The Sacrifice

Di Tian flew furiously toward the pillar of light, tearing through the air at incredible speed.

Qian Daoliu and Mighty Lion Douluo exchanged a glance. After dismissing their Martial Soul Avatars, they took Qian Renxue and Chi Yuan with them and flew toward where the pillar of light had risen.

"Big brother, are we going too?"

Titan Giant Ape walked over to Sky Azure Bull Python and looked toward the place where the pillar of light had risen.

"Let's go. No one told us to head back."

Sky Azure Bull Python twisted his massive body and swiftly followed behind the others...

Inside the cave, that strange wave appeared once more. A small beastly figure materialized out of thin air before Lie Xu.

"All right, let's begin."

Three-Eyed Golden Lion's clear voice rang out. She walked up to Lie Xu, and the vertical eye on her forehead flashed with golden light. Xiao Jiu also slowly came to.

The instant he woke, he naturally shuddered and transformed into a massive golden lion, shielding Lie Xu tightly behind him. His enormous lion's head fixed its gaze on the Soul Beast before him, who bore some resemblance to him, while the phantom images of eight little lion heads flickered in and out of view.

"Enough, Xiao Jiu. She means no harm."

Xiao Jiu looked her over and indeed detected no ill intent, so he transformed back into a little lion beast. Maintaining his full form in such a cramped space was uncomfortable, but he still stood between Lie Xu and Three-Eyed Golden Lion.

Three-Eyed Golden Lion walked toward Lie Xu one step at a time. With each step, an abstruse golden magic array appeared beneath her feet, glowing with the unique luster of the Star Dou Forest's fortune. The array spread out in layers along her path.

Only when the rose-gold vertical eye on her forehead touched Lie Xu's forehead did she finally stop. The golden magic array beneath them now enveloped both human and beast.

"Although I don't know why you chose to sacrifice yourself to me, I still want to ask: are you really sure?"

Lie Xu felt the vertical eye on his forehead trembling faintly. As someone who'd received nine years of compulsory education, he still couldn't help asking.

"Mm. I possess the power of fate, so naturally I believe in fate."

"I'm beginning."

The instant her words fell, the gilded fur covering Three-Eyed Golden Lion shimmered and rippled. Her third eye, the vertical Eye of Fate between her brows, reflected the mighty river of destiny. Rose-gold threads of fate snapped one by one around her, spraying golden flames that shimmered in concert with the magic array beneath her. Together, they formed a colossal pillar of light, dazzling beyond measure as it pierced through the rock and towered between heaven and earth.

It was like the sun: warm, bright, majestic, and impossible to refuse...

When Di Tian arrived and saw this, his eyes nearly split with fury. His surging Soul Power gathered into a black dragon with a pair of wings on its back, which he swung fiercely toward the cave ahead, as if to forcibly interrupt the sacrifice.

Stop right there!!!

After the dust settled, half the mountainside had been reduced to powder, and the entire cave lay exposed.

But a Soul Beast's sacrifice was irreversible to begin with. Once it started, the laws governing the sacrifice made stopping it impossible.

As the Soul Beast favored by the fortune of the entire Star Dou Great Forest, her self-sacrifice could not possibly be affected by anyone else. Even the collapse and pulverization of the mountainside had no effect on the ritual; not even a pebble entered the magic array's bounds.

Seeing that the situation could no longer be reversed, Di Tian could only forcibly suppress his anger and watch helplessly as everything continued as it should.

Those who arrived behind him had naturally witnessed everything that had just happened. They all tacitly chose to remain silent, quietly watching the Emperor Auspicious Beast's self-sacrifice.

Three-Eyed Golden Lion seemed completely unaware of what had happened and simply continued to activate the magic array.

"In the river of fate, I heard a mournful echo. It was the Heavenly Venerable's lowered gaze..."

As her words fell, Three-Eyed Golden Lion's body began to turn faint and melt away, bit by bit. She became a sky full of gilded light, which flowed without end through the Eye of Fate on her forehead and into Lie Xu's body. Beneath his feet, it slowly gathered from the void and formed a rose-gold Soul Ring.

The Golden Dragon Bloodline within her was like warm, molten gold. It steadily enhanced Lie Xu's light attribute and strengthened his physique.

Now that her soul had been freed from her body, Three-Eyed Golden Lion quietly gazed at the human child to whom she had entrusted her life. Her spirit stirred, and she spoke in a voice only Lie Xu could hear.

"I heard that when human children are born, their parents give them names. Could you give me a name?"

"Of course!"

Lie Xu answered softly.

"Envy your fine, elegant grace; in icy depths, a jade moon shines."

"I'll call you Yue'er."

"Yue'er, Yue'er..."

Three-Eyed Golden Lion murmured the name, then said, "Thank you. It sounds lovely. I like it very much..."

As her words fell, Three-Eyed Golden Lion's spirit grew more and more transparent, until only a hazy glimmer remained. At last, it flashed into a streak of purplish-gold light and vanished into the Head Soul Bone carrying the Eye of Fate.

A streak of light flashed across the purple-gold Soul Bone. Without Lie Xu needing to absorb it, it transformed into a beam of purplish-gold light and entered the space between his brows.

At that moment, just as the rose-gold Soul Ring beneath Lie Xu's feet was about to take shape, a purplish-gold light flashed across it, leaving abstruse purple-gold runes on its rose-gold surface and making it all the more mysterious.

The golden pillar of light slowly drew in and faded away. Three-Eyed Golden Lion's self-sacrifice had now come to a complete end.

As the light faded, Xiao Jiu appeared in the form of a golden lion, four meters tall. His eight little lion heads seemed much more focused now, though their eyes remained closed. Lie Xu sat cross-legged on his back, his head slightly bowed and eyes lowered, as if boundless compassion lay hidden within them.

A purplish-gold gleam suddenly swept across the space between his brows. A gilded vertical eye slowly opened there and glanced around. Its pupil gradually solidified, no longer scattered. All the purplish-gold spiritual light that had scattered moments ago was drawn back and concealed within the eye. The strange manifestations around him subsided into silence, leaving only the wonder between his brows, steeped in unfathomable mystery.

Through the sharing effect of the Soul Bone, an equally wondrous vertical eye naturally appeared between the brows of Xiao Jiu's enormous central lion head, gazing at the people before them.

Whether it was Qian Daoliu, who stood at the pinnacle of humanity, or Di Tian, a Soul Beast who had lived for eight hundred and eighty thousand years, when that mysterious gaze swept over them, their hearts seemed to stop beating. Their souls were laid bare in that instant. The mysterious gaze lasted only a moment before sinking back into silence.

When the others came to their senses, they all held back their next move and, as one, turned their gaze toward the young man on the golden lion's back.

Lie Xu now radiated an aura that was at once profound and mysterious.

Like a breeze, ethereal and elusive; like a distant mountain, deep and weighty; like an emperor, majestic and noble; like the immortal deities enshrined in temples, imbued with divine compassion for all the world...