Once that old man dozed off or turned his attention elsewhere, he would use his tremendous speed to rush out and snatch the bait.
Just as Little Skyhorned Ant was watching Meng Tianzheng with his full attention.
The space behind him underwent a silent, subtle change.
The laws of Perfect World were extraordinarily resilient, especially within these immortal ruins, where they were as impregnable as walls of metal and a moat of boiling water.
Yet at this moment, the deepest fold of the void behind Little Skyhorned Ant strangely turned transparent.
There was no roar of shattering space.
Nor any phenomenon of the Great Dao collapsing.
It was like a painted scroll being gently pressed from behind.
A section of dark-gold body appeared without warning across that transparent fold in the void.
It was only the tip of the iceberg of Gu Xian's immense body.
He was sleeping in the chaos beyond the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands, his body, countless tens of millions of li long, stretched out naturally, and one small section happened to pass through this folding point in space.
Gu Xian had not moved at all.
He was merely lying there quietly, asleep.
But the physical mass of this section of his body was simply too great, so great that even Perfect World's spatial laws could only be forced to sag beneath it, forming a perfectly fitted surface.
Little Skyhorned Ant had been watching the immortal pool.
Suddenly, he sensed an oppressive force from behind that made all the blood and vital energy in his body stagnate.
He whipped his head around.
The sight before him left this descendant of the Ten Fiends, renowned for ultimate power, utterly dumbstruck.
It was a wall.
A gigantic dark-gold metal wall covered in intricate patterns.
It lay quietly embedded in the void, blocking every stretch of space within Little Skyhorned Ant's sight.
There was no head, no tail.
Every dark-gold scale was larger than the tallest main peak of Celestial God Academy.
Little Skyhorned Ant could even see strands of natural Dao resonance flowing like rivers of stars across that dark-gold surface.
"Gulp."
Little Skyhorned Ant swallowed, completely forgetting the bait in the immortal pool.
His eyes blazed with an unprecedentedly fervent light.
As members of the Heavenly Horned Ant race, they spent their lives pursuing the ultimate fleshly body and the very finest physical materials.
To Little Skyhorned Ant, this dark-gold thing before him was simply the most perfect treasure in existence!
"Could this be a piece of raw supreme immortal gold left behind from the Immortal Ancient Era?"
Little Skyhorned Ant trembled all over with excitement.
The thought of it being a living creature never even entered his mind.
Because no creature in this world could possibly possess a bodily surface with such a pure, terrifyingly dense metallic quality.
This was definitely a piece of chaos divine iron that had yet to be mined!
"If I could break off a piece, even one only the size of a fist, and fuse it into my life-bound weapon..."
Little Skyhorned Ant's breathing quickened, his eyes bloodshot.
Putting Meng Tianzheng out of his mind, he crept toward that section of dark-gold body.
The closer he drew, the heavier that purely physical pressure became.
By the time he came within a hundred zhang of the dark-gold scale, Little Skyhorned Ant already felt as though he were walking with ten primordial divine mountains on his back.
But the belligerence and stubbornness in his bones had been fully roused.
"I'm a Heavenly Horned Ant!"
Little Skyhorned Ant gritted his teeth, dazzling golden divine light erupting from his entire body.
Braving that natural pressure of sheer mass, he inched forward step by step until he stood directly beneath the dark-gold body.
Viewed up close, its visual impact was even more horrifying.
Standing there, Little Skyhorned Ant could not even fill a single groove in the patterns on that scale's surface.
He took a deep breath and fixed his gaze on a slightly protruding dark-gold barb at the scale's edge.
That barb was insignificant compared with the whole, but to Little Skyhorned Ant, it was still several hundred zhang thick.
"Break!"
Little Skyhorned Ant bent his legs slightly, then suddenly sprang into the air.
He locked both arms around the dark-gold barb, the Heavenly Horned Ant true blood within him instantly boiling to its limit.
Runes of ultimate power flashed madly across his body.
An immensely vast golden Heavenly Horned Ant manifestation even appeared behind him, roaring toward the sky in a mountain-uprooting stance.
Little Skyhorned Ant drove his physical strength to one hundred percent.
Space groaned beneath the crushing pressure of his arms, unable to bear the burden.
Yet the dark-gold body did not budge.
Let alone breaking off, that barb did not even show the slightest sign of trembling.
It was like an ant trying to shake an eternal star.
Little Skyhorned Ant grew furious.
"I refuse to believe this!"
He completely abandoned all his defenses, converting every last bit of vitality in his body into pure strength.
One hundred and twenty percent!
Two hundred percent!
Golden blood poured wildly from Little Skyhorned Ant's pores.
The muscles of his arms bulged high, and gashes deep enough to expose bone split open across his skin.
