The next moment, Li Xiaoyu's steady voice rang out in his sea of consciousness.
After hearing the contents of the talisman edict, the expression on his face instantly froze.
Master Puhong's eyes were filled with shock and gravity.
"Amitabha."
He swept his gaze over all the eminent monks present, his voice trembling.
"Brothers."
He looked at them and slowly spoke.
"The calamity has come."
Far to the south, the land once divided among the Four Major Demonic Sects had been transformed under the unifying hand of Jin Ping'er, the newly appointed Saintess.
One magnificent Holy Mother Hall after another had risen from the ground.
Countless people displaced by war had found a place to call home again under the protection of the Holy Mother Sect.
They regarded the purple-clad woman who had led them out of darkness as their savior, a goddess who had come to rescue them.
They had fashioned a golden statue of her and worshiped it day and night, their incense offerings never ceasing.
At that moment, in the Holy Mother Sect's main temple, a magnificent palace built from countless pieces of white jade and colored glass,
Jin Ping'er lounged upon a throne carved from thousand-year-old ice jade, listening to reports from the branch leaders below.
A roguish smile played across her face.
Yet wisdom glittered in her eyes.
A few years were enough to change many things.
She was no longer the enchantress who knew only how to beguile the masses.
She was a true leader,
a powerful ruler who could bind the sundered Demon Sect together once more.
Just then, a streak of blue light shot through the sky from outside the hall and flew inside.
It circled once in midair before landing steadily in front of Jin Ping'er.
"Hm?"
Jin Ping'er looked at the