The rain over the desolate hills had yet to stop when a storm sweeping across the entire Douluo Continent erupted with lightning speed.
The day after the pursuit ended, Spirit Hall, the Heaven Dou Empire, the Star Luo Empire, and the Clear Sky Sect issued their highest-level warrants to the entire continent almost simultaneously.
Tang Hao's portrait was plastered across the gates of every major city on the continent and the noticeboards of every Spirit Hall Branch.
His crimes were spelled out in plain language: colluding with a hundred-thousand-year soul beast, violating human morality, fusing with a soul beast's essence and falling into the demonic path, slaughtering human soul masters, and betraying all humanity.
The bounty was staggeringly high. Even providing accurate information on his whereabouts would earn a ten-thousand-year soul bone. Anyone who captured or killed him would receive resources befitting a Titled Douluo, jointly guaranteed by both empires and Spirit Hall.
Unlike previous warrants, which had circulated only among soul masters, this time even commoners in the continent's remotest villages knew that the Clear Sky Sect had produced "the demon Tang Hao, who mated with a soul beast and betrayed humanity."
After all, to ordinary people, soul beasts were nightmares that killed, burned, and plundered, destroying homes and villages. Colluding with them crossed the most fundamental line of everyone's survival.
Just as the continent-wide tide of condemnation grew fiercer, the Flame Will Dynasty, which had long remained secluded in the east and rarely involved itself in the continent's conflicts, suddenly brought the storm to its peak with a document titled Humanity's Joint Defense Declaration.
Humanity's Joint Defense Declaration of the Douluo Continent:
Admit it: you cannot tolerate those soul beast abominations wearing human skin! They are different from us by birth. However human they look, however well they pretend to be human, they are no more than creatures like the Wolf Bandits. Their bestial nature runs deep in their bones. Coexistence is nothing but a fool's dream!
From the moment our ancestors awakened the first spark of a martial soul, broke through the encirclement of savage ferocious beasts, and won a place for humanity to survive on this continent, our destiny became inseparably bound to the word "human."
Humanity's lands, humanity's path of cultivation, humanity's flame of civilization—we will never allow another race to lay claim to them!
Look, our fellow humans! Those ferocious beasts that should have remained confined to the Star Dou Forest, the Far North Ice Plains, and the Sunset Forest have begun shedding their fur and scales, taking forms indistinguishable from ours, and hiding within our sects, our academies, and our cities!
They have begun concealing their claws and fangs, walking among us under human identities, cultivating with human methods, stealing the soul rings and soul bones that should rightfully be ours, and even defiling our bloodlines. They use human kindness as a shield for their disguises, stealing the glory of a civilization we spent thousands upon thousands of years building through false affection!
We once gave them a way to live. We allowed them to breed and thrive in their own territories. Yet they repaid us by watching us from the shadows, attacking us from behind, and using human flesh and blood as nourishment for their advancement!
We once spoke of coexistence, yet they grind their teeth and savor blood in the darkness. Beneath the disguises of their hundred-thousand-year transformations, their man-eating nature has never changed!
Tens of thousands of years ago, sects were subverted from within by them, gifted soul masters died in their ambushes, and the bones of countless fellow humans became stepping stones for their breakthroughs!
But humanity is no flock of lambs awaiting slaughter, no sacrifice for soul beasts to advance! We are the fire that burns through the wilderness, the hammer that shatters shackles, the only race on this continent worthy of being called its masters!
Therefore, in the name of humanity's supreme will on the Douluo Continent, I declare: no more self-deceiving appeasement! No more indulgence of transformed abominations! No more compromise with disguised beasts! Our martial souls have awakened, our soul skills are ready, and our soul-hunting parties stand prepared to march! Every soul master is a walking boundary marker of human territory, and every flash of a martial soul is an open declaration of war against other races! Every Titled Douluo is an iron wall defending human civilization, and every set of soul bones is the supreme armament with which we safeguard our race's future!
Listen, our fellow humans! The call of our ancestors has never ceased! From the first clash in the Soul Hunting Forest to the bloody battles beneath our city walls, across every inch of this continent, all human cries converge into the oath engraved upon our souls: those not of our race will never share our hearts!
