A sliver of power from his peak

The power surrounding the figure was extremely illusory-one could even say it did not exist.

Yet the figure sat quietly cross-legged there, his form indistinct.

Upon sensing the figure, a flicker of curiosity immediately appeared in Li Qingxun's eyes.

Then that curiosity turned cold, before giving way to disbelief.

He was far away from the figure, so far that he could not reach him at all. They could not even establish any connection; the distance was simply too great.

With his current two-ring cultivation, crossing such a vast distance...

To see who the figure actually was, or rather, to confirm his identity, would be extremely difficult.

But what struck him as strange, or rather, puzzling, was this.

The figure carried a portion of the fantasy power he had left behind.

That fantasy power was of a higher level than what he currently commanded.

It was fantasy power he had left behind after reaching nine rings.

Aside from the Shrek Seven Devils of that generation, he had also killed some of the powerhouses at Shrek Academy from the same generation.

People such as Xuan Zi and Mu En, and even Yan Shaozhe and Xian Ling'er.

He had killed all of them back then.

Beyond them, no one else should have possessed this portion of his power.

Who exactly is this? Normally, if someone could appear here, it should be Huo Yuhao.

But is he really Huo Yuhao?

Could Huo Yuhao really have survived and hidden himself here instead? Now that would be interesting.

As Li Qingxun pondered, his curiosity stirred. He could sense that the figure had fallen into a complete slumber.

Unless something changed drastically, he would not be able to disturb him.

But he had no way of determining exactly who the figure was.

After all, it had been his clone who had done those things back then.

Although his consciousness and his clone's consciousness were one and the same, so it could be said that he had done them himself.

But searching through memories from ten thousand years ago to determine exactly how many traces of fantasy power he had left behind...

Even Li Qingxun could not manage that.

This fantasy power should have been used to erode the figure's consciousness, which was why he had forcibly sealed his own consciousness away.

That meant he must have already been beaten half to death by Li Qingxun back then.

Huo Yuhao, Xuan Zi, and even Mu En were all strong possibilities.

Of course, it could also have been someone like Ye Xishui or Long Xiaoyao.

But as remnants of the Holy Spirit Cult, they were people whose consciousnesses Huo Yuhao would probably never have wanted to preserve.

Especially Ye Xishui, along with Zhongli Wu and the Holy Spirit Cult of that generation-he had slaughtered every last one of them, one by one.

He had used fantasy power to simulate all their powers through fantasy.

Then he had let their consciousnesses dissipate completely in eternal oblivion.

That was not because he was some kind of good person.

Rather, it was because when he first emerged into the world, or rather, when he had just created his clones...

Ye Xishui had once encountered his first clone.

Finding his martial soul rather strange, Ye Xishui had wanted to capture him for research.

If his clone had not immediately self-destructed and died, Ye Xishui might well have traced him back to his true body.

And throughout his subsequent rise, from betraying Shrek Academy to joining the Sun Moon Empire and helping it launch its campaign...

Ye Xishui and the others had also made things difficult for him.

Ye Xishui and those Holy Spirit Cult elders had even hunted him down and attempted to assassinate him.

That had made his hatred for them exceptionally deep.

So once he had the ability, once he became a Titled Douluo...

Relying on the Fantasy Dragon's absurd attributes and his utterly overwhelming power, he had wiped them all out.

For many of them, dying at his hands had actually been a mercy.

More had their consciousnesses forcibly eroded by him, trapped in eternal torment within their own minds, unable to escape.

Precisely because of that, he had left behind far too much fantasy power, and killed rather too many people.

So he truly could not determine who this figure was, though his instincts still leaned toward Huo Yuhao.

He simply could not confirm whether it really was Huo Yuhao.

Still, encountering this figure had helped put out some of the fires burning at his heels.

As Li Qingxun raised his hand, a faint wisp of fantasy power streamed out of the figure.

The power was weak, but extremely condensed.

It should have been a wisp of power left behind by his clone during its time as a Titled Douluo.

Even after ten thousand years of depletion had thinned it to the point of near nonexistence.

Yet as the power entered Li Qingxun's body, his fantasy power, which had been depleted almost completely by creating a clone, returned to full capacity in an instant.

And as the last wisp of fantasy power dissipated from the figure, the man sitting cross-legged seemed to tremble for an instant.

Then small changes began to appear in his body, and his head abruptly turned toward Li Qingxun.

Watching the change, Li Qingxun frowned.

Then, in the next second, Fantasy activated. As Reality Distortion took effect, Li Qingxun erased himself completely from this place.

The figure's head whipped around, his gaze as cold as a frigid pool, fixed on the direction in which Li Qingxun had departed.

But Li Qingxun was already long gone, so the figure could only sit there in silence.

Ten thousand years of torment, an eternity of his consciousness sinking into oblivion, trapped in an endless catastrophe of death and rebirth, had utterly warped his mind.

His gaze remained locked on the direction where Li Qingxun had vanished completely, icy killing intent rising in his eyes. "It's him. That was definitely his power!"

"That's impossible! He clearly went to the Divine Realm. Why? Why is he still on the Douluo Continent?"

A trace of fury filled the figure's voice.

As that voice spread outward, shaking everything with its force, the entire lower level of the Spirit Ascension Platform began to tremble slightly.

Under the figure's influence, another figure sat quietly cross-legged farther away.

His body seemed to tremble for an instant at the first figure's words.

Then, as power continued spreading outward, several more figures quietly emerged, only to be completely concealed again by streams of data.

Beneath the tree, Li Qingxun opened his eyes, a thoughtful look in them.

Now that he had taken away that wisp of fantasy power, the figure's torment had ended as well.

But even if he had not taken it, that remaining sliver of fantasy power could only have tormented the figure for a few more years at most.

That held little significance for him.

Having this wisp of fantasy power, on the other hand, would not only help him replenish his own power more quickly.

The fantasy power he had possessed as a Titled Douluo could also allow him to use an authority mastered at sequence 1 once.

Whether it belonged to his own pathway or another, he could wield it once.

Unfortunately, the clone's fantasy power was still too weak. If my true body could reach the Titled Douluo realm, I should be able to forcibly wield the power of sequence zero.

Even though it would be greatly diminished, that would still be better than what I have now. Li Qingxun sighed at the thought.

His clone's power could not raise it by one sequence within its own pathway. It could not even access the next sequence.

While his clone had two rings, it could only use sequence 8 powers from all pathways.

Unlike him, it could not summon sequence 7 power from the next pathway to use.