The blazing barrier stood stark against the dark sea. A surging wall of fire more than forty feet high cleaved the mournful night in two, dividing it into northern and southern camps. North of the fiery boundary, countless spirits gathered beneath a pall of ghostly gloom, yet none dared launch a true charge against the flaming wall.
Seeing this stifling stalemate, Ghost King Xiao Mang, who hated evil with a vengeance, stepped forward to break the deadlock for his timid kin. The spectral captains and headless generals lingering on Zhuyou's side suddenly felt their vision darken. In the next instant, a small mountain seemed to have appeared before the wall of fire that shone as brightly as day.
"Roaaar-"
Before they could look closely, that black-and-red mountain, bathed in fire and draped in light, let out a long, piercing howl. For a moment, even the towering blaze seemed to dim and sway.
Though the howl was savage and terrifying, the ghosts hidden in the darkness sensed something familiar and comforting within it. With that roar shaking the waves, almost every spirit and monster "saw," in its own way, the brilliant Evil Spirit Ghost King and his vast, surging ghostly power.
"..."
And so, amid Xiao Mang's liver-rending, courage-shattering roar, the Zhuyou Ghost Army's ceaseless whispers and rustling abruptly fell silent. Deathly stillness settled over the sea, broken only by the rushing of wind, waves, and burning flames.
On this tense battlefield, the hill-sized giant in black armor spared no time for words. He merely nodded toward his astonished kin to the north, then turned his enormous body and studied the flaunting wall of fiery light without moving. The flames burned fiercely, their tongues flickering without a wisp of smoke, yet seemed to carry a sacred golden radiance that scorned all