Aspiring to the Immortal Path

After sowing the seeds, Tang Jie used life creation.

The bean soldiers were usually summoned through a spell art, Sowing Beans into Soldiers. This was because some external force was needed to give them a boost, or else they would have to naturally grow.

Sowing Beans into Soldiers was actually a spell art belonging to the Dao of Life, so one could use similar methods as well. To put it simply, spell arts and their like could be used to grant the beans life and the ability to fight.

But regardless of how powerful these spell arts were, they all belonged to Life, so none of them could be greater than the Great Dao itself. To directly use the Dao’s power of life creation on the beans was many times stronger than using Sowing Beans into Soldiers.

The two combined created a special kind of bean soldier.

The power of life creation turned the beans into soldiers, but these soldiers were clearly much stronger, each one at the peak of Mortal Shedding. But because they had few spell arts, their actual strength was inferior. However, if they could assemble into formations, one only needed around twenty to fight against a Spirit Ring cultivator, completely different from the three hundred that were needed in the past.

Still, Tang Jie frowned.

In the end, he was still weak in the Dao of Life, unable to get the bean soldiers over the hump and into Celestial Heart. It had to be understood that bean soldiers could use their numbers to fight above their realm. Not fight above their tier, but above their realm!

“Realms” referred to the major thresholds, and “tiers” were the minor thresholds.

When the bean soldiers were weak, they could use their formations and numbers to defeat a Celestial Heart True Person, so if they were individually at Celestial Heart, they could take down a Violet Palace True Lord without a problem, all the way up to Soul Projection! So long as the difference was within two realms, victory was only a question of numbers. This was unlike regular cultivators—a group of Spirit Ring True Persons could never defeat a Soul Projection True Lord, for the greater the gap in strength, the less power numbers had.

If the bean soldiers reached Soul Transformation, Tang Jie suspected that they could even fight an Earth Immortal. Of course, it was hard to estimate what the losses would be.

Putting all that aside, the current bean soldiers had to organize into phalanxes of one hundred, or else let alone Violet Palace True Lords, Celestial Heart True Persons would be enough to doom them.

Tang Jie had spent a long time growing these beans, and he had more than enough to sow as many as he pleased. Thus, he kept on sowing beans and turning them into soldiers until his Life Dao power ran out, creating nearly ten thousand of them before finally sending them out.

As for the bean king, Tang Jie was unwilling to let him join the assault. This was mostly because this was a very scattered battlefield, so the bean king couldn’t play much of a role, so the chance of losing him outweighed the value of sending him out. After all, the bean king was the only one who could constantly grow stronger through cultivation, and he was now much stronger than before. In the past, the bean king could only enhance around a thousand bean soldiers, but now, his influence could span over hundreds of thousands. In fact, he was deeply displeased that Tang Jie couldn’t provide him so many soldiers at once.

Once this was done, Tang Jie finally began to rest.

In this war of two worlds, gruesome battles were playing out all over the place.

Celestial Heart and Mortal Shedding Realm cultivators were the main fighting force here, and these cultivators formed teams and fought on different battlefields, with many people preparing for a prolonged campaign.

Because of Yun Tianlan’s own preferences, while the world collision had taken place at the Transverse Range, it leaned more toward the lands of Godhead Palace and the Beast Refining Gate so that these areas sustained more damage. In addition, most of the formation eyes had been concentrated there, turning the western side of Rosecloud into the main battlefield. More than half of the cultivators were concentrated in the borders of these two countries.

In Nadir Hill, the Heaven Wind Plains.

A group of cultivators from Godhead Palace was standing guard around a formation eye, a company of one hundred men led by a Spirit Ring cultivator. There were also three hundred puppets and two hundred fiends, but the puppets had all been lost and more than half of the fiends had been killed or injured. Even the company itself had lost ten-some men.

Across from them was an attacking force of three-hundred-some Hemos cultivators, with even more of them dead on the ground. The problems facing the defender were different from those of an attacker. As the attacking side whose job it was to destroy the formation, the Blood River cultivators had the initiative and were able to concentrate their power wherever they pleased. After all, they only needed to destroy part of the domain-merging formation to destroy it all, so there was no need to disperse their forces.

Thus, each group guarding the formation eyes either had to deal with no one at all or with several times their number.

This company had drawn the short straw and was being attacked by a greater Hemos force, and they were being pushed to the brink. Although they had been able to use their formations to strike back against the numerous enemies, the vast difference in strength was slowly breaking them down. With their puppets and fiend beasts destroyed and slain, the actual cultivators now had to take the front line, relying on their combat formations to defend against the Hemos. But the Hemos had their own combination spell arts, and while these cultivators were still holding on, it was only a matter of time before they hit their limit. If it weren’t for the fact that Godhead Palace specialized in defense, they would have collapsed long ago.

“Aaah!” A massive wave of blood sent a cultivator flying.

His spiritual energy had run out long ago, and when he was knocked flying, a barrage of crimson light blasted him, shattering his cracked Godhead Armor and killing him on the spot.

With his death, the pressure on the combat formation grew, each person having to bear a little more.

The Hemos cultivators roared, the bloody light behind their heads congealing into an enormous pillar that rammed forward. This crimson pillar had a corrosive power, and as it struck the golden ring formed by the Godhead Palace cultivators, smoke began to rise from it. To resist the corrosion, the golden ring began to contract so as to concentrate more power, but this contraction had its limits, and once that limit was hit, the ring would shatter. RαŊ𝘖βÈŠ

“Push! Kill them!” a Hemos cultivator laughed.

