Immortal of the Nine Realms

The Human Race possessed a thorough understanding of the Flame Race, including the exact number of their Saints and the layout of their Half Saint clans. However, when it came to the individual Saints of the Flame Race, ordinary divinity experts were entirely in the dark. There were simply no channels available for a common cultivator to obtain even a shred of intelligence regarding foreign entities of that caliber.

After all, common divinity experts couldn't even claim to thoroughly understand the internal affairs of their own race's Saints. At most, they had merely heard their Saint titles.

No one present knew exactly who that Flame Race Saint was, but they could declare with absolute certainty that Saint Jinyang and Saint Luoxue had indeed entered into a deep collaboration with him.

"Saint Jinyang claims this is so our Human Race can gain an extra Saint, but is it not simply a selfish play so that the Half Saint Jinwu under his command can become a Saint? Still, Old Fang... how on earth did your Ancestor Fang manage to offend a Saint of the Flame Race to the point where they are willing to part with two Saint Blood Bodhis just to block his ascension?"

Wang Chongsong's eyes flickered with keen curiosity as he looked over at Fang Chen, clearly hoping to pry some useful intelligence out of him.

"How should I know?" Fang Chen replied crisply, his eyes remaining quietly fixed on the foreign saint.

"Flame Race. Saint Chiyan."

A voice tinged with a thick layer of wariness resonated from behind the curtain in the sky.

"Honored peers, Saint Chiyan's personal arrival today stands as a testament to his absolute sincerity. The very moment you agree, he will immediately produce the two Saint Blood Bodhis, allowing Jinwu and Zhangxue to become a Saint right here," explained Saint Jinyang with a smooth smile. "By doing so, the total number of our Human Saints will instantly break through to eleven. We will have propelled our race's developmental progression forward by tens of thousands of years entirely for free. Is this not a monumental blessing for our people?"

No one stepped forward to answer his prompts. Behind the massive veil, the five neutral Saints states had evidently fallen into intense, silent deliberation.

In the surrounding mist, the hidden Limit Breaking experts from the opposing factions all registered looks of pure exhilaration. Their choice to align with the Jinyang Alliance and the Luoxue Alliance had truly been the correct move! As long as Fang Lie failed to become a Saint today, their act of taking sides would never face issues. Conversely, with their respective factions gaining two brand-new true Saints, the future benefits flowing their way would be completely unimaginable!

On the other side, around the Chaoxian Tower, the countenances of the allied were incredibly unsightly.

This matter directly impacted the core structural foundation of the Human Race. If their people truly gained two additional true Saints, every single human child born from that day onward would inherit two extra Supreme Bones! A temptation of this staggering magnitude was almost entirely impossible for the race as a whole to resist.

Yet, because they had actively chosen to stand within the Fang Clan's camp today, if Half Saint Fang failed his ascension, they would undoubtedly face a ruthless and systematic punishment by the Jinyang and Luoxue Alliances in the aftermath. Not a single Half Saint clan present would escape unscathed. Therefore, driven by their own structural survival instincts, they desperately hoped that Half Saint Fang would successfully claim his Saint seat.

"Saint Jinyang, our race has been locked in bloody warfare with the Flame Race for countless millennia. Yet, you have actively chosen to collaborate with Saint Chiyan. Can you provide a proper explanation as to what the Flame Race's underlying objective truly is?" Saint Wandao suddenly interjected.

Before Saint Jinyang could even open his mouth, Saint Chiyan let out a smooth laugh and spoke up. "Saint Wandao, for my race to willingly part with two Saint Blood Bodhis naturally involves our own overarching calculations. As for our underlying objective, there is absolutely no necessity for you to know. You only need to understand that choosing to cooperate with me right now yields immediate, immense structural benefits for your Human Race."

"Indeed. Regardless of what objective the Flame Race harbors, the exact moment you nod your heads in agreement, our people will instantly gain two true Saints," Saint Jinyang added with a detached smile. "Even if we must forfeit another potential Saint to achieve this, what harm is there?"

"First of all, Fang Lie has advanced step-by-step to arrive at his current height; his ascension anomalies are fully matured and ripe," Saint Wandao countered, his eyes flashing with a look of supreme contempt.

"Secondly, the foundational accumulation of Half Saint Jinwu and Half Saint Zhangxue under your commands is nowhere near sufficient. Forcefully consuming the Saint Blood Bodhi to claim a Saint seat will completely strip them of any future capacity to refine their paths. An ascended Saint stripped of the capacity for future progression is nothing more than a crippled Saint. To the Human Race, such entities represent nothing but a fleeting, superficial gain, completely devoid of any long-term strategic value."

"Is a superficial gain right before our eyes not enough!? Saint Wandao, you are looking far too far into an imaginary future," Saint Jinyang snorted coldly. "Progression beyond the baseline of a Saint is something you can dream about all you want, but to the current Human Race, it remains completely, utterly impossible."

"When our Human Race served as mere slave-soldiers in the ancient era, who among us could have ever imagined that a day would come where we could birth even a single true Saint? The very first Saint of our people emerged from the Wang Family. Today, that same Wang Family has chosen to stand firmly by the side of the Fang Clan," Saint Wandao noted with a cool smile.