The terrifying reactive force surged along the dark-gold barb and back into his body without restraint.
Crack!
The crisp sound of cracking bones rang out.
In this physical contest with that section of dark-gold body, Little Skyhorned Ant's arm bones actually began developing fine cracks, unable to withstand the opposing compressive force.
Not only had he failed to move the other party in the slightest.
He was instead on the verge of shattering his own body!
At the critical instant when Little Skyhorned Ant's arms were about to snap completely.
A rebuke filled with authority and urgency suddenly exploded deep within his sea of consciousness.
"Foolish child, let go!"
Along with that rebuke.
A drop of true blood that had lain hidden between Little Skyhorned Ant's brows for endless ages suddenly ignited.
A tall, imposing golden phantom stepped straight out of the true blood.
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul!
This peerless expert, whose might had shaken the Nine Heavens during the Immortal Ancient Era and who had dared fight an Immortal King at close quarters, finally awakened the instant he sensed his son on the verge of collapse.
The moment the Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul appeared, he did not hesitate at all.
With a sweep of his great hand, a gentle yet overbearing force wrapped around Little Skyhorned Ant, forcibly wrenching him off the dark-gold barb and flinging him far away.
Little Skyhorned Ant rolled over a dozen times on the ground before coming to a stop.
Ignoring the excruciating pain in his arms, he raised his head, his face full of unwillingness to give up.
"Father!"
"You've come back to life?"
"No, it's a wisp of your remnant soul."
"Father, why did you stop me? That's a piece of supreme immortal gold. As long as I can break off a piece..."
"Shut up!"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul sternly cut his son off.
Little Skyhorned Ant froze.
He had never heard his father speak to him in such a stern, trembling voice.
Little Skyhorned Ant raised his head and looked at his father.
Only to discover that the tall back of his father's remnant soul had actually gone rigid where he stood.
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant stared at the section of dark-gold body spanning the fold in the void ahead.
He did not look at the barb.
His gaze followed the patterns on that scale, extending ever farther outward.
The more he looked, the more violently the soul-light of the Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul flickered.
As a king who had once stood at the pinnacle of an era, his breadth of vision and insight were far beyond Little Skyhorned Ant's.
He could see through to the essence of things.
Though that dark-gold surface was as cold and hard as peerless immortal gold.
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's keen spiritual senses caught a trace of the Great Dao's rhythm within it.
It was the aura of a life that transcended conventional understanding, so immense that even heaven and earth seemed cramped before it.
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul slowly extended a hand.
He did not touch it.
He merely sensed, across the void, the physical density naturally emanating from that section of body.
Just that single attempt to sense it from a distance.
And the Great Heavenly Horned Ant's phantom palm began showing signs of disintegration, as though an invisible millstone had ground over it.
He snatched his hand back as if electrocuted.
His soul-body shook violently, nearly collapsing on the spot.
"Father!"
Little Skyhorned Ant was terrified and struggled to crawl over.
"Don't come over!"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul raised his hand, stopping his son from approaching.
He gasped for breath, feeling that suffocating pressure even though he was only a remnant soul.
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant turned to look at his son.
Those golden eyes, once fearless, were now filled with profound wariness.
"Child, what you were trying to break off just now..."
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul spoke in an extremely dry voice, every word seeming to squeeze through the gaps between his teeth.
"Was no raw immortal gold at all."
Little Skyhorned Ant sat dazed on the ground, blood still dripping from his arms.
"Then what is it?"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant drew a deep breath, his gaze sweeping once more toward that dark-gold wall whose end could not be seen.
"That is a living creature."
"This is only an insignificant little section of his body."
Little Skyhorned Ant sat dazed on the ground, blood still dripping from his arms.
"A living creature?"
He could not comprehend the concept.
"Father, are you saying this boundless metal wall is some creature's fleshly body?"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul slowly nodded.
"That's right."
"Moreover, this is merely a tiny section of his body."
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's voice echoed through the abyss, carrying a bone-piercing chill.
"Our Heavenly Horned Ant race reigns supreme through our fleshly bodies, renowned for ultimate power."
"But before such absolute mass, techniques and laws alike lose all meaning."
"He doesn't even need to defend himself."
"Even if a True Immortal descended and struck this scale with all their might, the only outcome would be the True Immortal being shattered to death by the recoil."
Little Skyhorned Ant sucked in a breath of cold air.
He lowered his head and looked at his split-open arms.
He had just exerted every ounce of his strength without budging even a single barb on the other party, nearly shattering his own body instead.
And that was while the other party was asleep, completely unguarded!
"Go!"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul abruptly turned his head, looking at the surrounding void.
"The folded space here is about to give way."
"His body lies across this place, and even without moving, its sheer physical mass is constantly crushing the surrounding spatial laws."
