The cannon fire had long since fallen silent. The roiling purple-black smoke was torn apart little by little by the biting wind, slowly settling back to the earth.
Two enormous craters blasted out by the Godslayer Fixed-Install Soul Tool Cannons stretched across the plain. The rock at their bottoms had melted completely under that godslaying destructive power, cooling into broad expanses of glossy black, glasslike crust, with cracks spreading outward like spiderwebs.
Charred earth and rock rose high along the crater rims. Huge chunks of melted, shattered stone lay scattered everywhere. The once tightly packed high-rises had been reduced to collapsing walls and broken ruins.
The walls were covered in scorch marks from the intense heat. Some stones had been burned half molten, then abruptly cooled into grotesque, uneven, twisted shapes.
Not a single intact tree remained in the entire area. The once-lush branches and leaves had all turned to drifting ash, leaving only lengths of carbonized stumps jutting bare from the scorched earth, shedding showers of black charcoal flakes at a touch.
Even after the Soul Cannons' devastating bombardment, survivors had still clung to life in gaps between ruined walls and in underground cellars, but the Ghost Emperor's arrival had utterly erased that last faint trace of life.
As far as the eye could see, bodies lay everywhere across the scorched, cracked ground. The dead bore no horrific external injuries; their faces were simply lifeless and ashen, their eyes hollow and sunken. Their souls had already been forcibly drawn out by Netherworld Soul Power, leaving nothing but soulless husks sprawled crookedly in piles of rubble, beneath corners of walls, and among the broken stones beside the craters.
Wisps of gray, translucent Vengeful Spirit mist drifted between the broken walls. They could neither disperse nor enter reincarnation, imprisoned here by the lingering sinister power of the Ghost Emperor.
If one listened closely, the wind passing through the gaps between shattered beams and pillars carried faint sobs and mournful cries, fragmented and shrill, echoing eerily, yet with no source to be found.
Dense, icy netherworld death energy hung low over the entire ruin like a heavy gray fog, weighing down even the daylight until it grew dim and bleak.
The cold wind swept across the earth, raising billows of black, scorched ash that pattered against the broken walls with a dry rustle.
There were no shouts, no groans, no breath of the living. The once-prosperous Imperial City, the laughter of children, the conversations of ordinary folk, the sight of cooking smoke curling upward-all had become things of the past.
Sunlight spilled over the ravaged ruins, yet could not dispel the chill there. This land had become a silent domain of death, with only the desolation left after destruction remaining forever.
Across these ruins, orderly units of the Spirit Pagoda Enforcement Corps appeared from time to time, their uniforms neat, like the only light in the darkness.
"Boss, there's someone still alive here!"
"Sir! Save me! Save me!" an old man shouted hoarsely, dragging half his body as he crawled over.
"Don't move!"
"Don't move!"
As they spoke, the Enforcement Squad members drew their Soul Tool Guns.
"Oh, shit!"
With that, before the old man could react, he heard the captain order, "Empty your magazines!"
Bang, bang, bang!
After several gunshots, the old man had become a lump of mangled flesh.
"Phew... threat eliminated! Come on, let's keep searching!"
"Councilor, this is a Top-Secret File issued by the Spirit Pagoda. Please take a look."
"Mm, leave it there."
With that, Qian Gu Fenfeng stopped his work and opened the file.
"Unusual energy fluctuations in the Core Circle of the Star Dou Great Forest. The Spirit Pagoda has recalled all Spirit Envoys to headquarters.
-Qiangu Dongfeng."
The heart of the Star Dou Great Forest.
The Lake of Life rippled with warm, emerald-green waves, unchanged for ten thousand years. Its vast, boundless life essence seeped continuously into a hidden space beneath the lake, nourishing Silver Dragon King Gu Yuena as she slept there.
Throughout her long slumber, her enormous, crack-covered dragon body had lain still deep beneath the lake. Her silver scales were dull and lightless. The divine wounds left by the Dragon God's great battle healed little by little under the slow nourishment of time and vitality.
Countless days and nights passed. The strife of the human world outside and the hopes of the Soul Beast clans could only become faint ripples, reaching distantly into the depths of her dormant consciousness.
At a certain moment, a trace of opportunity quietly stirred her sleeping essence.
Humm-
A low, far-reaching vibration erupted from the lakebed. At first, a faint silver light slowly brightened beneath the deep water. Then vast swathes of silver radiance, like flowing moonlight, broke free of the lake's confinement. The entire Lake of Life suddenly surged, its emerald waters boiling and churning as luminous mist streamed skyward, enveloping the entire forbidden core region. All the beasts in the forest trembled together, high-ranking Soul Beasts instinctively bowed their heads, and even the breeze stilled among the dense woods.
Her sleeping consciousness slowly rose out of boundless darkness. Fragmented ancient memories swirled through her mind like ice crystals: the slaughter in the Divine Realm, the splitting of the Dragon God, the exhaustion of fleeing to Douluo. Scene after scene returned to her mind.
The enormous silver dragon's eyes slowly opened.
They were a pair of amethyst-deep vertical pupils. The majesty that had lain dormant for ten thousand years poured forth in an instant.
The lingering dragon cry was not a roar, but a low, clear, cold sound carrying the weight of destiny. It pierced the lake waters and spread across every inch of the Star Dou Great Forest.
Her immense silver dragon body rose from the lakebed. Iridescent elemental glimmers flowed once more across her fine, lustrous silver scales. Her long, slender horns pierced the mist, and her broad wings slowly unfurled, drawing the seven great elements of wind, water, fire, earth, light, and darkness between heaven and earth to whirl and howl around her.
The pain and wounds accumulated over hundreds of millions of years had not yet fully faded, but the Silver Dragon King, the Co-Lord of Soul Beasts, had finally awakened from her long recuperation.
Di Tian and the Ferocious Beasts who had long stood waiting by the lakeshore all bowed, lowering their proud heads.
The waters slowly settled, and the silver light gradually withdrew. Light and shadow shifted over the dragon's form, transforming her into an exceptionally beautiful woman with silver hair and purple eyes. Her white robes draped down as she gazed into the distance.
"Humans... deserve to die!"
Before you continue