The seal melted completely.
Terrifying thermal radiation surged out from underground.
No flames manifested.
The surrounding rock strata turned straight into dazzling white light the instant they touched the heat, then vaporized on the spot.
Meng Tianzheng's eyes stung, and all color vanished from his vision.
He grabbed the second elder beside him and retreated madly, relying purely on his body's explosive strength.
The heat wave swept across the Celestial God Academy's central plaza.
Formation foundation stones forged from supreme-grade Immortal Gold melted into pools of boiling molten iron, flowing through the gaps between the paving tiles.
The floating islands overhead lost their formations' support and plummeted straight down.
Before they even touched the ground, their undersides crystallized in the searing heat, then disintegrated into dust that filled the sky.
"Go!"
Meng Tianzheng shouted sharply.
Unable to mobilize their magical power, the academy's elders could only rely on their formidable physical reserves to forcibly hurl the core disciples, one after another, onto the distant teleportation platform.
The teleportation platform's formation patterns flickered wildly under the interference of the thermal radiation, threatening to go out at any moment.
Meng Tianzheng stood at the highest point of the great hall.
He watched the Celestial God Academy, whose legacy had endured countless epochs, melt inch by inch under purely physical heat.
Deep underground, that section of Dark Gold torso radiated a suffocating dark-red glow.
The surrounding space warped under the extreme heat, forming vast expanses of absolute vacuum.
The Lower Realm, the Eight Regions.
The spatial barriers here were far weaker than those of the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands.
The sky turned an oppressive dark red.
The temperature soared abruptly.
Lakes in the Great Wilderness dried up within a few breaths, exposing cracked, parched beds.
Countless Ferocious Beasts lay on the ground, mouths wide open as they gasped for breath, the temperature of their blood shooting upward, ready to boil at any moment.
Stone Village.
The villagers looked up at the sky, their faces filled with terror.
Village Chief Shi Yunfeng wiped the hot sweat from his forehead; the air had already scalded his skin red.
The willow at the village entrance moved.
Liu Shen manifested her true form.
Her breathtaking face was filled with extreme gravity.
The three thousand clusters of light surrounding her were dimming at a speed visible to the naked eye.
The spiritual energy of heaven and earth was forcibly stripped away, and the rules of the Great Dao failed entirely.
Liu Shen looked up at the heavens.
Her gaze pierced the boundary walls of the Eight Regions and saw that immense thermal energy spreading across dimensions.
"This isn't a calamity of Laws."
"This is purely physical heat."
Liu Shen withdrew all her immortal divine abilities.
Before that absolute mass and heat, any barrier of magical power would be pierced instantly, rendering it meaningless.
Dozens of emerald-green willow branches abruptly stabbed underground.
The branches grew frantically toward the depths, piercing hard rock strata and tightly entwining and securing the entire plate beneath Stone Village.
She abandoned magical defenses entirely.
Relying on the extreme physical resilience of her own trunk, she forcibly held together this stretch of earth that was about to split from thermal expansion.
Thermal radiation penetrated the boundary walls and descended upon the Eight Regions.
Wisps of white smoke rose from the surfaces of Liu Shen's branches.
The edges of her emerald leaves turned scorched yellow, then curled.
Relying on the physical reserves of an Immortal King, she forcibly withstood this lethal wave of searing heat.
Stone Village remained completely unharmed.
But the entire territory of the Lower Realm's Eight Regions shrank by a full margin under the indiscriminate scorching heat.
The wasteland of Sin Province.
Shi Hao took great strides, running frantically outward.
Pure physical explosive strength left a straight afterimage trailing behind him across the crystalline plain.
In the enormous pit behind him, that Dark Gold fragment had completely liquefied.
It had become a mass of Dark Gold liquid metal.
The liquid metal radiated terrifying heat.
The surrounding crystalline plain began melting into viscous liquid that flowed back toward the center.
The gravitational field changed direction.
It no longer pressed downward, but instead pulled at tremendous speed toward the center of that mass of liquid metal.
The ground beneath Shi Hao's feet cracked.
He kicked hard against the ground, using the physical reaction force to leap a hundred zhang forward.
A succession of sonic booms sounded behind him.
Shi Hao looked back in midair.
That mass of Dark Gold liquid metal had risen from the bottom of the pit and hovered in the air.
It had become an absolutely perfect sphere.
Its surface had no flaws, no refraction of light or shadow.
It was beating.
Thump.
Thump.
The frequency of that beating matched the immense physical pulses between heaven and earth exactly.
The space around the Dark Gold sphere collapsed completely.
Light was swallowed outright.
It began to sink.
Meeting no resistance from any substance, the sphere burned straight through Sin Province's crust.
