Chapter 251: White Heat

Chapter 251 -247: White Heat

“You dared to harm my junior brother. Now you will pay with your lives!”

Almost several thousand figures appeared, an even more terrifying sight than the one outside Nine True Mountain.

Riding their own clouds, they stacked up layer upon layer, floating in midair. Each held a Magical Treasure, swirling with various colors. It was like gods and demons descending from a mural, or like the gates of a celestial palace swinging open in the Celestial Vault for Immortals to do battle. The sense of pressure was immense.

A voice echoed from all directions, and then a Ghost Head materialized in the void. It was pitch-black and indigo-blue, shaped like a Yaksha, with a pair of crimson eyes like blood-red lanterns that cast their glow over the land.

It plunged straight toward the people in the small courtyard.

At this moment, nearly the entire Demon Sect had been mobilized, save for their Masters.

On the Daoist Sect’s side, the man and woman wore grave expressions. The woman let out a sharp cry, and a scroll flew out from her chest, instantly unfurling above everyone’s heads. Golden stars glittered within a painted landscape of mountains and rivers, and scorching flames flared, nearly illuminating half the sky.

This was the very item that had just refined the old woman inside it.

The man, meanwhile, sent his Flying Sword shooting out. It flew upward, growing in the wind until it was dozens of yards long, advancing alongside the scroll.

But just then, the Ghost Head’s aura intensified. Vaguely, Chen Qingyang saw a person in a Profound Robe press a palm down forcefully.

BOOM! The world seemed to crack with a sudden clap of thunder, a sound that traveled a great distance.

The golden light on the Flying Sword and the scroll was instantly extinguished. The man and woman collapsed to the ground, while the Ghost Head remained as imposing as ever.

“Senior Brother Yan, what a move!”

“Kill these Daoist Dogs! Reclaim the disciple for Venerable Meng!”

“The Holy Sect is eternal!”

…

Seeing the first move succeed, cheers erupted from the sky like a mountain echo. It was as if on a battlefield, their own general had just unhorsed the enemy’s champion.

“Senior Brother, Senior Sister, are you alright?” Li Zheng, quick of eye and hand, hurried to feed the two an Elixir. Senior Brother Jie Yi prepared to summon his Peach Wood Sword, but before it could even appear, another voice was heard from the horizon.

“Junior Brother, don’t rush. Let me deal with him!”

The voice had barely faded when a rain of swords tore through the sky. A slash of silver cut through the thick crimson, heading straight for the Ghost Head.

The silver light flashed as thousands, tens of thousands of rays converged; the hum of swords, one after another, pierced the clouds.

Each individual ray was shaped like a sword, and together they formed a long dragon that flowed at extreme speed. It was, in effect, a single technique that unleashed ten thousand swords at once!

“It’s the Tai Hao Sword!”

Someone in the Demon Sect began to shout in alarm.

It was the first time in his life Chen Qingyang had ever seen such a sharp Sword Formula. Wherever it passed, the Ghost Head instantly dissipated. The figure in the Profound Robe within cried out in shock and retreated.

Though much of the Sword Qi was spent, a considerable amount remained. It turned in the sky and stabbed straight toward the large group of Demon Sect Disciples.

Those Disciples had low Cultivation. If they were hit, the losses would be nothing short of catastrophic.

“Hmph. No martial ethics.”

Another person from the Demon Sect stepped forward. With a wave of their hand, a bloody vortex condensed in midair. Vaguely, an image of a seated Goddess could be seen within. A faint golden light seeped out, giving it a sacred feel.

The sky-filling sword light vanished into the vortex and disappeared completely, dissipating in total silence.

“A fine Earth Six Paths Skill, to be able to even stop my sword!” The voice came from the middle of the Demon Sect Disciples, where a figure had appeared out of thin air.

A gray Daoist Robe, a gaunt face, long, graying hair, and a Peach Wood Flying Sword. His bearing was ordinary, but this was the man who had just unleashed the sword attack.

