He Shattered a God King's Godhead Across the Plane Barrier-And You Call This a Mortal from the Lower Realm?

Asura God sat up amid the rubble.

The charred thunder mark on his chest was still burning.

It wasn't burning on the surface. It was burning inward.

Purple-gold lightning was lodged in the cracks of his Godhead, burrowing deeper inch by inch. Whenever it touched a wisp of Asura Divine Power, it ground it to dust.

Asura God raised a hand to press against his chest. The instant his palm touched it, the lingering lightning jolted his fingertips away, and his flesh sizzled, turning black in a patch.

"Damn it—!"

He had only made it halfway through the curse when his throat turned sweet. He spat out another mouthful of divine blood.

The blood landed on the ruins, burning through several divine bricks.

Asura God stared at the smoking bloodstain, his expression darkening little by little.

That lightning strike hadn't been ordinary suppression, nor had it merely wounded his body. It had been aimed at his Godhead.

In other words—the other party hadn't meant to teach him a little lesson. They had issued a clear warning:

Reach out again, and I'll strike you, God King and all.

The moment the thought surfaced, Asura God's back went rigid.

He didn't want to admit it.

But the facts were right there. He couldn't deny them.

Asura God had lived for tens of thousands of years. He had seen countless upstarts and personally slain countless so-called prodigies. Whether they were people from the lower realm or gods from higher planes, anyone who dared act insolently before him ended up as nothing but a corpse.

But today was different. He hadn't even seen his opponent. He had merely sent a Divine Punishment down upon Douluo Continent, only to be struck from afar by a bolt of lightning and sent tumbling into the ruins.

If word of this got out, the entire Divine Realm would be in an uproar.

"No..."

Asura God gritted his teeth and used a broken stone pillar to push himself to his feet.

He couldn't panic.

At least not yet.

First, he had to find out what had happened over on Douluo Continent.

That bolt of lightning couldn't have come out of nowhere, and there was no way it had struck Asura God Hall with such precision for no reason. There had to be traces. There had to be clues.

Asura God closed his eyes, enduring the tearing pain in his chest as he sent out another wisp of divine sense.

This time, he didn't spread it out in a sweeping rush as he had before.

He had learned his lesson.

If he recklessly probed again, and something was waiting on the other side, he'd truly lose face before all the myriad worlds today.

Asura God compressed that wisp of divine sense until it was as fine as a thread of blood. From the edge of the Divine Realm's rift, it crept downward, passed through the Plane Barrier, and descended toward Douluo Continent.

Spirit City.

The square before the Pope Palace had yet to fully quiet down.

The stone steps had split down the middle, rubble lay everywhere, and the air still carried the scorched stench left by the Divine Punishment's lightning.

Bibi Dong stood before the steps, one sleeve stained with blood, her face deathly pale.

Ye Lingling crouched beside Hu Liena, still muttering, "I knew the Celestial Master's things would work," her voice trembling even as her eyes shone.

And Hu Liena stood right in the very center.

Completely unharmed.

Asura God's divine sense had barely arrived when the first thing it saw was the Tribulation-Avoiding Garment on her.

Most of the golden light had faded from the garment. It was as thin as a veil of water, fitting snugly against her. The Three-Legged Golden Toad on the front of her robe rose and fell slightly, as if it had just eaten its fill and was now resting lazily.

But Asura God saw clearly—it was that thing that had just swallowed his Divine Punishment.

His eyelid twitched.

The next moment, his divine sense picked up on something else.

Not the garment.

An aura.

A faint trace of Daoist resonance still lingered between heaven and earth.

It was so faint that an ordinary person couldn't sense it at all. Even someone like Bibi Dong, who had one foot on the threshold of godhood, might not have been able to distinguish it.

But Asura God was different.

He had just taken that Purple Gold Divine Lightning bolt head-on. He knew its scent all too well.

It was the same.

The aura in the thunder mark and the Daoist resonance lingering in Spirit City were exactly alike.

Asura God slowly clenched his fingers.

"It was him..."

