty, lovely chant as they danced between heaven and ocean.

Wu Tie was at least hundreds of thousands of li away, yet the great kun's volume was truly terrifyingly huge. At such a distance, in Wu Tie's field of vision each great kun still appeared fist‑sized, and from head to tail they measured at least ten thousand li.

Wu Tie stared blankly at those several wondrous beings for a while, then turned back to look at Ao Chi and the two youths standing nearby.

Their blood dripped drop by drop onto the sea a hundred zhang below; each drop, heavy as a mountain, splashed heaven‑high waves and boomed upon impact. Their blood slowly diffused in the seawater, and gradually countless fine lotus vines sprouted from the water, then vast sheets of lotus leaves spread outward in all directions.

A long wind blew across the sky‑sea; amid the emerald lotus leaves, golden, silver, and white lotus buds slowly unfurled, then the petals opened, releasing a rich fragrance.

"Resentment, and anger?" Wu Tie exhaled, repeating Ao Chi's earlier question. He clenched his fist and struck the fugitive chief's occiput a few more times, ensuring he would sleep longer.

"Going with the flow, encountering great events yet powerless, even having to tread carefully just to preserve life." Wu Tie smirked: "A bit helpless, a bit resentful, a bit angry."

"Going with the flow, encountering great events yet powerless, even having to tread carefully just to preserve life." Wu Tie smirked: "A bit helpless, a bit resentful, a bit angry."

Ao Chi let his blood flow freely.

His emaciated body was covered in spider‑web‑like cracks, resembling a shattered jar that could collapse at any moment.

He looked at Wu Tie and smirked: "You're not used to this, are you?"

Ao Chi narrowed his eyes and asked Wu Tie, word by word: "Have you grown accustomed to a base, survival‑only existence, merely preserving your life?"

Wu Tie spread his hands, shook his head firmly: "I have concerns, so I merely preserve my life. But how could one possibly grow accustomed to such a thing?"

He tilted his head, looking at Ao Chi and the two outstanding youths, Wu Tie said in a deep voice: "Ao Chi Dragon King, and the two seniors, I am also, according to Ao Chi Dragon King's words, one who colludes with extraterrestrial demons, a degenerate who forsakes his ancestors."

Ao Chi and the two youths stared fixedly at Wu Tie; blood kept seeping from the youths' bodies, yet they ignored their wounds, merely staring fixedly at Wu Tie.

After a while, Ao Chi murmured: "It must be him, right? If that pretentious scholar who likes to fan himself in the depths of winter isn't mistaken..."

The youths' brows simultaneously split open a seam; a golden and a silver vertical eye each burst from their brows, and a chilling divine light shone, scanning Wu Tie up and down; Wu Tie instantly felt his scalp go numb.

The two youths gave a soft shout together, dropped their broken weapons, and lightly clapped their palms.

A breath of aura extremely familiar to Wu Tie welled up from the youths' palms — it was… the scent of the Primordial Classic.

However, the Primordial Classic cultivated by the two youths is obviously a reduced version compared to the one Wu Tie practices; their Dao resonance aura amounts to only about half of the full Primordial Classic.

Wu Tie stared blankly, hesitated a moment, then drew a deep breath.

He withdrew the concealment ability of the Nine Revolutions Mystic Art, fully releasing the aura of the Primordial Classic engraved in his very bones.

Perfect and flawless, embracing all things, the universe eternal, Heaven's Way follows nature.

Around Wu Tie, a faint yet perfect Dao resonance arose, complete and unblemished, as if it encompassed every mystery between heaven and earth.

The two youths laughed together, then their bodies swayed, as if they had expended their last strength; they sat cross‑legged in midair, sitting quietly there, smiling at Wu Tie.

They, they no longer had the strength to speak.

Only Ao Chi grinned, chuckling softly: "That pretentious scholar almost had me bawling this time, heh heh, heh heh; the time he divined for the demons' descent and the actual time those damned demons appeared differed by half an hour..."

"That unlucky dog‑head doll, sigh, all I could do was torment him to buy time."

Shaking his head, Ao Chi also sat cross‑legged in midair, he said in a deep voice: "However, over such a long span of years, with my cultivation, even the lingering spark of my soul‑fire has nearly been extinguished, my consciousness almost utterly lost… for such a lengthy time, he erred by only half an hour… heh heh, truly worthy of being our grand strategist of old."

"Impressive, truly impressive. I'm convinced, I yield."

Ao Chi let out a sigh, the rents on his body seemed to widen a little, and the speed at which blood gushed out increased greatly. He looked at Wu Tie, smiling happily: "If there is still a chance, I will never challenge him to a duel again… the Grand Strategist is the Grand Strategist; as long as you use your brain, you can do it, no need to brandish spears and staves."