His attire was nearly identical to Senior Brother Jie Yi’s; he was surely from the Tai Hao Sword Institute.

Following his appearance, countless more figures materialized between heaven and earth. Some floated in midair, others landed on the ground. They outnumbered the Demon Sect Disciples and had them nearly surrounded.

“Heh, this old trick again. When it comes to valor and invincibility, our Holy Sect reigns supreme. But when it comes to schemes and plots, how can we compare to you hypocrites!” The one speaking now was the person who had controlled the Ghost Head earlier.

“Junior Brother, why waste your breath on them? We came prepared today. No one can stop us!”

As soon as the words fell, the aura of the nine Blood Dragons in the sky intensified. They coiled overhead, and a suffocating feeling washed over everyone.

Chen Qingyang focused his senses and realized that the Demon Sect was using a technique to drain all the Qi Mechanism from the area, putting pressure on everyone present.

Then, tens of thousands of White Jade Soul Banners rose into the air, scattering countless streams of dark green energy that quickly enveloped everything.

Truly formidable!

First, they drained the Qi Mechanism, then they used the Soul Banners to summon Nether Qi. This naturally put the Daoist Sect at a disadvantage. In the magical battle to follow, even those who were originally evenly matched would be relegated to a Lower Rank.

Standing among the ranks of Demons, Elder Tai Hao naturally sensed that something was wrong. His hands formed a seal, and his Peach Wood Sword was unsheathed once more. “Junior Brothers, charge with me! Kill them!”

With that, he condensed a thousand-yard-long beam of Sword Qi and slashed forward. To possess such power at Half-Step Foundation Establishment was truly rare.

“Your opponent is me!”

In the sky above, the bloody vortex appeared again. The Goddess within looked sacred as she completely refined such an immense beam of Sword Qi.

Chen Qingyang felt a sense of familiarity, as if it were the Six Paths Blood Refining Array. The Goddess within, or perhaps, the Earth goddess.

The standoff between the two sides exploded with that one sword strike. Everyone unleashed their techniques and attacked their opponents.

It was a clash of soldier against soldier, general against general.

Regardless if they were Daoist or Demon, the Disciples with Cultivation below the Eighth Realm had all more or less formed Arrays—the Three Talents, the Five Heroes, the Seven Stars, the Twelve Dragons and Phoenixes, and so on. In short, the lower their Cultivation, the more they needed to group together to maximize their chances of survival.

The Demon Sect was already more ferocious in combat than the Daoist Sect. Now, with such dense Nether Qi filling the Array, the Daoist Sect was relegated to a Lower Rank as soon as the fight began. As far as the eye could see, they could only parry, with no opportunity to strike back.

Chen Qingyang remained hidden in the shadows, his Conscious Fish wandering through the chaotic sky. He still hadn’t seen any Foundation Establishment Masters appear.

Perhaps they were each trying to gauge how many experts the other side had committed. Otherwise, it might be a repeat of last time, when a Demon Sect Master was slain by Yun Ci in a single strike.

He continued to move through the shadows, looking for the right opportunity. The battle entered a white-hot stage, and the formations of both sides were no longer as stable as before.

Chen Qingyang saw an Essence Condensation Fifth Realm cultivator before him suffer a minor injury in the fray. The cultivator was knocked back several steps, landing in a dark corner of his vision.

With a thought, the Five Elements Sword appeared in his palm. It flashed like a brilliant light. With a sneak attack, he could kill an opponent of the same realm in a single strike.

This time, he obtained over five thousand Immortal Seedlings.

After finding another opportunity, he killed two more people, accumulating over thirteen thousand Immortal Seedlings.

If this battle could last for three days and three nights, he wouldn’t even need to hide his Cultivation anymore. He might even be able to reach the Foundation Establishment Realm on the spot.

But things rarely go as planned. The ground was littered with the corpses of Cultivators, all of them Low Tier. As for those at the Sixth Realm and above, they were extremely difficult to kill. They formed Arrays, their coordination was flawless, and when they charged the enemy, it was impossible to determine a winner in the short term. Chen Qingyang searched for a long time without finding an opening.

