Chapter 280 - 265: Your Dao Position Is Beneath Me
"What a peerless Demon! And what a Ten Thousand Laws Realm Heaven!"
Li Xuanqing stood upon the high platform in the center of his army, his crimson Python Robe whipping wildly in the gale.
He showed no signs of retreat despite the overwhelming pressure from above. Instead, he tilted his head to the sky, his eyes erupting with a brilliant light, like two blazing suns.
A tide of vital energy, forged of iron and blood and far more immense and pure than before, erupted from the top of his skull and shot toward the heavens, like a dormant volcano suddenly erupting!
This vital energy was a dark, crimson-tinged gold, so dense it seemed solid. As it rocketed into the sky, it produced a deafening roar like that of dragons and tigers, and within it, the faint phantoms of a massive army could be seen charging into battle.
The battle intent was potent, the Evil Qi pure.
It threatened to stain the warped space overhead—the area distorted by the Daluo Realm—with a metallic sheen!
"You think summoning this pathetic excuse for a Realm Heaven is enough to destroy my Emperor’s Extreme Slaughter Array and defeat my magnificent World-Suppressing Army?!"
Li Xuanqing’s voice boomed like a great temple bell, each word echoing with the clang of steel and the thunder of warhorses. It caused the vital energy of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers below to surge and their battle intent to boil over.
"A fool’s dream!"
Before the words had even faded, he took a thunderous step forward!
This single step landed squarely in the torrent of the army’s formation—a flood formed from the converged vital energy and battle intent of half a million soldiers!
BOOM!
With his foot as the epicenter, it was as if a soul had been injected into the vast and intricate Emperor’s Extreme Slaughter Array. It suddenly let out a roar that shook Heaven and Earth!
"Emperor’s Extreme as my body, Slaughter as my path!
My blood the fuel, my soul the bridge!
The Divine Demon descends, the army stands united!"
Li Xuanqing chanted the ancient True Words, and the dark golden vital energy around him blazed like fire, completely engulfing his form.
In the next instant, his form began to swell, growing ever taller!
He completely merged into one with the entire array, with the vital energy and battle intent of half a million soldiers, and with the unseen, iron-willed National Fortune of the Nanyin Dynasty—a fortune forged in conquest and tempered by guardianship!
He was the array!
And the array was him!
"ROAR—!!!"
A triumphant roar, as if from the primordial wilderness and filled with indomitable will, exploded from the core of the dark golden flames.
The light and flame violently collapsed inward, condensing!
The ten three-thousand-foot-tall Emperor’s Extreme Slaughter Military Deities, which had been struggling against the Star Battle World with their auras already fading, let out furious and resolute roars in unison.
Their massive bodies disintegrated simultaneously, transforming into ten beams of intensely condensed, crimson-gold divine light. Like a hundred rivers flowing to the sea, they plunged madly toward the core where Li Xuanqing was located!
The ten beams of divine light smashed into and fused with the dark golden flames that Li Xuanqing had become!
An indescribably terrifying energy brewed, erupted, and reforged itself within the confluence!
In the space of a single breath.
A completely new, towering figure, exuding an aura that made even the Heaven and Earth Laws tremble, strode forth from the flames and manifested beneath the Celestial Vault of the Valley of No Life!
This figure stood five thousand feet tall, seemingly forged from the hardest Divine Iron and the most scorching battle-blood in all of Heaven and Earth.
Its face was a blur, shrouded by a roiling cloud of dark golden vital energy and Evil Qi that seemed to be alive.
Only its eyes were visible, like two blazing volcanoes in Purgatory, spewing endless flames of conquest and a domineering will.
It had no head; the space above its neck was replaced by the roiling cloud of vital energy and Evil Qi.
Its upper body was a mass of knotted muscle, powerful as a coiling dragon and crouching tiger, and was covered by the phantom of a heavy, ancient bronze breastplate scarred with countless slashes and stained by blood.
Its lower body was shrouded in the same churning, dark golden cloud of vital energy and Evil Qi, which connected to the ocean of vital energy from the half-a-million-strong army below. A ceaseless torrent of power flowed from this ocean into its form.
A terrifying Daoist Intent—pure, domineering, and martial to the absolute extreme—erupted from this Military Dao Divine Demon Dharma Aspect and swept across the battlefield!
Li Xuanqing’s voice, like the chorus of a million men, thundered from an angry-looking face on the chest of the Military Dao Divine Demon. It rang with the clang of steel and an undeniable, domineering power.
"Today, I shall pit my Nanyin Military Dao against the Ten Thousand Laws of you, Demon!"
"Military Dao Realm Heaven—Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm! Open!"
With a roar that seemed to sunder the heavens, a Foundation Establishment Realm Heaven unfurled with a mighty boom.
As far as the eye could see, there was a boundless land, stained a dark, near-black crimson from the dried blood of a billion souls.
The ground was littered with countless broken weapons, tattered war banners, and decaying skeletons, stretching all the way to the horizon.
The sky was an oppressive iron gray, devoid of sun, moon, or stars. It was marred only by countless blood-red fissures, like scars, that constantly dripped burning Blood Fire.
The air was thick with the undying stench of rust and blood, saturated with a terrifying Evil Qi and a battle intent that knew only the instinct to slaughter and conquer.
