In the battle of Blackstone Pass, one of the Heavenly Lan Holy Temple's three peak Nascent Soul Late Stage experts had died, and the other two had fled. Han Li had severed the backbone of the Mulan Grassland with a single sword strike. Yet the war had not swept onward like a gale through rotten wood, as expected.
Deep within the Heavenly Lan Holy Temple, in the Mulan Grassland.
This was no stretch of flat, open pasture, but a treacherous land shrouded year-round in a murky gray "astral wind belt." Fierce winds sliced across the earth like blades, and the air was thick with "immortal-eroding astral qi," potent enough to eat through the protective spiritual light of Nascent Soul cultivators. This natural chasm was the Mulan Grassland's final barrier.
"The Divine Master has fallen... what are we to do?"
A Core Formation Late Stage shaman lay prostrate on the ground, his voice trembling. Before him stood the enormous Heavenly Lan Altar, encircled by twelve totem pillars. At its center, the thousand-foot-tall phantom of the Heavenly Azure Totem had dimmed considerably, yet still radiated the terrifying pressure of the Nascent Soul peak.
"Silence!"
An aged yet utterly chilling voice rang out from the altar's shadows. An old woman clad in a tattered, multicolored feather robe slowly rose, leaning on a White Bone Banner staff. Her cultivation had dwindled to the Nascent Soul Middle Stage. She was the Heavenly Lan Holy Temple's sole surviving Grand Elder-Granny Witchbone.
"Han Li may be strong, but trampling our Mulan flat won't be so easy!" Ghostly flames danced in Granny Witchbone's eyes. "Pass down my orders: activate the Heavenly Chasm Wind Wall Formation! Every tribe is to abandon its outposts beyond the pass and retreat behind the wind wall. Even if we scour the grassland into