‘As expected, I’m not the only clever person in the world.’

After a long search, he finally came across a cultivator at Essence Condensation Six Realms. This person wasn’t injured but had already expended a great deal of energy. Moreover, his group of three was fighting five opponents. An opportunity should present itself soon.

So Chen Qingyang went nowhere else, simply waiting there. The group was locked in a bitter struggle for a very long time; he had to wait for almost two hours before an opportunity arose.

The five-man Array of the Daoist Sect finally showed its power, repelling the cultivator at Essence Condensation Six Realms. He looked to be gravely injured, and Chen Qingyang was confident he could finish him with a single blow.

But at that critical moment, a black shadow flashed past. In an instant, the man shriveled into a dried corpse.

It was that Zhang Jiu again!

‘Now he’s the one who’s like a lingering Yin Soul.’

Looking at him now, his Cultivation seemed to have grown since he had just broken through to the Sixth Realm. And with his Nine Nether Demon Devouring Technique, he only targeted his fellow Demon Sect members.

Chen Qingyang was no match for him at present. He decisively gave up and circled around to another area to continue looking for opportunities.

‘If I act on impulse, I could break through right now, but the consequences would be severe. I’ll just consider it as storing up my Cultivation for now.’

After another two hours, he found opportunities to take down one cultivator at Essence Condensation Six Realms and one at the Fifth Realm, gaining over ten thousand more Immortal Seedlings.

[Available Immortal Seedlings: 68,147]

‘Still not enough.’

He needed enough to use on the True Understanding of the Circulation of Stars Demon Suppression Array and the Great Soul Scripture, with some left over to advance his Cultivation even further.

He continued to roam the battlefield using this method. By now, several thousand corpses had fallen from the sky, piling up below and causing rivers of blood to flow.

The stench of blood in the air grew heavier, and the Nether Qi became ever denser. The Demon Sect members who were still standing were now extremely difficult to deal with. Chen Qingyang had to search for a long time just to get another six thousand or so Immortal Seedlings.

Looking now, the Daoist and Demon Sects, which had arrived with overwhelming force, nearly ten thousand strong, had been whittled down to about two or three thousand.

Among them were many who had cultivated for a hundred, or even a thousand years. They had struggled so hard to reach their current level, only to be reduced to nothing in a single day’s conflict.

A few days ago, he and Lin Qingxuan had joined forces and still struggled to deal with a single cultivator at Essence Condensation Six Realms. Here, deaths like that were commonplace.

The one thing the Daoist and Demon Sects didn’t lack was experts!

In the sky above, even more than ten Half-Step Foundation Establishment experts had fallen. Chen Qingyang personally witnessed the woman with the scroll and Senior Brother Jie Yi die tragic deaths at the hands of the Demon Sect.

Li Zheng, on the other hand, with his middling Cultivation, had stayed within the range of the Fifth and Sixth Realms and had actually managed to survive until now.

This meant that Chen Qingyang had to be extremely careful, keeping his figure hidden in the darkness at all times. In any case, to the Tai Xu Sect, he was just an “unofficial member.” No one would be paying any attention to him.

Just then, the blood-red sky suddenly trembled, and the color of the nine dragons instantly dimmed.

Chen Qingyang looked up and could even see starlight beginning to peek through the crimson.

‘Of course. The Nine Dragon Dream Array has held on for so long; it’s about time it gave out.’

Once the Array was broken, under the power of the Circulation of Stars Demon Suppression Array, not a single Demon Sect Disciple here would survive.

The Daoist Sect Disciples all saw a glimmer of hope. Someone even shouted, “Brothers, break through the blood array! Victory is in sight!”

Chen Qingyang swept his gaze around again. ‘The opportunities left for me are dwindling.’

‘If I want more Immortal Seedlings, I’ll have to take them from the experts.’