Nine thunderballs, nine devourings.
With every thunderball it swallowed, another law imprint appeared on the body of the Heaven-and-Earth Furnace.
By the time it swallowed the ninth, the furnace walls were already covered in dense, intricate patterns.
Those patterns were not decorations, but permanent marks left upon the furnace by completely refined Void Origin power.
From this day onward, the Heaven-and-Earth Furnace's affinity with void energy would far surpass that of magical treasures of the same rank.
Xu Changqing raised his head and looked toward the sky.
The rift had yet to close, clearly brewing something even greater.
Seeing this, he remained unmoved, calmer than ever before.
Soon, the third level of heavenly tribulation arrived.
No more fissures descended from the void rift, nor did thunderballs condense. The entire rift began to writhe.
The void energy within the rift collapsed inward and gathered, gradually sketching out a blurry outline.
As that outline became clearer and larger, it finally stepped out from the rift.
Void Tribulation Beast!
Its form was not fixed.
Its entire body resembled a constantly churning mass of shadow.
It had no facial features, no limbs.
Only a shadow that continuously twisted and changed.
When the Calamity Beast descended, the entire Star Core landmass sank downward.
Its very existence caused the laws that should have been stable to begin wavering.
The Calamity Beast landed less than thirty zhang away from Xu Changqing.
It did not pounce. Instead, it slowly and silently merged into the void, only to emerge three zhang behind Xu Changqing the next second.
It vanished from one location and appeared in another.
There was no process.
No trajectory.
No warning.
It moved through the void as naturally as humans breathed.
Yet the Calamity Beast's target was not Xu Changqing's physical body.
It extended a shapeless