Gangzi Was Targeted Even in the Divine Realm
In recent years, Pope Bibi Dong had gone to great lengths to recruit commoner geniuses and expand the ranks of her trusted followers, laying the groundwork for unifying the continent someday.
As long as he personally escorted these two promising talents with Innate Full Soul Power to Pope Hall, Pope Bibi Dong might be so pleased that she would reward him with a top-quality ten-thousand-year Soul Bone from the temple treasury, or use a secret technique to lend him a hand. He might yet have a chance to break through the Level 90 threshold and don the black robes of an elder of Pope Hall!
"Someone, come!"
Salas sprang to his feet, his platinum robes billowing without a breeze, and gave an order in a chilling voice:
"Prepare the fastest twin-flying-horse carriage. I am going to Nuoding City myself!"
"Pass down the order: until I give my personal approval, all information concerning Nuoding City is to be sealed. Anyone who leaks the slightest word will be executed on the spot, without mercy!"
Meanwhile, beyond the nine heavens, in the vast Divine Realm.
Within the Divine Realm, the atmosphere was like the sea before a storm.
"Ah-! Stop hitting me! It hurts!!"
Yu Xiaogang's shrill, pig-slaughtering screams echoed for a long time across the empty temple and the sea of clouds.
The Sea God and Asura God wore faces so dark they seemed ready to drip water. They could not even be bothered to use a single divine skill, instead relying purely on punches and kicks as they furiously passed Yu Xiaogang back and forth through the air like a sandbag.
"Slap! Bang! Thud!"
Asura God smashed a heavy straight punch into Yu Xiaogang's face, crushing his bright green bamboo-tube helmet completely flat. Immediately afterward, the Sea God struck him with a backhand slap, sending him flying backward dozens of yards like a broken spinning top.
"He failed the assessment, and the divine position rejected him. That settles official business!"
Asura God rubbed his fist, which glimmered with bloody light. The fury in his eyes was almost substantial as he gritted his teeth and sneered:
"Now it's time to settle our personal score! You good-for-nothing ruined my grand scheme. Even a hundred thousand lashes of the divine whip wouldn't be enough to vent my anger!"
Yu Xiaogang lay sprawled on the icy floor tiles, blood pouring from his nose and mouth. Every bone in his body ached as though he had fallen to pieces.
Even now, he could not understand what sin he had committed to suffer such inhuman torture the moment he ascended to godhood.
As it turned out, these two supreme gods high above had long since set their sights on Tang San in the lower realm!
But the Divine Realm's iron laws were strict: First-Level Gods and even God Kings were forbidden from interfering in the lower realm's affairs without cause. The two could only drink their divine tea and watch Tang San's movements from afar.
Who could have expected that, in the time it took the two of them to exchange a few cups and play a game of chess in the temple-
Yu Xiaogang, who had been trapped at Level 29 all his life in the lower realm, would rise like a rocket, surging to the perfection of Level 100 in the blink of an eye, without any warning!
Worse still, as soon as that fool gained power, not only did he fail to guide Tang San properly, he even forced Tang San to absorb a useless thirteen-year Lone Bamboo for some ridiculous "obedience test"!
Seeing the laws of the lower plane tremble violently from the fluctuations of Level 100, the two God Kings went with the flow and forcibly brought Yu Xiaogang up.
They had thought he was a once-in-an-era genius who had created his own divine path, and had even considered giving him an official post if his qualifications proved adequate.
But after a series of assessments, the man had revealed a mouthful of selfish, narrow-minded thoughts of revenge. He had crumbled at the first touch in actual combat, unable even to withstand a casual wave of force from a God King, and every ring on his body was a worthless ten-year white ring!
The two God Kings immediately felt that their intelligence had been mercilessly insulted by an ant from the lower realm. Their official and personal grievances collided, resulting in this utterly brutal beating.
"Good hit! I've hated the sight of this straw bag for ages!"
The Sea God sent a flying kick into Yu Xiaogang's backside, sending the giant humanoid bamboo shoot skidding over ten meters away, but he could not help turning on Asura God with an angry outburst:
"Asura! You've got the nerve to vent your anger here? If you hadn't left some damned remnant of Rakshasa God's divine will in Slaughter City a thousand years ago, stirring the lower realm into a foul mess, would my Sea God Inheritance have spent hundreds of years waiting in the mortal world without finding a suitable candidate?!"