He drew a deep breath, and one hundred and eight silver-white light clusters the size of thumbs floated up above his head, then swiftly entered Wu Tie's glabella. Streams of clear information flowed into Wu Tie's divine fetus, this being the complete imprint of the one hundred and eight Vast Sea Divine Pearls.

As long as Wu Tie refines them slightly, these one hundred and eight Vast Sea Divine Pearls, each forming its own small world, will come entirely under his control, and they can be used at will; no matter Wu Tie's cultivation level, the pearls will function as if he had refined them for countless years—at the mere thought, they can unleash at least one-tenth of their power.

In other words, even if Wu Tie now has only Chonglou Realm cultivation, he can still exert at least one-tenth of the power of the Vast Sea Divine Pearls.

Moreover, Ao Chi's previous all-out strike that annihilated Linghu Qingqing and Old Man Hu's army—due to his special condition—had the Vast Sea Divine Pearls' destructive power amount to less than one percent!

Less than one percent!

With these one hundred and eight Vast Sea Divine Pearls, Wu Tie truly has a foundation to stand upon.

Wu Tie swiftly absorbed the information transmitted from the pearls' imprints, and then, one after another, sinuous Grand Dao patterns like giant dragons emerged from the void, continually drilling into Wu Tie's body.

Each of the one hundred and eight Vast Sea Divine Pearls contains twelve complete Grand Dao principles, for a total of one thousand two hundred ninety-six complete Grand Dao. There is no need to painstakingly absorb those puppets taken by the Yin-Yang Daoists; having obtained the Vast Sea Divine Pearls, these Grand Dao principles naturally become Wu Tie's to command.

Wu Tie's aura continually rose, his divine fetus turned variegated, and over a thousand Dao patterns spread rapidly across his divine fetus.

Within the Vast Sea Divine Pearls lies an immeasurable amount of the purest heaven-earth primordial energy; at this moment, that energy continually flows into Wu Tie's body, helping his divine fetus continually condense and strengthen, and aiding the continual rise of his magical power cultivation.

Wu Tie solemnly gazed at Ao Chi and the two youths.

Within the small world of the Vast Sea Divine Pearl, Wu Tie is akin to a creator, able to command all things.

In the instant he received the pearl's imprint, Wu Tie saw that Ao Chi and the two youths had already reached the brink of annihilation.

They had used a secret art to squeeze out the last shred of strength, only then managing to reach Wu Tie's side; after a few words, they presented him with the one hundred and eight Vast Sea Divine Pearls.

Wu Tie looked at Ao Chi and the two youths with mixed feelings, not knowing what to say.

Ao Chi smiled at Wu Tie: "Don't be sad, don't be upset; a man, even if he's cut by a blade, shouldn't cry like a little girl."

"Besides, I and you have no particular bond, so there's no need to mourn the passing of spring and autumn; let us be the butt of jokes."

"Ah, we nineteen were people who deserved to die back then."

"By means of the False Civility secret art, I have clung to life until today, and that is already the limit. Like me, I am merely a split-off form conjured by the Vast Sea Divine Pearl, and though I possess the supreme Dao of One Qi Transforming into Three Purities, I have not cultivated it to perfection. My true self has fallen, the other two Dao companions have fallen, and I… in fact… should have died long ago."

"With the power of the Vast Sea Divine Pearl, I might still be able to endure many more years—but what would be the point?"

"I can no longer make any progress, and my strength is not even one percent of what it once was… to linger on like this is utterly uninspiring."

"So I should have died long ago; this time, it is also getting what I wished for."

"If it weren't for the False Civility's admonition, I would not have had the heart to persist for so many years in that pitch-black coffin."

"Carrying our share, live on well."

Ao Chi extended his right hand, made a leftward and a rightward stroke, and wrote a large 'person' character in the void!

"Remember this character."

"Remember your bloodline."

"Remember your ancestors."

"Forever remember your origins, your source…… remember your enemies, and then slaughter them all!"

"Remember, kill those who draw near to demons!"

"Remember all of this."

"Help us, slaughter them all."

Ao Chi smiled at Wu Tie: "Live on well…… I don't know whether the False Civility was right this time; we have suffered so much, waited so many years, and here we have given you these treasures, and I also don't know whether the False Civility was right."

"I hope he has always been correct."

"Don't let us down, kid, because this time we are truly returning to heaven and earth, with no chance whatsoever of coming back to life."

"We have been heroes…… we have been magnificent…… carrying our magnificence, live on like a true hero."

In the next instant, Ao Chi and the two youths exploded into fragments.