Deep within the Yun Clan Territory, in a secret chamber of the Ancestral Shrine.
Eleven elders sat cross-legged, their auras linked. Their vast Immortal Venerable power formed an intricate, ancient formation, its patterns shining brilliantly as they stood ready for battle.
At the center of the formation, Yun Yuan stood with his hands behind his back, his robes stirring gently in its radiance. His eyes were closed, his expression calm, even carrying a trace of the carefree resolve of one ready to die for a righteous cause.
He was waiting, waiting for that final, fated moment to begin. With this body, he would shield the Yun Clan's Qilin Prodigy-the child he had raised-from that sinister instant capable of corroding an Immortal Venerable's essence.
"It's coming!"
Yun Yuan's eyes snapped open, and he shouted!
He clearly sensed cold, uncanny murmurs of chaos tracing their way upstream along the Sumeru Puppet Transformation and its karmic link!
Like a venomous snake that had scented blood, they lunged straight toward him.
First Elder Yun Che and the others were taut with tension, their hands shifting through seals. The Sealing Secret Art was poised to strike. The moment the contamination truly reached him, they would temporarily seal it away together with a portion of Yun Yuan's essence!
Yet just as that heart-chilling fluctuation climbed to its peak, seemingly about to descend in the very next second.
Everything, without warning... subsided.
The Yun Clan elders: "???"
Like a rising flood, it strangely surged backward into the deep sea just before crashing against the embankment.
Yun Yuan's eyes flew open, filled with bewilderment. "What happened? That thing retreated?"
It was as though something unseen had intercepted it midway, blocking it for him-or rather, for Yun Qing.
"Could Your Majesty have made some arrangement?" Fourth Elder Yun Zhenye