Firmament Sword

RUMBLE!

Between heaven and earth, a cataclysmic roar resounded as vast swaths of the void collapsed.

The aftershocks struck below, ripping massive, bottomless chasms into the vast, endless reed marsh.

The ground fractured, the cracks stretching for tens of thousands of miles!

Mountains crumbled, the earth split open, rivers ran dry, and lakes evaporated!

Before this terrifying power, Xu Luo's body had no ability to resist and was instantly sent flying.

As for Huo Xuan Mountain... his eyes widened as, in that instant, he was torn to shreds by the two terrifying forces, then, with incredible speed... reduced to dust!

Meanwhile, the Profound Nether Leech, which had already fled an unknown distance, exploded with a BANG the moment its master died. It transformed into a vast, majestic wave of energy that violently slammed into the endless void!

This was the very reason Xu Luo had allowed it to escape; as long as Huo Xuan Mountain died, the Profound Nether Leech could not possibly survive!

Otherwise, letting such a vicious creature get away would have undoubtedly led to great disaster!

With the Profound Nether Leech's abilities, few in the world could restrain it. Slaughtering a city... would be a mere thought for it!

Xu Luo coughed up blood repeatedly in the void. Even though he had focused all his power on defense the instant he unleashed the Shaking Light Burst, he was still severely injured by the impact.

But his eyes were filled with a smile.

'Divine Power Realm... Ninth Layer!'

'An expert standing at the apex of this world!'

'Someone as heavy as a great mountain, whose name alone could suffocate people, who could kill a Transformation Realm Powerhouse with a single glance!'

'And I actually managed to defeat—no, kill!—such a peerless expert!'

'Without relying on the Seven Star Souls, without the help of the Cyan Dragon or White Tiger, just by relying on my own wisdom and strength, I alone... defeated a great power of the Ninth Layer of the Divine Power Realm!'

For Xu Luo, this was a major breakthrough in his life!

'I didn't rely on anyone else, only myself…' Xu Luo's body was severely injured, but his spirits... were higher than ever before.

Riding the force of the blast, Xu Luo fled tens of thousands of miles away, leaving behind the battlefield that was no longer a reed marsh, but a deep pit tens of thousands of miles wide.

Gurgling streams of water welled up from underground. In the future... this place would become a great lake!

In later generations, people would call it "Immortal Lake," meaning a lake created by Immortals, because originally... there was no lake here.

Xu Luo found a steep mountain composed almost entirely of stone, with sheer cliffs on all four sides, looking extremely perilous.

Halfway up the mountain, Xu Luo carved out a cave dwelling with a wave of his hand. He then slipped inside and dropped a large boulder to seal the entrance.

Sitting cross-legged in the cave, Xu Luo began to recover.

The Shadow Shaking Heart Method began to circulate continuously, its speed of absorbing Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi as fast as ever!

Several days later, Xu Luo could move freely again. Although the injuries inside his body had not fully healed, they were no longer a major hindrance.

Afterward, Xu Luo began to venture out in search of various Spirit Medicines. The Sect Continent was rich in medicinal resources. In the mountains, herbs hundreds of years old were commonplace, and there were even thousand-year-old medicines, some of which had gained a sliver of spiritual awareness.

Xu Luo did not harvest excessively, only picking what he needed. His injuries also required these Spirit Medicines to aid his recovery.

Another half a month passed, and Xu Luo's injuries were about eighty to ninety percent healed. He decided it was time to leave the Sect Continent.

He was homesick!

Ever since the sects from the Central Plains Star Continent entered the Mortal World and the legend of Beidou's Eighth Star spread, he had been away from his home and family. He had drifted from place to place, entering the Southern Domain, then the lands of the Ancient Race, and now he was on the Sect Continent... He had left his footprints on all four continents of this world.

Now, while he couldn't claim his strength was at the peak of the current era, he was no longer the old Xu Luo that anyone could bully.

Therefore, Xu Luo wanted to go home and see his family.

But before that, Xu Luo decided to return to the Ancient Race Continent one more time!

He was going to pay the Huo Family a visit!

The Huo Family's Elder Saint had always been a sharp blade hanging over his head!

There was no telling when that blade might suddenly fall.

In a one-on-one fight, Xu Luo believed he could contend with a great power of the Ninth Layer of the Divine Power Realm. Even if he wasn't their match, escaping with his life wouldn't be a major problem.

But if he were to face a Saint... Xu Luo had no confidence whatsoever. A Divine Power Realm expert could kill with a glance, but a Saint... could kill with a thought!

The difference in their realms was simply too vast.

Thus, Xu Luo had to return to the Ancient Race Continent to check on the Huo Family and see if that Elder Saint, Huo Tongtian, was still obsessed with Beidou's Eighth Star after so much had happened!

Xu Luo didn't go to say goodbye to Li Ye. He feared that countless people were watching Li Ye right now, and he didn't want to bring trouble to his friend.

Xu Luo did, however, think of the couple Song Chengfeng and Chu Xiaoya, as well as Su Qianqian... He thought to himself, 'We can only meet again if fate allows it!'

At this moment, a pall of grief hung over the Sect Continent.

The battle on the Endless Ocean had become a shared tragedy for both the Sect Continent and the Ancient Race Continent.

Countless powerhouses had died. There were almost no wounded.

Many once-mighty sects that had enjoyed a golden age collapsed in the aftermath of that battle.

