The Truth-Seeking Orb was still expanding.
Twenty meters, thirty meters, fifty meters... The black sphere, which combined every nature of yin, yang, and the five elemental releases, had grown large enough to blot out half the night sky. The patterns swirling across its surface resembled a greedy mouth, sucking in even the moonlight and chewing it to pieces. Space within hundreds of meters around it twisted grotesquely.
Only the phantom outline of Kaguya's upper body remained. She hovered directly above the Truth-Seeking Orb like an empty shell drained of its soul, the faintest final glimmer lingering in her pale purple eyes.
"What have you misunderstood?" Her voice seemed to come from far away.
Shengu Xuan stood less than five meters from the edge of the Truth-Seeking Orb. The black sphere's all-devouring gravitational pull acted on him without so much as stirring the hem of his clothes.
"You think that ball of yours is devouring everything." He raised his right hand. Eight streams of Demon Black Chi seeped between his fingers and wound lazily around his arm. "But devouring is the very essence of these eight fellows of mine."
He glanced at Kaguya.
"You're using devouring against devouring itself. If that isn't asking to die, what is?"
Kaguya's lips moved. She wanted to say something, but her chin had already begun turning transparent, and she was on the verge of losing even the ability to speak.
Shengu Xuan did not wait for her to finish. He reached his right hand toward the still wildly expanding Truth-Seeking Orb and spread his fingers. Eight streams of Demon Black Chi gushed from his palm, transforming into eight thick, shadowy tentacles, each radiating a different attribute, and plunged straight into the orb's surface.
The black sphere stopped expanding.
It had not been stopped by force.