Chapter 647 Sanctuary Habitat
The Demonic Figure "Qu Qiao Monk," the Demonic Minister "Wenren Miedao," and the "Blood Fiend Ancestor" are all top-tier powerhouses among the transcendent beings. Each possesses immense power, with countless strong individuals within their clans. They wield supreme authority, and their officials, disciples, and followers are scattered throughout the Demon Kingdom and even across various living realms.
It can be said that any expert, army, or resource that can be mobilized has the strength to conquer an entire habitat on their own. Most habitat lords are subordinates to them, and need to pay tribute and curry favor.
But even such formidable individuals, and three of them at that, when they came together, were utterly defeated.
Mo Duanfeng, who witnessed the battle firsthand on the inner side of the Belt of Decline and Flourishing, was unable to shake off the shock for a long time.
When Li Weiyi, Tang Wanzhou, and Nangong arrived, it was two days after the battle had ended.
In the small underworld where the Demon Kingdom's altar was located, the ground was filled with ragged, shackled members of the sinful race, who were preparing for the sacrifice. Their eyes were either vacant or confused.
The altar was not destroyed; there was a sense of relief and joy at surviving the ordeal.
Being in the realm of the dead, trapped in the cycle of decay and prosperity, there is no escape; ultimately, death still comes.
Li Weiyi looked at the hundreds of thousands of humans before her. They huddled together like sheep, relying on each other's body heat to ward off the bitter cold, and most of them were on the verge of starvation.
"Crack!"
Mo Duanfeng kept swinging his sword, slicing through the chains binding them.
Li Weiyi, Tang Wanzhou, and Nangong Jiang distributed all the food from the bag.
Upon seeing the three of them arrive, Mo Duanfeng sheathed his sword and walked over, his face covered in sweat and his arm twitching slightly.
He said, "The elders of the Ancient Clan of Time have already gone to gather food, and it should be sent back soon. There are many unpleasant things in the world, and I never like to deal with them, as I always feel troubled. But the life and death, the loneliness and weakness right in front of me, I really can't turn a blind eye."
"Old Mo, why are your hands shaking?" Li Weiyi asked.
Mo Duanfeng smiled bitterly: "If you keep swinging your sword for two days, you will tremble even more than I do. Even fighting Gu Zhenxiang didn't make my hands tremble."
All three were moved.
Tang Wanzhou asked, "What about the truth of the past?"
"He escaped before the elders of the Ancient Clan arrived, and using the Earth-grade Boundary Bag, he took most of the troops guarding the altar with him." Mo Duanfeng's eyes revealed admiration and praise, with no regret that no opponent had escaped.
Li Weiyi asked, "You fought each other, what was the outcome?"
"Well, this person is extremely intelligent, almost like a demon. As soon as the battle outside the Kuru Belt broke out, he deduced that a powerful member of the Ancient Clan of Time would arrive, so he chose to retreat immediately," Mo Duanfeng said.
Li Weiyi said, "A top scholar should have such judgment. The outbreak of battle outside means that the Ancient Clan of Time no longer needs to hide and can eliminate all enemies in the Ancient Kingdom of Time Ruins without any scruples. Gu Zhenxiang's ability to escape is a testament to his capabilities."
Mo Duanfeng said, "So, he was in a retreating mindset at the time, and had no intention of fighting me. I unleashed the first six of the Seven Slashes of Duanfeng, and he neutralized them all. He didn't give me a chance to unleash the seventh slash before fleeing far away, and challenged me to a duel at Xiaoyaojing next year's results announcement ceremony."
"He was able to neutralize the Emperor's Blade of the Wind Mansion without taking any damage?"
Tang Wanzhou found it hard to believe.
The people present all knew the power of the "Fengfu Emperor Blade," which not only shattered Chu Yutian's Taiyin Battle Soul with a single strike, but also broke the Blood Pool Silver Sea.
Very few martial artists of the same cultivation level could withstand that single strike and survive.
As Mo Duanfeng's cultivation reached the fourth realm, the power of that single strike had risen to an unknown level.