"Do you know why? It is because even when staring directly into the jaws of absolute impossibility, our people still harbored a fierce, unyielding intent to forge ahead. That is the sole reason we were able to transform the impossible into reality. If our Human Race ever loses this core spiritual drive, we will remain nothing more than playthings trapped inside the palms of others to this very day! Where would we have ever found the structural strength to forge the Nether Ruins?!"

"Fang Lie is nowhere near as exceptional as you make him out to be," Saint Jinyang muttered after a long, heavy silence.

Saint Wandao laughed. "In truth, I have already deduced exactly what it is you truly desire. It is the Eighteen Heavens Prison Tower in Fang Lie's hands, isn't it? This proves that the value of this object far exceeds two mere Saint Blood Bodhis. Do you truly believe we would ever hand it over? Surrendering it to the Flame Race? You are dreaming a beautiful dream."

Saint Chiyan watched from the sidelines with an icy glare, a look of growing impatience etching itself onto his face. He turned his cold gaze back toward the grand curtain in the sky.

"The five of you. Have you reached a final verdict yet?"

"Through our rigorous analysis and evaluation, we stand firmly by our decision to grant Fang Lie his ascension to the Saint seat! The rest of you, retreat!"

A thunderous, sweeping command boomed from behind the massive curtain, accompanied by the sudden, terrifying release of five incredibly immense auras.

Seeing that outcome, Saint Wandao burst into a loud, ringing laugh, his own terrifying presence immediately surging outward to join them. The habitually silent Saint Wanqing followed suit without a word, letting her own dark aura skyrocket into the heavens.

The combined presence of seven true Saints instantly crushed down the combined auras of Saint Jinyang, Luoxue, and Chiyan.

Saint Jinyang's countenance twisted and shifted rapidly. He clearly had not anticipated that the five neutral Saints would arrive at such a conclusion. He let out an unwilling, furious roar, "Why!? When this path clearly grants our race an additional true Saint, why on earth have you chosen this outcome!?"

"Our race shall never enter into a transactional collaboration with the Flame Race. For them to willingly part with two Saint Blood Bodhis today means they possess absolute certainty that they can wrench something from our hands whose strategic value far exceeds those herbs!"

"Although Half Saint Jinwu and Half Saint Zhangxue harbor the genuine potential to become a Saint, forcing their growth through artificial means will permanently sever their future paths of refinement. They should not become Saints at this moment. As long as we grant them sufficient time, they will find their own opportunities to ascend without the need for a Saint Blood Bodhi."

"Fang Lie's Saint Qi are already fully mature. It is entirely righteous that he ascends to the Saint seat today. No entity, whether internal or external, is permitted to obstruct him. To defy this order is to declare yourself an enemy of the entire Human Race. We shall hunt you down from the highest heavens to the deepest underworld, executing you without mercy!"

"The Human Dao is the path forged by the Human Race itself. The core of the Human Dao Heart must never be compromised. If a supreme Saint seat can be actively bought and influenced by an external race, and this news leaks out to the wider world, countless peerless paragons of our people will instantly lose their unyielding will to fight and compete. Saint Jinyang, Saint Luoxue... you two very nearly demolished the entire foundational bedrock of our race! Therefore, this stands as the absolute verdict of our council. If the two of you refuse to accept it, we shall revisit this deliberation only after Fang Lie has successfully become a Saint!"

The grand, sweeping Saint declarations resonated across the entire cosmos, shattering the silence of the world.

The countenances of the Saint Jinyang and Saint Luoxue twisted through a dozen shades of pale panic and fury.

Across the surrounding mist, around the Chaoxian Tower, and throughout the entirety of Zanglong City, every single Limit Breaking expert let out a sharp, collective gasp of cold air. None of them had truly comprehended the terrifying, long-term domino effect this scheme would have triggered. If a Human Saint could be actively manipulated and bartered for by an external, rival race... they didn't dare to let their imaginations wander down that path.

Wang Chongsong's face was deathly white. "Holy mother of god... the Flame Race is incredibly insidious! Who on earth came up with this strategy for them!? Those burning blockheads have never possessed a strategic intellect this sharp!"

They had been a literal single step away from having the entire foundational baseline of the Human Race slowly dissolved from within. That was a classic case of boiling a frog in warm water!

Fang Chen mused, deep awe and gravity coloring his features. "The Eighteen Heavens Prison Tower was their immediate tactical objective, but fracturing the unyielding competitive drive of our race's young geniuses was also their goal. Combined with the multi-layered socio-political fallout that would follow, achieving a bloodless victory and breaking a booming, ascendant race entirely from within, all by parting with a mere pair of Saint Blood Bodhis... Or perhaps, from the very beginning, the Eighteen Heavens Prison Tower was nothing more than a carefully deployed smoke screen, meant entirely to obscure the Flame Race's true, ultimate strategic objective... What a terrifyingly brilliant scheme."

At that exact moment, Half Saint Fang re-established his absolute focus. Stepping back onto the path of ascension, his pure white aura began to skyrocket once more, shattering the sky as it surged towards a full Saint!