Invulnerable to All Arts! The Stunned Demon Ancestor

Inside the Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation, Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire raged. These were no ordinary acquired elements.

The earth was Mystic Yellow Breath Soil from when Hundun first opened. A single grain weighed more than a Mountain Range and could serve as the foundation for Refining an Acquired Spirit Treasure. A million grains rampaged through the formation. Even a Great Firmament Golden Immortal would have a hole punched through his body if one struck him!

The wind was Nine Heavens Astral Wind from beyond the Thirty-Three Heavens. If it caught a Great Firmament Golden Immortal, his three souls and seven spirits would be torn from his body and annihilated in an instant!

The water was Three Lights Divine Water, a blend of three kinds of Innate Divine Water: Sunlight Divine Water, Moonlight Divine Water, and Starlight Divine Water. The first wore away blood, essence, bone, and flesh; the second corroded the Primordial Spirit and soul; the third devoured the true spirit and consciousness! A Great Firmament Golden Immortal who touched it would have both body and Primordial Spirit corroded in an instant and perish on the spot!

The fire was Lunar True Flame, an Innate True Flame as renowned as Solar True Flame. Utterly cold and yielding, it would burn away both body and Primordial Spirit on contact, leaving its victim to suffer its flames forever!

Beyond the formation's Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire, Blood Fiend Qi filled the sword array and sword light crisscrossed it. Though each blade of light had no physical form, each carried the power of a Lower-grade Innate Spirit Treasure. And there were surely more than a million of them!

Li Yi sat atop the Twenty-Fourth-Grade Pure World Lotus Platform, which raised Protective Immortal Light around him. His Lotus Platform was now an Innate Defensive Supreme Treasure. Once unleashed, no art could break through it! The elements and sword qi in the formation posed him no threat.

Gazing at the formation beyond his Protective Immortal Light, Li Yi soon began to discern its workings with his mastery as a Formation Grandmaster.

The Immortal-Slaying Sword, Immortal-Exterminating Sword, Immortal-Trapping Sword, and Immortal-Ending Sword were the four Array Eyes of the Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation. Unless all four were removed, the formation could not be broken. Even a Peak Quasi-Saint trapped inside would be worn down by the ceaseless sword light and elements until his Magic Power ran dry.

But to break the formation, one first had to find its Array Eyes and remove their swords. Each Array Eye was guarded by one of the four swords, making those positions the deadliest places in the array!

And anyone trying to take a sword would face the formation master's counterattack. Even if he managed to remove one, the other three would remain. The formation would still stand, and he would still be unable to contend with its master!

Only by removing the Demon Swords from all four Array Eyes at once could the formation be broken!

Having grasped the formation's essence, Li Yi marveled inwardly.

No wonder it's called the Primordial World's First Killing Formation. No wonder it takes all Four Saints to break it. Without even one of them, one Sword Eye would remain intact and the formation would endure. Even another Peak Quasi-Saint could never outlast Luohou inside his own array!

The thought had barely crossed his mind when a furious shout rang out from the formation's center.

"Well, well, you thieving Qiankun! You dare deliver yourself right to me? Today will be your Death Tribulation!"

At the formation's center, Luohou glared toward Li Yi in the east, rage surging through him.

While Refining the Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation, he had sensed that someone had stolen the Blood Fiend Qi of the Three Clans. It had delayed the formation's completion by several Yuanhui. To gather enough Fiendish Qi, he had even entered the world himself and killed several Rogue Cultivators at Peak Great Firmament!

Though he could not divine the culprit's identity, he had kept the score. Once he Proved the Dao and attained Primordial Unity Great Firmament, he would uncover the Heavenly Secrets and settle it!

But the moment Li Yi entered the formation, the karmic thread between them—one as strong as Luohou's with his Dao Contender Hongjun—revealed Li Yi's identity!

Luohou had no idea how Heaven-Earth Daoist had concealed their Karma, but no one else could be bound to him by a thread that thick except the man who had stolen a third of the Blood Fiend Qi he had planned to harvest from the Calamity Cycle!

Luohou roared. Hatred flaring, he abandoned the others and flashed toward Li Yi's position in the east, intent on killing him there.

