For an ordinary transcendent, even having one hand torn apart would not greatly affect the situation. After all, a transcendent's body was no longer mere mortal flesh. Localized physical injuries did not affect their transcendent combat.
But these "gods" were different.
They had long since abandoned flesh and blood. Their current bodies were combinations of power and circuits, not easily injured. Even if they were "injured," they generally would not suffer significant wounds before their own energy was depleted. Once a sufficiently obvious wound was left behind, it could only mean that the attack against that god had struck directly at Their vital point.
Namely, Their talent circuits and rules.
Ordinary transcendents could not even perceive a god's "weakness," much less "look directly" at one. Even gods of the same rank found it no easy task to discover one another's weaknesses.
Since their entire bodies had been forged from energy and laws, they naturally possessed powerful secrecy. Moreover, every god embodied a pure, singular attribute. To see through the strongest talent circuit of another attribute entirely unlike one's own, one either had to spend a great deal of time studying it or rely on an overwhelmingly higher level of secrecy. But as fellow gods, none of Them was much stronger than the others.
Thus, gods often secretly studied other gods' "weaknesses" over long periods of coexistence. They rarely fought each other. Once they did, they could gradually crack their opponent through battle, but they also risked exposing themselves.
Yet after such long years, no matter how little they had understood each other at first, the gods had by now grasped more or less of one another's weaknesses. All they needed was an opportunity, a reason, or even an excuse to "eliminate" these competitors.
But Xu Zhi did not need that