Even the top three powers on the Sect Continent—the Liejiang Daoist Sect, Western Buddhism, and the Honglou Sect—became unusually low-key after losing the core of their strength.

Originally, the second-tier powers would have had a chance to challenge the authority of these three great forces. Unfortunately, they had suffered even greater losses in the battle on the Endless Ocean!

All things considered, the three great forces remained the three great forces, and the second-tier remained second-tier. The overall structure of the Sect Continent hadn't changed much, but its collective strength had fallen by several levels.

Along his journey, Xu Luo passed many sects filled with wailing and despair. Seeing the red, swollen eyes of the grieving families, Xu Luo felt a stir of emotion as well.

'A single moment of greed can cause the heavens to fall and the earth to shatter!'

'If not for their greed, they wouldn't have died, and their families wouldn't be grieving for them now.'

'Although those people died because of me, I don't need to bear any of the karma!'

'Because... they all wanted to refine me!'

'It was their own greed that brought about their utter destruction!'

Having seen the world's splendors, tasted the warmth and cold of human relationships, and witnessed all of life's myriad forms, Xu Luo's state of mind... once again elevated.

On this journey, Xu Luo traveled in peace.

His heart was as placid as still water. Even when he overheard many young people clamoring to find Beidou's Eighth Star to take revenge, his heart... felt not a single ripple.

After crossing the Boundary Mountain, he returned to the Ancient Race Continent.

He didn't use his Transformation Skill. Instead, he swaggered openly into the Ancient Race Continent.

Tianya City.

Xu Luo returned here once again, his state of mind completely different from before.

When he first came to Tianya City, his heart was filled with grief and indignation. Back then, he couldn't see the path forward at all and had no good way to resolve his predicament.

But now, Xu Luo was completely at ease. He sat quietly in the same tavern he had visited before, slowly sipping his wine and listening to the conversations of the other patrons.

"Did you hear? More than half of the experts who gathered here a while ago didn't make it back alive!"

"What? What happened? I heard those people were all chosen talents from all over!"

"Yeah, and there were many powerful figures from the older generation, too. How could they have met with a mishap?"

"Heh, it didn't happen here. They all went to the Sect Continent! To look for that Beidou's Eighth Star!"

"Beidou's Eighth Star? The one from the legends? The one who, if captured and refined... can help someone become an Immortal? Is that legend true?"

"Of course it's true! They just probably never expected Beidou's Eighth Star to be so terrifying that he'd kill them all!"

In the tavern, someone who had returned alive from the Sect Continent was recounting what they had heard to the people around them. They desperately needed someone to talk to, because nearly everyone who had been in the skies above the Endless Sea that day—aside from those who arrived late—had experienced that terrifying calamity.

"Those at the Transformation Realm couldn't even get involved. You know about the great powers of the Divine Power Realm, right? In the eyes of ordinary mortals, those are already figures like Immortals!"

"Heh, well, those Land Immortals in the eyes of mortals were as fragile as eggs hitting a stone in the face of that calamity!"

"They were utterly crushed!"

"There was this great power at the Ninth Layer of the Divine Power Realm... oh right, he was from the Ding Family of the Ancient Race! You know the Ding Family, right?"

The man looked around. Seeing that everyone's eyes in the silent tavern were fixed on him, he nodded in satisfaction and said, "It was a top-tier great power from the Ding Family. He was right next to me. Then, when the calamity struck, WHOOSH... he just vanished! It scared me half to death. We were just talking a second ago, how could he disappear in the blink of an eye?"

"He even told me that after they found Beidou's Eighth Star, even if he could get just a single finger, it would be a heaven-sent fortune!"

"Too bad for him. He didn't even see a single hair of Beidou's Eighth Star before he lost his own life."

At that moment, someone asked, "Then how did you survive?"

"Yeah, you're not just bragging, are you? Was it really that terrifying?" someone else chimed in.

"Bragging? Heh... I wish I were. Of all my sect brothers who came with me this time, I'm the only one left!"

"Terrifying? If you'd seen it, you'd know what true terror is!"

"As for how I survived... would you believe me if I said it was just luck?" The speaker gave a bitter smile. "At the time, I had no idea how I made it out alive. It probably... had a lot to do with me being at the very back of the group, not qualified to push my way to the front! At that moment, thousands of people... were turned to ash in the blink of an eye. Not even a speck of dust was left!"

"Heavens... Beidou's Eighth Star did that?"

"Beidou's Eighth Star... is too vicious, isn't he? That's thousands of lives!"

"Yeah, killing thousands just like that... that's too inhuman!"

"He's the reincarnation of a star. He was never human to begin with!"

The people in the tavern discussed in low voices.

The speaker just shook his head with a bitter smile. "For something like this, you can only blame your own bad luck. You can't blame Beidou's Eighth Star. After all... we were the ones who wanted to kill him first."

This man was one of the sensible ones. Especially after surviving the calamity, he had seen through many things, so he spoke with considerable frankness.

However, not everyone was as open-minded as this man, willing to face their own mistakes.

A cold, sneering voice reached everyone's ears, "That Beidou's Eighth Star is an unforgivable villain to begin with. Killing him is purely an act of justice on behalf of heaven! This time, he tricked and slaughtered tens of thousands of experts from the Sect Continent and the Ancient Race Continent. He will surely face divine retribution!"

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