Mo Duanfeng nodded: "The Emperor Blade of the Wind Mansion is the sixth of the Seven Slashes of Duanfeng. In an instant, it drains all the magical energy of the entire Wind Mansion and unleashes its strongest attack. The first five slashes were unleashed by draining the magical energy of the five seas respectively."
"The seventh strike, the Ancestral Field Immortal Blade, I mastered it after breaking through the fourth realm and comprehending it within the Cocoon of the Camellia. Once unleashed, it drains all the ancestral field's magical energy in one strike; either the enemy dies, or I perish."
Even with Li Weiyi and Tang Wanzhou's martial arts talent, they looked at each other in disbelief, never expecting Mo Duanfeng's seventh strike to be so domineering.
If it is truly that terrifying, even if Gu Zhen were invincible, he might not be able to withstand it.
"In my opinion, this seventh strike shouldn't be so easy to execute, right?" Tang Wanzhou knew what it meant to drain all the ancestral energy in one move.
Mo Duanfeng smiled without saying a word: "You, Tang Wanzhou, will soon catch up and become the biggest opponent of me, Gu Zhenxiang, Shenji and others. I dare not tell you the truth. But Brother Weiyi, you are really good at hiding your true intentions."
"Why is it happening to me again?" Li Weiyi asked.
Mo Duanfeng solemnly said, "The Grand Palace Master's appearance and attack on the Demon Kingdom's army is enough to explain a lot. I've been thinking about this for two days, and I really can't understand how the Ancient Clan of Time managed to persuade her to join us?"
"Furthermore, please tell me, do you two really have ten Demon Lord-level experts in the Lingxiao Realm?"
The four of them headed towards the zone of decay and prosperity.
They channeled their magical energy into their eyes and peered outwards.
Through the thick, grayish-white fog of curses, the devastated scene outside could be vaguely seen. The glazed flames had been burning for two days without going out, turning the area into a fiery wasteland with rivers of lava.
The ground was littered with armor and corpses, broken spears and flags, the earth was cracked, and mountains were collapsing—a scene of apocalypse.
One can imagine how astonishing the battle two days ago must have been.
Li Weiyi asked, "Old Mo, why are you so curious?"
"First of all, Lingxiao Realm is too remote and small, with almost no contact with the outside world, so please forgive my ignorance. In the past, I had only heard of the Grand Palace Master's reputation, and I also vaguely knew that three female Palace Masters ruled a realm."
“Two days ago, I heard the Grand Palace Master’s deafening voice, as if it came from the heavens above.” Mo Duanfeng looked very respectful, then imitated Yu Yaozi’s tone and said loudly, “Wenren Miedao, how dare you be so presumptuous in front of this Palace Master? You are a transcendent being of your level. There are ten people in the Lingxiao Realm who can match your level of transcendence.”
It should be understood that a behemoth like the Demon Kingdom would certainly have more than ten experts of the level of Wenren Miedao, but it would not be much more than that.
If even a small Lingxiao Realm can produce ten such beings, how could Mo Duanfeng not be shocked?
Li Wei silently calculated that Zen Sea Mist, the Grand Palace Master, the Third Palace Master, the King of the West Sea, Zuoqiu Xuanming, Tang Lion Camel, the Ancestor of the Zhu Clan, the Sect Master of the Thunder Cloud Sect... these are undoubtedly top-tier transcendents, but it is not necessarily true that they can all reach the level of the Demon Minister.
"The Grand Palace Master is merely a figurehead to intimidate the enemy. Ten is a bit of an exaggeration. Five, I suppose, there should be at least five," Li Weiyi said.
Tang Wanzhou said, "Old Mo, the Lingxiao Realm is isolated at the southernmost part of Yingzhou, yet it has not been swallowed up by the Netherworld of the Dead and the demon race. Don't you think that in itself is a symbol of strength?"
Mo Duanfeng looked thoughtful, then nodded seriously, feeling a sense of awe for the mysterious habitat in the far south of Yingzhou.
Suddenly, Li Weiyi thought of something: "Outside the Ancient Ruins of Time, the Grand Palace Master must act quickly to prevent the powerful figures from the Ancient City of Industry, the Seven Grievances Plain, and other Netherworld Realms from coming over and interfering. The Holy Temple Realm is probably the real battleground."
The image of Zen Sea Observation Mist appeared in Li Weiyi's mind, but she wondered if she was there.