"If we don't leave now, this collapsing space will grind us into nothingness!"
The Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul swept his great hand, scooping up Little Skyhorned Ant, and transformed into a streak of golden light, fleeing madly outward.
Deep within Celestial God Academy.
Within the immortal ruins, beneath the projection of the Origin Mother Cauldron.
The immortal pool's surface was like a mirror.
The purple fishing rod in Meng Tianzheng's hand trembled slightly.
A faint ring of ripples spread across the water.
Someone immediately leaned closer and lowered his voice.
"Grand Elder, did something take the bait?"
Meng Tianzheng said nothing.
But his brows knitted tightly together.
How keen were a Supreme's spiritual senses?
He sensed that the spatial fluctuations beneath the water were not caused by any creature taking the bait.
Instead, they carried a hair-raising sensation of space being torn apart.
"Fall back!"
Meng Tianzheng barked, seized the man's shoulder, and instantly retreated several thousand zhang.
The very instant they left that spot.
Boom!
The water at the center of the immortal pool exploded.
The once-calm space shattered with a crash like a mirror struck by a heavy hammer.
Countless spatial fissures spread wildly.
A blood-soaked golden figure tumbled clumsily out of the deepest void fissure.
It was none other than Little Skyhorned Ant.
He was in a miserable state, the bones of both arms riddled with cracks, golden blood splattered all over the ground.
Immediately afterward, Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul rushed out as well.
His once-solid soul light had dimmed until it was almost transparent, as though a gust of wind could scatter him.
The man's eyes widened.
"Grand Elder, this... is this what you fished out?"
"Isn't he in a bit too sorry a state?"
Meng Tianzheng ignored the man's teasing.
He stared at Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul, his expression exceedingly grave.
"Fellow Daoist, you are one of the Immortal Ancient Ten Evils. What exactly did you encounter to end up like this?"
Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul panted violently.
He whipped his head around toward the still-expanding spatial fissure.
"Meng Tianzheng! Seal off that folded space, now!"
"Activate Celestial God Academy's strongest killing formation immediately!"
Great Heavenly Horned Ant's voice carried terror he could scarcely conceal.
Meng Tianzheng's heart shook violently.
An unrivaled powerhouse from the Immortal Ancient era had actually been frightened to this extent?
"What exactly is in there?" Meng Tianzheng asked gravely.
"A wall."
Little Skyhorned Ant struggled up from the ground, his voice trembling.
"An enormous dark-gold metal wall with no end in sight."
"I only tried to snap off a barb along its edge, and I nearly ruined my own body!"
Dark gold?
A wall with no end in sight?
Hearing this, the academy disciple beside them looked utterly bewildered, unable to understand what those words meant.
But at those words, Meng Tianzheng's pupils instantly contracted to pinpoints.
Dark gold! An enormous metal wall!
He knew the origins of that thing all too well.
Several days earlier, a change had occurred in the chaotic void beyond the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands.
He had activated his Supreme Dharma Eye and witnessed with his own eyes that terrifying creature lurking beyond the realm, so enormous it could crush the ages.
Back then, the beast had revealed only a patch of scales, yet it had nearly made him lose his mental composure.
Meng Tianzheng had thought that such a taboo existence slumbered only in the chaos and could never easily set foot in the lower realm.
Who could have imagined that a section of its body had already silently pierced the realm barrier and stretched straight across the folded space beneath Celestial God Academy!
How immense did its bulk have to be?
Every hair on Meng Tianzheng's body stood on end, and a chill shot straight to the crown of his head.
By now, Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul light had dimmed to its lowest ebb.
He had already been reduced to a mere wisp of lingering will, and just now, to save his young son, he had forcibly torn through space under the physical backlash from that dark-gold body. Now his oil had run dry and his lamp was dying.
Dense cracks appeared across the surface of his soul body, which could collapse completely at any moment.
Great Heavenly Horned Ant had no time at all to concern himself with Meng Tianzheng's shock.
He shoved the blood-soaked Little Skyhorned Ant in front of Meng Tianzheng.
"Brother Meng, a great calamity is coming."
Great Heavenly Horned Ant's voice was exceedingly weak, yet carried a resolute finality.
"I entrust my child to you."
"Take him away. The farther from that space, the better!"
As soon as he finished speaking, Great Heavenly Horned Ant's remnant soul threw back his head and let out a long cry, burning the last wisp of his soul light.
Dazzling golden light illuminated the entire immortal pool ruins.
He transformed into a streak of light and charged without hesitation toward the still-expanding spatial fissure.
He would use the last of his Ten Evils essence to forcibly repair this spatial node.
Only then could he prevent the terrifying pressure of the dark-gold body's own mass from leaking out.
"Father!!!"