His voice was low and hoarse.

His divine sense drew a little closer to Hu Liena, fixed on the Tribulation-Avoiding Garment and the strange threads of Daoist intent flowing through the toad pattern. Then he compared that aura with the Purple-Gold Thunder Mark on his chest, which had burned through his Godhead—and every piece instantly fell into place.

It wasn't a coincidence.

It wasn't the will of heaven.

And it certainly wasn't a backlash from the rules of the plane.

"It was that Celestial Master!"

Asura God's eyes flew open, his voice twisting out of shape:

"That bolt of lightning that struck me was that Celestial Master's revenge!"

The Divine Officials kneeling inside the hall lowered their heads even further.

No one dared answer.

Asura God hadn't expected anyone to.

There was only one thought racing back and forth through his mind now—Celestial Master's Grand Wedding, gifts bestowed by heaven and earth, the Tribulation-Avoiding Garment swallowing Divine Punishment, Purple Gold Divine Lightning striking a God King from afar... Each of these things was outrageous on its own.

With them all piled onto one person, the word "troublesome" didn't begin to describe it.

He had lived for tens of thousands of years.

In all that time, he had traveled through more than one plane and seen plenty of so-called mighty beings' relics, ancient divine weapons, and forbidden arts.

But he had never heard of an existence like this.

A man in the lower realm, never showing himself or making an appearance, stirring the fortunes of an entire world through the medium of the Eighteen Betrothal Gifts.

The fifth betrothal gift he sent could block a Divine Punishment personally unleashed by a God King.

From across the Plane Barrier, his true self had brought down half of Asura God Hall with a single bolt of lightning.

What the hell was this thing?

The more Asura God thought about it, the drier his throat became.

He had meant to heal his injuries, figure out the other party's methods, then strike back hard.

But the instant the thought surfaced, he fell silent.

Strike back hard?

With what?

He couldn't even figure out who the other party was. They could casually unleash a Purple Gold Divine Lightning bolt that he couldn't understand at all. If he truly provoked them, would the next bolt merely send him crashing into the ruins?

Asura God wasn't sure.

It was precisely that uncertainty that sent a chill creeping up his spine, inch by inch.

He shivered.

It was a slight movement, but he noticed it himself.

Asura God's expression turned utterly grim.

He was actually afraid.

After living all these years, commanding slaughter and passing judgment on the gods, Asura God was actually getting chills down his back at the name of a Celestial Master from the lower realm.

But fear or not, he had to accept it.

If he refused to accept it, he'd only die sooner.

Asura God took a couple of breaths, forcibly suppressing his churning emotions. His gaze returned to the wisp of divine sense on Douluo Continent.

Hu Liena was still standing there, her fingers lightly pressing against the Golden Toad on her robe, her eyes a little red.

Bibi Dong stood beside her, her expression grave. It was clear that today's events had shaken her deeply as well.

Asura God stared for a few breaths, then slowly withdrew his divine sense.

He couldn't keep watching.

If he did, he'd only grow more and more uneasy.

"Stand down."

The two words were squeezed out of his mouth, as if he were speaking to someone else, or perhaps to himself.

"This Celestial Master is terrifying... Until I've figured out what he's capable of, I absolutely must not provoke him again."

After saying this, Asura God stood in the middle of the ruins, motionless for a long time.

Humiliated.

Utterly humiliated.

When had he ever suffered a loss like this?

Someone from the lower realm had slapped him in the face, and not only could he not slap them back at once, he had to talk himself into holding back.

The feeling was more sickening than the thunder mark on his chest. But no matter how sickening it was, he had to endure it.

After all, life mattered more than pride.

Only after a long while did Asura God raise a hand to wipe the divine blood from the corner of his mouth. A layer of coldness settled over his eyes once more.

Fear was one thing.

Backing down was another.

There was no way he would let this matter go.

"Once my injuries have healed..."

He stared at the Divine Realm's rift, which had yet to close completely, and lowered his voice to a near whisper:

"I'll settle the score with you—slowly!"