Certain Kill

After probing for a while longer and confirming that the old man had no other tricks up his sleeve, Yuan Jie no longer intended to keep fighting him.

These several hundred years of fierce battle had also been a rare tempering for him. Under the pressure of life-and-death danger, his potential had been fully awakened, his mind clear and tranquil. Using the old man's Nether-Poison Dao to continuously temper and verify his own World Dao, his cultivation had rapidly advanced. The supreme divine ability he had created, one suited to his own Dao, had also gradually been perfected through the fierce battles.

However, as their battle continued, the territory affected and destroyed grew wider and wider, and more and more living beings suffered calamity. He could also feel threads of karmic force attaching themselves to him.

Although he possessed a Merit Golden Wheel comparable to a High-Grade Innate Spiritual Treasure and could easily offset this little karmic force, merit was not easily obtained. Naturally, it was best not to squander it.

With that thought, Yuan Jie instantly contacted Yuan Yan, Yuan Lun, and Yuan Ling through their deep connection at the source. They had long been concealed in the nearby void, secretly setting up their arrangements. He intended to activate the means they had prepared and settle the outcome with a single strike if possible.

Even if they could not kill the old man instantly, they had to use the great formation's power to severely wound him, completely seal all space and time within this region, cut off every route of retreat, and ensure that he would die here today.

"Move!" In that instant, Yuan Jie, Yuan Yan, Yuan Lun, and Yuan Ling were of one mind, their souls resonating. No further words were needed. Together, they circulated their respective Daos, activated the spiritual treasures in their hands, and unleashed their strongest combat power.

Yuan Jie no longer held a steady defense, nor did he use the World Dao to activate the World Cauldron to protect his true body. Instead, he poured all his cultivation into fully circulating the World Dao while activating both the World Cauldron and the Cosmos Pearl. Vast, boundless World Dao essence intertwined with profound and unfathomable spacetime Dao essence, instantly suppressing heaven and earth and freezing the spacetime of countless ages. Even spatial fluctuations and the circulation of the Dao were utterly forbidden.

Yuan Yan was surrounded by surging yin and yang qi. He fully circulated the Yin-Yang Dao and activated the Myriad Dao Primordial Gourd, which sprayed forth a beam of Yinyang Divine Light.

The Yinyang Divine Light streaked across the heavens and instantly locked onto the Netherworld Soul Banner and Netherworld Venom Dragon Sword that protected the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor. It forcibly drew them in and sealed them within the Myriad Dao Primordial Gourd.

Yuan Ling struck at the same time. The Mind Dao spread out at full force as he activated the Illusory World Painting. A boundless mental illusion instantly enveloped the entirety of the sealed spacetime, and the power of the illusion surged like a tide into the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's sea of consciousness.

With his spacetime frozen by the World Cauldron and Cosmos Pearl, the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor could not move at all. He had no time to react before falling directly into the boundless illusion.

In his daze, he forgot the life-and-death battle before him. His mind was dragged back several kalpas, to when his Dao injuries had only just recovered by eighty or ninety percent and he had sworn to leave the Dragon Clan.

Yet the moment his oath fell, the void suddenly exploded. Torch Dragon's figure, stretching across endless ages, descended. His expression was indifferent and unmoved, his gaze cold as he looked at him. His voice contained not the slightest emotion. "Netherworld Serpent Ancestor, you have betrayed the Dragon Clan. Your crime is unforgivable. You must die!"

Torch Dragon, at the Primordial Golden Immortal realm, merely extended a claw casually. Endless intent of the Time Dao swirled around it, as though the vast river of time itself had come crashing down. The Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's perception of time and flow of thought were instantly frozen completely, and he could not even think.

He could not even form the thought of resisting.

At that moment, his Dao Heart trembled violently. Terror and despair arising from the depths of his soul swept through his entire body. It was as though he had returned to twenty thousand kalpas ago, when he had first faced Torch Dragon's casual claw. He was just as powerless, just as insignificant, without the slightest ability to resist.

Boundless despair shrouded his mind, and he even instinctively gave up resisting, as though he were destined to perish beneath that claw.

But suddenly, the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's face twisted savagely. He roared, burned his essence blood and origin, and unleashed the terrifying Nether-Poison Dao without reservation.