Within this realm, any Dao or principle unrelated to war, slaughter, conquest, and subjugation was suppressed to its absolute limit.
Only the purest, most direct intentions of violence, destruction, annihilation, and conquest were amplified to their peak!
This was the Military Dao Realm Heaven he had manifested using the power of his half-a-million-strong army—the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm, an insight born from Li Xuanqing’s lifetime of warfare, command, and fusion with the Dynasty’s National Fortune!
"Demon! Do you dare enter my domain of war for a battle to the death?!"
The furious face on the Military Dao Divine Demon’s chest issued a heaven-shaking challenge. The giant bronze axe in its hand rose high, poised to cleave the twisted, chaotic Daluo Realm above!
And as it moved, the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm surged upward. Carrying a terrifying Daoist Intent that sought to crush all civilization, burn all order, and leave only the most primal desire for conquest, it slammed violently into Qi Yun’s Daluo Realm!
On one side was the Daluo Realm, all-encompassing, evolving the Ten Thousand Laws, its core a principle of supreme, magnanimous control.
On the other was the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Domain, extremely pure, dedicated only to war and slaughter, its will bent on absolute conquest and destruction.
The two Realm Heavens collided with a deafening boom beneath the Celestial Vault of the Valley of No Life!
BOOM—!!!
This time, the collision...
There was no brilliant explosion of light, no violent clash of energy.
There was only a deeper, more fundamental conflict—a struggle between Daos!
On one side, the Ten Thousand Laws waxed and waned. Sword Qi and the light of talismans flowed, with life and death alternating, showcasing infinite variations and possibilities.
On the other, Blood Fire scorched the sky amidst the deafening din of war. A will of destruction and conquest, pure to the extreme, crashed like a tsunami, seeking to crush, incinerate, and assimilate all other Daos into its own singular purpose.
SCREEE...
A teeth-grating sound, like two incompatible metals being forcefully ground against each other to the point of annihilation, echoed from the invisible boundary.
Qi Yun stood at the center of the Daluo Realm. He felt the feedback from its boundary—waves of pressure so heavy it was as if his entire ’world’ was under immense assault. His expression grew taut.
He could feel the purity and extremity of the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm.
This was a purely offensive Foundation Establishment Realm Heaven!
’What a Military Dao Realm Heaven... using the extreme to shatter the myriad, the pure to overwhelm the complex.’
A cyan-gold light flickered in Qi Yun’s eyes as he analyzed the situation.
’This Li Xuanqing is truly worthy of his title, Grand Protector Nanyin, a master of military command.’
’His Dao doesn’t concern itself with subtlety or change, seeking only absolute power and will.’
’To have extrapolated the art of military slaughter to such a degree... he has practically created his own tyrannical, peerless Dao.’
’But what a shame...’
"Your Dao Position is beneath mine!"
Before the words had faded, he abruptly raised a hand. His fingers spread wide, then he made a grasping motion in the empty air, aimed at the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm!
It was just a simple gesture.
But in the instant his five fingers closed—
HUMMM!!!
An indescribable and unfathomable will, like the imperial edict of a world-ruling sovereign, instantly permeated and enveloped the entire Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm!
Mastering All Skills!
Li Xuanqing, who was fully immersed in driving his Realm Heaven, his will perfectly merged with it as he reveled in the ecstasy of conquest, felt his heart suddenly seize!
The seamless, perfect connection between himself and the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm was being forcibly... pried apart by a higher power!
"What?!"
"This... what kind of skill is this?!"
A look of unprecedented gravity crossed Li Xuanqing’s face.
He had campaigned for centuries, commanded massive armies, and faced countless titans of the Demon Dao and masters from the Immortal Sects. He had witnessed all manner of bizarre Divine Techniques and Supreme Daoist Skills.
But never had he encountered a Divine Technique like this—one that didn’t attack his form or destroy his power, but instead, directly, tyrannically, and unreasonably... shook the very foundation of his Dao and interfered with his authority over his own Realm!
Below, the half-a-million soldiers of the World-Suppressing Army grunted in unison, their faces turning pale as one.
Their own energies were linked to the army’s formation and to Li Xuanqing, and they too felt that same terrifying, rending tremor.
"Grand Protector!" one of the commanders roared, his eyes wide with fury and distress.
"Hold the formation! Focus your minds!"
Li Xuanqing immediately steadied his Heart and Spirit, trying to re-stabilize his connection to the array and his Realm Heaven.
However, the tyrannical nature of Mastering All Skills was far beyond his imagination.
Even with Li Xuanqing exerting his full will, he could not stop the authority over the Blood Conquest and Slaughter Realm from being usurped.
Just as the World-Suppressing Army was about to be plunged into an abyss...
Inside the Central Army Tent, Celestial Master Chen, who had been quietly observing the situation, slowly shook his head and let out a soft sigh.
’A certain victory, turned on its head just like that.’
’Alas... The will of heaven is truly unpredictable.’
With that, the Great Master of the Celestial Secret Sect suddenly gave the duster in his hand a gentle shake.
A supreme, profound power was suddenly unleashed.
The entire Valley of No Life!
It trembled violently!
...