Above the Nine Provinces, two figures faced each other across a thousand feet of empty air.
Shennong stood above the clouds. He was an aged figure in an ancient robe of coarse hemp, barefoot, his face weathered like stone etched with the passage of time. Wisps of pure plant qi curled around him.
Yet his back remained straight as he protected the countless living beings of the Nine Provinces.
A thousand feet away, Hongjun stood with his hands behind his back.
Clad in a plain, ancient Daoist robe, he was shrouded in a cold, sacred radiance. His face flickered within the light, indistinct, seemingly real yet unreal.
With his hands behind his back, waves of Ancestor God pressure rolled out like an unfathomable ocean, weighing down the entire sky.
"Shennong, you broke our agreement and intervened." Hongjun's voice pressed down from every direction, so thunderous that the entire sky trembled.
As his voice descended, even the wind above the Nine Provinces stopped.
"Agreement?" Shennong raised his eyes. "What you call an agreement is nothing but your own selfish desire."
"Selfish desire?" The radiance around Hongjun did not waver. "The Heaven-Earth Calamity is an act of supreme merit."
"Merit?" Shennong's remnant soul suddenly stirred, and his manifested body grew a little more solid. "You cannot even give a clear account of what this calamity truly is. Everything rests on your word alone! All I see is you intimidating the Four Directions Realm."
"You intend to unleash a bloodbath, slaughter the Human Race, and gather tens of millions of soldier souls." Shennong's voice exploded through the void. "This battle was inevitable from the start."
"Below Ancestor Gods, all are ants." Hongjun's voice remained thunderous. "I seek tens of millions of soldier souls to repair Suiren's Heaven-Earth Copper Furnace and bring a Heaven-Earth