At this moment, one of the cultivators became exhausted, and as he did, an opening appeared in the golden ring. A Hemos cultivator immediately waved his hand, pulling over that cultivator and biting into his neck. The cultivator let out a terrified scream and attempted to break free, but his futile struggles only served to make the blood flow faster. The Hemos cultivator was quickly revitalized, much of his lost strength being restored. This was one of the specialties of the Hemos cultivators: the ability to suck the blood of enemies to recover, letting them continue to fight.

But this technique was as taboo as the Ghost Dao in the eyes of the orthodox cultivators of the Rosecloud Domain, so it made them shiver in fear. Some of the cultivators were so scared that they no longer wanted to fight, and if it weren’t for the Spirit Ring True Person keeping an eye on everyone, they would have run off long ago. Even so, someone shouted, “Sir, we can’t hold on! Let’s retreat!”

The Spirit Ring cultivator was a thick-bearded man with a broad-bladed saber, appearing more like a general than a cultivator.

The call made his heart wince, but he ultimately shook his head. “We can’t retreat. Just hold on! Reinforcements will come soon!”

“But when are they going to get here? We’ve been holding this place for three days!” a cultivator angrily shouted.

When this battle had started three days ago, they had already sent the emergency signal, but still no one had come.

Their defensive formation was about to fall, their puppets had been destroyed, and their fiends had been slain. Despite their efforts to rotate men, the cultivators were still running out of power, and all their medicines had been used up, but still, the reinforcements had not come.

Some people had started to give up hope.

“They won’t be coming, right?” someone asked in despair.

“We’re from Godhead Palace, the old foe of that Freedom Celestial Sovereign. How could they come and save us?” a person sorrowfully said.

“Perhaps the Basking Moon Sect is even hoping that we die,” another person angrily said.

Is that so? Perhaps.

The bearded cultivator helplessly thought, But that’s precisely why we can’t leave!

Godhead Palace was having a very tough time, and they were able to last this long not only because of the Basking Moon Sect’s mercy, but also because they had been patiently enduring it all.

They could not give the Basking Moon Sect an excuse to act against them. Even if they died in battle, they couldn’t desert, or else all of Godhead Palace might be wiped out as punishment!

This thought made the bearded cultivator call out, “Shut your mouths! As cultivators, we shouldn’t fear death! Today, we fight to the death!”

“Fight to the death!” the cultivators shouted back, but rather than courage and determination, their voices carried sorrow and helplessness.

As they were despairing, a figure appeared in the distance, flying toward them.

As it drew closer, it became apparent that it was one of Tang Jie’s clones, and they didn’t know whether they should be sad or happy. The Hemos cultivators didn’t know about Tang Jie, and seeing that he didn’t appear very strong, they sent a wave of blood at the clone.

The clone said nothing, flying over and pointing at the blood wave, upon which the blood wave dissolved. The Hemos cultivators were undeterred, on the contrary howling in excitement, “He’s Soul Transformation! Kill him!”

There were quite a few Celestial Heart cultivators among these three-hundred-some Hemos, and when they worked together in a formation, they had more than enough to kill a single Soul Transformation cultivator.

An even fiercer attack hurtled toward Tang Jie’s clone.

The clone snorted and said, “A mantis not knowing their own strength and trying to block a carriage!”

He waved his arm, sending a cloud of spiritual energy out. Although the clone was only at Soul Transformation, the original was an Immortal, with all the knowledge and experience that implied. Even the most ordinary spell art would have the might of a Divine Connection when used by him. In addition, even if the clones couldn’t use Dao Arts, they still possessed his profound understanding of the Daos.

This cloud of spiritual energy struck a node on the undulating blood wave, upon which the wave erupted with light and then melted away like snow under the sun.

With another thrust of his palm, the Hemos combination formation crumbled.

The clone waved his hand, summoning the Nine Heavens Calamity Blades, which sliced through the helpless and screaming Hemos, and in a flash, several dozen of them were slain.

The clone waved his hand again, upon which the remnants of the blood transformed into an expanding crimson fog, the Flesh Millstone.

With a peak Celestial Heart clone and the blood of these Hemos cultivators, Tang Jie had unleashed a Violet Palace–level Divine Connection, instantly pulverizing several dozen more Hemos.

In only two moves, he had killed a third of the Hemos, leaving the Godhead Palace cultivators dumbfounded. They could already see that this was a clone of the Freedom Celestial Sovereign, but one that was only at Soul Transformation, yet he had still easily destroyed that formation of three hundred Hemos cultivators.

The three Celestial Heart Hemos cultivators lunged out at Tang Jie’s clone while shouting, “Reassume the formation! We’ll hold him off!”

They threw out their treasures and unleashed all their power, willing to go all-out in order to stop Tang Jie.

Tang Jie’s clone formed a circle with his hands and twisted it, upon which the crimson fog turned into a vortex, sweeping up the three and instantly grinding them to bits, after which it howled downward, slamming down like a dragon and sending blood fountaining into the air.

The Hemos lost all will to fight and retreated.

Tang Jie didn’t give chase, instead turning to the Godhead Palace cultivators.

All of them tensed up.

The clone threw out a placard at the bearded cultivator. “All of you have done very well defending the formation eye with your lives. This is a contribution placard that you can use to claim your reward back at headquarters. The living will be richly rewarded while the deceased will receive sumptuous burials and have their direct descendants looked after for a thousand years.”

He flew off.

As the cultivators watched Tang Jie leave, they dropped to their knees and shouted, “All hail the Celestial Sovereign!”