It fell toward the depths of the Three Thousand Dao Provinces' core.
Shi Hao landed steadily and wiped the trace of blood from the corner of his mouth.
Deep within the Three Thousand Dao Provinces' core, there was now a lethal heat source that could not be removed.
In the deepest reaches of the Chaos Void.
Gu Xian's body temperature reached the extreme point of the restructuring process.
The bone marrow restructuring entered its final stage.
The old cellular structures were completely eliminated.
New, high-density Dark Gold Bone Marrow filled every bone cavity.
In his sea of consciousness, the countdown ticked.
[Bone marrow restructuring complete.] [Body mass increased.] [Physical volume expanded by one percent in tandem.]
Gu Xian remained fast asleep.
He did not open his eyes.
Nor did he roll over or stretch.
But at this moment, his body began expanding its own volume.
An expansion rate of one percent.
For an ordinary creature, it would be imperceptible.
But for Gu Xian's enormous body, which spanned countless star domains.
The absolute space required by this one-percent increase in volume exceeded hundreds of greater worlds.
The Borderland Imperial Pass.
The old supreme beings slumped atop the walls.
They had just withstood the onslaught of thermal radiation through their physical reserves.
That Dark Gold section of tail in the Heavenly Abyss had originally lain quietly across it.
Suddenly, the surface of the tail section began expanding outward.
There were no fluctuations of magical power.
It drew upon none of the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.
It simply grew thicker and larger.
The red chains of Laws remaining in the Heavenly Abyss snapped outright the instant the tail section expanded.
The physical space occupied by the tail section extended outward by millions of li in an instant.
The void before the Imperial Pass was compressed into solid crystalline walls.
The foundation stones of the defensive formations outside the city walls were reduced to powder under absolute physical compression.
Enormous cracks appeared across the surfaces of the massive city walls.
The cracks rapidly spread throughout the entire structure.
"Retreat!"
Every commander and armored soldier atop the walls fled frantically into the city.
Enormous blocks of masonry crashed to the ground, gouging deep pits.
In the direction of the Foreign Realm's great desert.
An Lan and several Immortal Kings stood at the edge of their ancestral land.
They watched helplessly as that section of tail suddenly grew larger.
The desert's territory was forcibly compressed backward by ten million li.
The boundless yellow sand was compressed into hard rock, which then shattered into powder.
Wu Shang clenched his fists.
His nails pierced his palms, and golden blood dripped onto the ground.
He said nothing.
None of the Immortal Kings spoke.
They watched that Dark Gold section of tail, which had expanded and then fallen still again.
A profound sense of helplessness swept through all their hearts.
It had merely grown a little larger.
Yet the boundary between the two realms had been forcibly rewritten.
The entire Heavenly Abyss had been stretched until it was shattered.
The countdown continued ticking.
The physical pulses between heaven and earth became steadier and more immense.
All living beings in the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands and the Foreign Realm lost every shred of their will to resist under the crushing weight of that absolute mass.
The Borderland Imperial Pass.
Enormous fissures spread from the foot of the walls all the way to their highest point.
The Immortal Ancient Formation Patterns originally branded within the city walls had now become a heap of lusterless scrap metal.
The armored soldiers atop the walls lay sprawled across the ground.
No one spoke.
Silence enveloped this mighty pass that had stood for thousands of generations.
Several old supreme beings leaned beside the ruined battlements, their chests heaving violently.
Just now, they had relied purely on their physical reserves to forcibly withstand that sudden physical compression.
One old supreme being lowered his head and looked at his dust-covered hands, then turned toward the Heavenly Abyss.
That Dark Gold section of tail occupied more space in his vision than before.
"It grew larger."
The old supreme being's dry, hoarse voice echoed across the empty wall.
"It didn't devour any spiritual energy of heaven and earth, nor did it stir any Great Dao Laws."
"Pure expansion of physical volume."
Another commander stationed at the Imperial Pass struggled to his feet.
He walked to the edge of the wall and looked down.
The void before the Imperial Pass had already been compressed into solid crystalline walls by that expanding tail section.
Those crystalline walls emitted a cold, eerie glow, completely sealing off the route to the Heavenly Abyss.
"The great formations are all destroyed." The commander drew a deep breath.
"Magical power is forcibly deconstructed by those regular pulses in the air."
"We can't even perform the spells to repair the walls now."
The old supreme being braced himself against the masonry and straightened.
He glanced at the surrounding defenders, their faces filled with despair.
"Then move the stones by hand."
The old Supreme's voice carried the resolve to smash the cauldrons and sink the boats.
"The Great Dao is dead, but our bodies are still here."
"Go into the city and gather everyone who can still stand."
"Carry up those shattered stellar rocks, one by one, and plug the cracks!"