With his failing exposed, Asura God's face abruptly darkened, and he shot back:
"Bullshit! Poseidon, you've got the nerve to bring that up? If you hadn't gotten yourself tangled up with that Angel God woman in the depths of the sea, leaving a pile of messes behind before dusting off your backside and walking away, why would I have had to search for one in ten thousand in the lower realm?!"
"Stop pinning the blame on me!"
Blue light surged in the Sea God's eyes as he pointed at Asura God's nose and cursed him roundly:
"From the time Tang San was in his mother's womb, what awakened within him was the Blue Silver Emperor and a temperament that could embrace all rivers like the sea. He was clearly the heir I had chosen for the Sea God Inheritance! You meddled halfway through and used the presence of Slaughter City to lure him in. You were plainly looting a burning house and stealing another's love!"
"Bullshit! The Clear Sky Hammer is the world's hardest, most tyrannical weapon of slaughter. He was born with the makings of a killer from Asura's sea of blood. My divine mark was branded on him when he swung that hammer at age six!"
Asura God's eyes were scarlet as he pressed forward, refusing to yield an inch:
"How many tens of thousands of years have I slogged away on the God Realm Committee? I've long wanted to throw down my burden and wander happily through the higher-dimensional universe! But because this fool turned Tang San's first ring into a ten-year white ring, cracks appeared in the foundation of his divine soul, and the difficulty of his Divine Trial increased tenfold!"
"Now I have to stay on duty in this damned Divine Realm for thousands more years, and you still dare try to snatch my disciple?!"
The two supreme gods of the Divine Realm argued more and more fiercely. Their terrifying divine might tore through the vast sea of clouds around the temple, stirring up countless bolts of dazzling seven-colored lightning.
With every word they exchanged, the frustration and fury in their hearts surged twofold, and naturally, all of it found an outlet in Yu Xiaogang beneath their feet.
Whenever Asura God cursed, he raised his foot and delivered a bone-crushing stomp; whenever the Sea God retorted, he swung his hand and struck with a Divine Wind Sky-Rending Palm.
"Bang! Slap! Crack!"
The sounds of bones breaking and flesh being struck rose and fell.
Fortunately, Yu Xiaogang's divinely bestowed Second Martial Soul was an exceptionally pure Ten-Year Solitary Bamboo. Not only did it come with a full ten ten-year white rings, but the six Soul Bones on his body also brought "Lone Bamboo's ultimate toughness and slickness" to their limits.
No matter how the two God Kings punched and kicked, the instant those incomparably fierce forces touched the green bamboo armor plates, the slippery bamboo skin stripped away most of the force from the vast majority of them.
Although his bones ached unbearably and his entire body was black and blue, he somehow clung stubbornly to his last breath, unable to breathe it out no matter what!
He was beaten mercilessly for a full two hours.
The bamboo-tube helmet on Yu Xiaogang's face had long since been smashed into broken strips, and his formerly stiff, long middle-aged face had swollen into a purple-black steamed bun of risen dough, with blood streaking the corners of his eyes and mouth.
He lay on the ground, his snot and tears mingling with muddy water, his whole body trembling like a tattered fallen leaf in the autumn wind.
He was going mad.
What kind of Divine Realm was this? What kind of ascension in broad daylight was this?!
He had thought that ascending to godhood meant endless wealth and glory, with countless people looking up to him. Instead, the moment he walked through the door, before he could even drink a cup of hot tea, he had been treated like a sandbag and beaten half to death for half the night!
When he saw dazzling scarlet light flare once more on Asura God's palm, and the Sea God raise his sandbag-sized fist again, the last shred of hope in Yu Xiaogang's heart crumbled to dust.
He used every last bit of strength he had left, scrambling on his hands and feet as he frantically kowtowed on the ground. His bamboo armor thudded against the white jade floor as he let out the most abject, most agonized plea of his life:
"Stop hitting me! Great lords, you two God Kings, I beg you, stop hitting me!!"