Inside the sword formation, a smile touched Hongjun's face.

He did not know how Heaven-Earth Daoist had offended Luohou, but everything was going according to plan!

Looking at the elements before him, Hongjun sent three streaks of multicolored Spirit Treasure light flying from behind him. They raised Protective Immortal Light and headed for the Array Eyes in the east, south, and west, while he made his way to the northern Array Eye.

He lacked Li Yi's mastery of the Formation Dao, but as the one destined to face this tribulation, his Heavenly Dao Fortune had soared. With the Fragment of the Creation Jade Butterfly, he had managed to calculate the positions of all four Array Eyes.

In the eastern part of the sword formation, Li Yi sat on his White Lotus and quietly studied the famed Demon Ancestor Luohou before him.

Demon Ancestor Luohou looked like a middle-aged Daoist. A Dao Diagram floated behind him, and he held a black Spear.

The Spear was Hundun-colored from end to end. Even across a thousand miles within the formation, the Blood Fiend Qi and killing intent radiating from it sent a chill through Li Yi.

As Li Yi studied Luohou, Luohou studied him in turn. His eyes gleamed with admiration when they fell on the Lotus Platform beneath Li Yi.

"Now that's a fine Spirit Treasure!"

Luohou also possessed a Twelfth-Grade Black Lotus of World Destruction. It emanated Fierce Fiendish Qi, the very opposite of Li Yi's Pure World White Lotus.

The two should have both complemented and countered each other. But Li Yi's Pure World White Lotus had advanced to an Innate Supreme Treasure. Invulnerable to all arts, it far surpassed the World-Destroying Black Lotus.

Luohou wasted no words. Rather than approach, he activated the sword formation, sending Earth, Wind, Water, and Fire hurtling at Li Yi amid endless sword qi.

But Protective Immortal Light shone from Li Yi's Lotus Platform, holding the elements and sword qi firmly at bay.

Luohou's eyes widened. He was dumbstruck.

"Invulnerable to all arts? Unassailable from the start?"

Innate Supreme Treasures generally had unique properties. His God-Slaying Spear, for instance, could pierce anything! Any Spirit Treasure below the rank of an Innate Supreme Treasure—even a Supreme-grade Innate Spirit Treasure—would be punctured by one thrust and drop in grade. Against Cultivators, it could destroy the Primordial Spirit outright!

Heaven-Earth Daoist's Lotus Platform was an Innate Supreme Treasure specialized in defense. Where an ordinary Quasi-Saint would need immense Magic Power to withstand the sword formation, Heaven-Earth Daoist expended less than a ten-thousandth of what a normal battle would cost! Worse, the Lotus Platform ranked alongside his God-Slaying Spear, so the Spear's ability to pierce anything could not take effect!

"You thieving Daoist! I'll deal with you later!"

Luohou made his decision in an instant and turned to leave. Killing Qiankun would have to wait until his Magic Power ran dry, and that would take too long!

Time was what he needed most. If killing Heaven-Earth Daoist delayed him and the other three removed the immortal swords, he would be at a disadvantage!

But Luohou had delivered himself right to Li Yi. There was no way Li Yi would let such a chance to earn Merit slip by.

This was the clash of the Dao-Demon Tribulation, and the Heavenly Dao was surely watching. Whoever did more would receive more Merit afterward!

"I've had a taste of your Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation, Demon Ancestor. Now try my Twenty-Four Star Lodge Killing Formation!"

Hearing this, Luohou was about to shift away when Twenty-Four Star Pearls suddenly emerged beside Li Yi and enveloped him.

Boom!

Twenty-four Blood-colored Stars, each ten thousand miles across, rose and formed a Minor World of their own. Luohou stared at the star killing formation overhead, seething with Baleful Force, and ground his teeth.

That Baleful Force was the very power Heaven-Earth Daoist had taken from him!

And now Heaven-Earth Daoist had Refined it into a Peerless Killing Formation to trap him!

A smile appeared on Li Yi's face as he watched Luohou struggle inside.

With no one guarding the Immortal-Slaying Sword Formation, this was his chance to break it on his own!