The commander froze.
Had Supremes and high-ranking cultivators actually been reduced to hauling rocks like common laborers?
But he quickly came to his senses.
Within this territory governed by purely physical laws.
This was the only way.
The commander left to carry out his orders.
Before long, thousands upon thousands of cultivators rolled up their sleeves, shouldered heavy boulders with muscle power alone, and began the most primitive repairs to the city wall.
Across the Heavenly Abyss.
The Foreign Realm's great desert.
An Lan and the other four Immortal Kings stood at the very front of an army ten million strong.
The expanse of desert before them had been forcibly pushed back ten million li.
Under absolute compression, the endless yellow sands had become layers of hard rock.
The immortal light around the five Immortal Kings had completely withdrawn.
It was not that they did not want to release it.
Rather, that immense physical pulse, which came once every eighteen hours, suppressed all outwardly projected magical power.
Kun Di leaned on his cane, his gaze sweeping over the demoralized army of the Foreign Realm.
"Send orders to every division."
Kun Di's face was hidden in shadow.
"Abandon all warships and magical artifacts that require formations to operate."
"Quarry the hard rock compressed into shape here."
"Build a purely physical high wall along the current boundary."
Wu Shang turned to Kun Di.
"Build a wall?"
"What can stone like this stop?"
Kun Di did not look at Wu Shang. His gaze remained fixed on the enormous Dark Gold tail deep within the Heavenly Abyss.
"It isn't meant to stop it."
"If that thing truly decides to move, the entire Foreign Realm will be ground to dust. No wall would be of any use."
"This wall is meant to block our own people's view."
Kun Di turned to face the territory of the Foreign Realm.
"Hide that section of tail completely."
"Don't let the cultivators below see it again."
"Staring for too long at a colossus that spans dimensions will destroy everyone's Dao heart."
"If the Foreign Realm is to survive, we must learn to ignore its existence and learn to cultivate our bodies anew within this entirely new physical gravitational field."
An Lan nodded in silence.
The five Immortal Kings reached a consensus.
The vast army of the Foreign Realm put down the magical artifacts they took such pride in and began quarrying rock with their bare hands.
Boundless Heaven.
The desolate Star Domain in the far east.
Within the Changsheng Wang Family's temporary encampment.
Wang Changsheng sat cross-legged on a floating, isolated island.
He sensed the physical pulses between heaven and earth growing ever steadier.
Wang Da ran up onto the island, drenched in sweat.
He could no longer even fly through the air and could only climb using his legs.
"Father."
Wang Da panted heavily.
"Word has come from Boundless Heaven."
"The original site of the Celestial God Academy... is gone."
Wang Changsheng opened his eyes, his gaze calm.
"Tell me in detail."
Wang Da swallowed, his eyes filled with terror.
"That Dark Gold thing beneath the academy suddenly gave off terrifying heat."
"Then its volume expanded by one percent."
"The entire mountain range where the Celestial God Academy stood, along with the terrain for tens of thousands of li around it, was burst apart in an instant."
"That area has now become one enormous Dark Gold solid."
"The surrounding space has been compressed into a lifeless vacuum."
After hearing him out, Wang Changsheng showed no surprise whatsoever.
He had anticipated it long ago.
"Where is Meng Tianzheng?"
"He moved the core disciples to the border ahead of time, preserving a few embers," Wang Da answered truthfully.
Wang Changsheng rose and walked to the edge of the island.
"You can escape the first day, but you cannot escape the fifteenth."
"As long as that monster remains coiled outside the Nine Heavens and Ten Lands, the space for survival in this world will be squeezed away bit by bit until nothing remains."
Wang Changsheng turned to Wang Da.
"Notify the entire clan."
"Abandon the cultivation of all primordial spirit methods."
"From today onward, the Wang Family will focus on the Body Cultivation Technique."
"Use that immense physical pulse in the air to make your bodies resonate."
"Whoever adapts fastest to these new physical laws will survive this world-destroying catastrophe."
Wang Da accepted the order and withdrew.
The foundation of an Immortal Family lay in adaptability.
Since the Great Dao had been trampled underfoot.
Then they would yield to the weight of that foot and find a new way forward.
The Three Thousand Dao Provinces.
Deep beneath the wastelands of Sin Province.
That mass of Dark Gold liquid metal had embedded itself completely in the planet's core.
It maintained the shape of an absolutely perfect sphere.
The moment the surrounding magma in the earth's veins touched the sphere, terrifying gravity compressed it directly into solid dark matter.
The heat of the planet's core had no effect on it.
Instead, it had become the new gravitational core of the entire Three Thousand Dao Provinces.
On the surface.
Bare-chested, Shi Hao walked across the crystalline plain.
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