War! War! War! Even if we must cross countless mountains and rivers, even if we must burn through all our soul power and blood, it is not for prejudice, nor for conquest, but solely for humanity's survival! With the radiance of our martial souls, we will make this entire continent remember: humans are not prey! Through victory in soul hunting, we will establish for all generations to come: humanity is the master!
Hear this, all soul beasts who have taken human form: war has arrived. And we will bring you—your end!
The declaration was like a ladle of cold water poured into boiling oil, instantly sending the entire Douluo Continent into an uproar.
If the earlier warrants had merely been the major powers holding Tang Hao personally accountable, then Humanity's Joint Defense Declaration elevated the incident directly into a "struggle for survival between humanity and soul beasts," making "hostility toward transformed soul beasts" the politically correct stance for all humanity.
For a time, responses poured in from across the continent like a tide.
Countless powers, great and small, along with small and medium-sized sects, immediately spoke out again.
"Humans and soul beasts have been enemies in the struggle for survival for ten thousand years. Soul beasts feed on humans, while humans cultivate through soul rings. This is the law of heaven and earth, and it must not be transgressed. Yet now Tang Hao of the Clear Sky Sect, for the sake of his own personal feelings, has mated with a hundred-thousand-year transformed soul beast and fathered a child. Worse still, he has fused with a soul beast's essence, willingly embracing depravity and committing demonic deeds in a human body. He is a disgrace to all humanity and a mortal enemy of our survival!"
"Transformed soul beasts disguise their beastly selves in human forms, lurking in our streets, sects, and courts, beguiling humanity's prodigies, corrupting our bloodlines, and stealing our cultivation resources. Today, Tang Hao has been bewitched into betraying his race. Tomorrow, more prodigies will follow in his footsteps. If this continues, humanity's foundations will be utterly destroyed, and the turmoil of evil soul masters, the devastation of beast tides destroying cities, and the scourge of the Wolf Bandits will surely return!"
"In the past, Gale Demon Wolves forced themselves on humans and produced the abominable Wolf Bandits, with wolf heads and human bodies. Now soul beasts have become even more cunning, even harder to distinguish as they disguise themselves as humans and mingle among us, seeking to defile our human bloodlines and cloud our human minds. We must hold firm to the sanctity of our bloodlines and purge every hidden transformed soul beast. We will never tolerate any act of betraying humanity or colluding with soul beasts! The fate of Tang Hao of the Clear Sky Sect is our greatest warning: anyone who shelters a transformed soul beast is an enemy of all humanity, to be condemned and attacked by all!"
Their support for the Flame Will Dynasty's proposal could hardly have been more emphatic, and they began investigations within their sects one after another. Commoners in the major cities organized themselves to watch outsiders whose movements were unclear, who lived alone year-round, or whose auras seemed strange, reporting even the slightest suspicion to the local Spirit Hall Branch. Some radical soul master teams even formed parties and ventured deep into the forests, slaughtering soul beasts in a frenzy under the banner of "purging transformed soul beasts." Many low-level soul beasts that had previously kept to themselves suffered this undeserved calamity.
The two empires were the first to find themselves unable to sit still.
The Star Luo Empire had always prized martial strength and taken a hard line toward soul beasts. It immediately issued an edict ordering a thorough search for transformed soul beasts throughout its territory. Anyone found sheltering them would share their guilt, with punishment extending to three generations of their family. The Heaven Dou Empire hesitated somewhat, but faced with the fervent demands of its commoners and sects, it had no choice but to issue its own announcement supporting the Human Alliance, while strictly ordering local Spirit Hall offices to intensify their searches for transformed soul beasts.
Even the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect and the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan of the Upper Three Sects had to speak publicly. The Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Sect chose its words carefully, saying only that it would "uphold the boundaries of human morality and refuse to associate with soul beasts," yet it also tacitly accepted the investigations into transformed soul beasts. The Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan, a clan of beast martial souls that valued bloodline purity above all, declared in fierce terms that it would fully cooperate in purging hidden transformed soul beasts and would never permit the mixing of bloodlines.
But where, in truth, were so many transformed soul beasts supposed to come from? Yet with the facts and public opinion already laid out before them, they had to speak whether they wanted to or not.
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