How could he possibly close his eyes and await death? How could he possibly sit still and wait to be killed?

Not even Torch Dragon could make him do that!

A strike containing the strength of his entire life erupted forth. Torch Dragon's figure before him instantly shattered, and the mental illusion Yuan Ling had laid down was also forcibly broken by that seemingly mutual-destruction attack.

However, it was already too late!

During the opening when Yuan Jie had suppressed his spacetime with the World Cauldron and Cosmos Pearl, and Yuan Ling had ambushed him and trapped him in the illusion, Yuan Jie had already raised his hand and thrown out the Four Symbols Formation Flags. Together with Yuan Yan, Yuan Lun, and Yuan Ling, each holding one formation flag, he instantly linked them with the formation foundations secretly buried across hundreds of millions of miles. The Four Symbols Return-to-Origin Formation took shape in an instant, enveloping the entire heaven and earth.

Each of the four devoted part of his focus to coordinating with the others. With Yuan Yan serving as the formation's master, they activated the grand formation and condensed a Four Symbols Dao Diagram that covered the sky and suppressed chaos.

Upon the Dao Diagram, the powers of the sun, lesser yin, lesser yang, and greater yin reversed the Four Symbols, turned back into the Two Principles, and converged into the Supreme Ultimate, drawing upon the power of heaven and earth to return all things to the primordial source of chaos.

"Boom!" The Netherworld Serpent Ancestor had only just broken free from the illusion and was completely unprepared when he was instantly engulfed by the terrifying Four Symbols Return-to-Origin Dao power, which surpassed the peak of the Great Firmament Golden Immortal realm. He was dragged into the Dao Diagram and madly bombarded and refined.

This was simply not something the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor, who had only just regained his senses, could withstand.

In only an instant, his flesh exploded inch by inch, and his primordial spirit was torn apart. Even the Innate Imperishable True Spirit hidden deep within his soul was forced out of his body and exposed to the power of the grand formation.

Strike while he was down and finish him off!

Although the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor had suffered setback after setback, lost his protective spiritual treasures, and sustained grave injuries, he was still ultimately an expert at the peak of the Great Firmament Golden Immortal realm.

If they gave him even a moment to catch his breath and recover his senses before desperately counterattacking, then even with Yuan Jie and the others holding every advantage and initiative, it was not impossible for the situation to turn against them.

After all, if a peak Great Firmament Golden Immortal expert was willing to self-destruct, his power would be no weaker than a full-force strike from a Primordial Golden Immortal. He could forcibly break the Four Symbols Return-to-Origin Formation and might even severely injure all four of them.

Without the slightest hesitation, Yuan Jie, Yuan Yan, Yuan Ling, and Yuan Lun struck again in perfect coordination. Every move was a killing blow, leaving the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor no chance of survival.

Yuan Jie once again brought forth the World Cauldron and Cosmos Pearl. Yuan Yan activated them with the power of the Four Symbols Return-to-Origin Formation, and under the infusion of strength surpassing the peak of the Great Firmament Golden Immortal realm, the World Cauldron and Cosmos Pearl's might increased severalfold. No matter how desperately the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor struggled or erupted with his origin power in an attempt to gather his shattered body and primordial spirit, it was useless. He was held firmly in place, unable to move.

Immediately afterward, Yuan Jie raised his hand and brought forth the Immortal-Slaying Gourd. He gave the gourd a light bow and shouted in a deep voice, "Treasure, please turn around. Gourd Transforms into a Dao Sword!"

In an instant, an incomparably sharp, peerless sword light burst from the gourd's mouth. It immediately fixed the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's damaged primordial spirit in place and slashed directly at his primordial spirit's true spirit, cutting his primordial spirit and true spirit, which he had struggled in vain to reassemble, into fragments.

Yuan Ling did not dare pause. He once more activated the Illusory World Painting with all his strength. The boundless illusion descended again, recreating the Three Clans Battlefield from dozens of kalpas ago and entangling the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's consciousness, leaving him powerless to resist.

At the same time, he activated the Soul-Scattering Gourd and Spirit-Absorbing Gourd. The Soul-Scattering Gourd sprayed scarlet Soul-Scattering Divine Light across the sky, fiercely blasting toward the Netherworld Serpent Ancestor's scattered primordial spirit, seeking to completely grind it away;