After the elders of the Ancient Time Clan arrived, the four of them immediately headed towards Chun City, preparing to travel to the Holy Temple Realm via the spatial teleportation array.
They just left.
"boom!"
"Boom!"
...
Outside the Zone of Decay and Flourishing Life, on the vast and boundless dark land, a mighty aura of corpses surged forth.
A giant taller than the mountain emerged from the corpse aura, wearing a wide purple robe with Daoist patterns. His facial features were decayed, and his long hair fell down on both sides of his face, radiating brilliance like a celestial waterfall.
His body emanated a chilling, bone-deep aura of death, enveloping the land for miles around and extinguishing the shimmering flames in the shattered battlefield. He murmured, "Huang Yuyao, even the Yin Buddha Lice couldn't suppress her? It seems she's only one step away from becoming an Emperor Mind Master!"
"boom!"
With a wave of his arm, the Giant Corpse King unleashed a rusty battle sword, striking down at the Withered Belt with a single, unadorned strike.
The moment he touched the Belt of Withering and Flourishing, the figure of the Queen of Time appeared in the gray-white mist, several times taller than him, as if she had grown into the universe!
Many cracks appeared in the surrounding space.
The Giant Corpse King immediately fled to avoid the backlash of the Time Curse.
"We can already dodge it; it seems the curse has indeed weakened considerably."
...
Ancient boundary markers have been unearthed throughout Yingzhou, not only in the living environment but also in the realm of the dead.
Those boundary markers are all named with the character "州" (zhou, meaning prefecture).
According to an analysis by a martial arts emperor-level expert, before the Netherworld enveloped the world, Yingzhou once had an extremely glorious kingdom that divided the world into provinces for governance.
The Sanctuary Habitat ranks fifteenth among the fifty-eight medium-sized habitats in southern Yingzhou.
The population is estimated to be over two billion, occupying eighty states.
The Ancient Clan of Time is the most powerful, living in seclusion in the mountains of western Habitat. They only send a portion of their clansmen to establish the "Holy Hall," which serves as the court of Habitat, and together with the three major billion-clan clans and the seven major ten-million-clan clans, they govern the world.
It is precisely because the Holy Sanctuary is powerful enough and has a large population that even with the strength of the Demon Kingdom, it is extremely cautious to launch a war, and it must obtain irrefutable evidence before it dares to take action.
The ancestral mountain of the ancient clan is isolated from the world. Four heavenly springs and three earthly springs are located in the sky, while three others are located in three valleys. All year round, magical energy and mist drift around the mountain, nurturing thousands of precious and refined medicines.
Fruit trees bearing all sorts of rare spiritual fruits, along with birds and beasts, can be seen everywhere.
A stream flows gently, a spring gusts forth, and the cliff face glows with rosy light.
A magnificent and imposing architectural complex, with pavilions, towers, palaces, and red walls, sits atop a mountain valley.
Li Weiyi, Tang Wanzhou, and Mo Duanfeng stayed here and sat in an octagonal pavilion on a cliff, drinking together. They could see young martial arts practitioners coming to the valley below to cultivate one after another.
They were all full of energy and powerful in cultivation; none of them were below the Dao Seed Realm.
Mo Duanfeng said, "In the past hundred years of controlling the resources of the Ancient Kingdom of Time Ruins, the Ancient Clan of Time seems to have cultivated a large number of young experts. Such a vigorous and prosperous scene is rarely seen even in the Holy Capital."
"But it was precisely because they were too eager to cultivate young experts that the information was leaked. The Ancient Clan of Time is the largest power in the Holy Temple Realm, but not the only one. If it weren't for the intervention of the Grand Palace Master and the Lingxiao Dynasty, they wouldn't have survived this calamity," Tang Wanzhou said.
"Any help always comes at a price."
Mo Duanfeng looked at Li Weiyi meaningfully: "Brother Weiyi, even now, you still intend to hide it from us? You worked so hard in the Ancient Kingdom of Time Ruins, was it for Nangong? Was it the Grand Palace Master's decree? What grand scheme is the Grand Palace Master playing that has alarmed even the Holy Emperor!"
(End of this chapter)
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