Inside the formation, the scene changed abruptly.
There is no sky, no sea, only an endless starry sky stretching in all directions.
Beneath my feet flows a silver galaxy, above me flickering, unfamiliar stars.
Each person's place of origin is different, separated from one another by an insurmountable starlight mist, even their divine senses are isolated.
" Space Restriction?"
Someone tried to attack the star beside them; the starlight rippled like water, but the power was silently neutralized.
"More than."
The voices of the seven leaders came intermittently, transmitted through some secret method.
"Yes, the space is folded and superimposed. We may appear to be in the same formation, but we are actually on different 'levels.' We need to find spatial nodes to meet or break the formation."
How do I find it?
The old woman's voice was shrill.
No one answered immediately.
Within the formation, only the silent flow of the Milky Way and the suppressed breathing and heartbeats of each individual could be heard.
In this suffocating silence,
"Despair."
A soft sound.
It didn't come from their ears, but rang out directly in the starry sky where they were, as clear as if someone had tapped their fingers against their earlobe.
All twenty- Dao Body tensed up simultaneously.
Immediately afterwards, a calm, almost indifferent voice came from all directions, from every star, from every ray of starlight:
"Everyone's here."
These three simple words, devoid of any emotional fluctuation, sent a chill down everyone's spine.
That voice was clearly Li Qingshan's!
"He's out of seclusion?"
The man in red armor let out a low growl, his halberd held horizontally in front of him, his remaining left arm trembling slightly from the excessive force.
"Impossible!!!"
The old woman gripped her snake-headed cane tightly, the veins bulging on the back of her thin, bony hands.
Even the leader of the seven men subconsciously took a half step back, his eyes flashing intensely beneath his mask.
If Li Qingshan has truly broken free of his cocoon, even based on his combat strength before his tribulation, everyone present would probably be in dire straits, let alone after he has survived the tribulation of Severing the Dao.
Dead silence.
Only the Milky Way flows silently.
Then, the voice rang out again:
"Is my formation any good?"
As soon as he finished speaking,
"Buzz!"
The entire starry sky suddenly trembled!
All the stars lit up for a moment at the same time, and the immense stellar power, like a giant beast awakening, slowly unfolded its invisible body.
The sense of oppression increased sharply, and everyone's breathing became labored.
"It's him! He really came out!"
The giant growled, his remaining right fist instinctively protecting his head and face—a primal reaction to a deadly threat.
But the next second, a hazy figure slowly materialized.
Dressed in black, with black hair, and a tall, upright posture.
His face was blurry, but his body was surrounded by a faint, ethereal starlight aura that shared the same origin as the star array.
Those eyes were clear, calm, deep, and as cold as an ancient, frozen pool, indifferently scanning everyone in the formation through the starlight.
"Wrong!"
The leader of the seven suddenly shouted, his voice hoarse from extreme tension.
"This is not the true form! The true form is still Nirvana within the divine cocoon. This body has no fluctuations of qi and blood, no life force; this is an afterimage! A manifestation of qi!"
A single sentence was enough to enlighten me.
Everyone frantically scanned the area with their spiritual senses, and sure enough, the figure in black robes, though lifelike and subtly resonating with the surrounding starlight, was clearly an illusion formed by the power of an array!
Upon closer inspection, although its aura was as vast as the starry sea, it lacked the substantial, overwhelming pressure of the true form that could crush eternity.
"A wisp of energy, haha! Just a wisp of energy!"
The figure in the gray mist was the first to react, letting out a sharp laugh like that of a night owl.
"Playing tricks! Li Qingshan, your true form is still Nirvana within your cocoon, too afraid to show yourself, so you only send out this remnant spirit to scare people?"
The fear receded like a tide, replaced by a mocking rage and a kind of euphoric savagery.
"You scared the Laozi out of me!"
The giant spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva, a sinister grin spreading across his face.
"It's just an empty shell! Brothers, this formation is dead, and the main one is a fake! What are we afraid of? Tear this illusion apart, find the core of the formation, and the real thing inside the cocoon of light will be nothing more than meat on a chopping board!"
The old woman's eyes gleamed with a bright green light. She pointed her snake-headed staff at the black-clad phantom and said in a sinister tone:
"You dare to Manifestation even with a wisp of your aura? I am most skilled at extracting souls and refining spirits. In a moment, I will use this last bit of your remnant spirit to set you on fire, so that your true body can also taste the pain of having its soul torn apart!"
The atmosphere within the formation suddenly reversed.
The earlier shock and fear vanished, and everyone's eyes regained their fierce, greedy look, even carrying a cruel, cat-and-mouse-like pleasure.
It was all just a bluff! The real body was still undergoing a crucial transformation and was unable to move!
The black-clad phantom stood silently above the starry river, showing no reaction to the sudden surge of hostility and mockery.
Only a pair of cold eyes remained unmoved as they watched the group of "guests" who had straightened their backs again and were now seething with murderous intent.
Then, the phantom raised its right hand.
With long, slender fingers, he gently clenched his fist towards the Void.
The movements were slow and casual.
But just as he clenched his fist,
"Boom!!!"
The entire starry sky exploded.
It's not a metaphor.
It literally means "explosion," with all the stars in sight, both above and below, simultaneously bursting forth with destructive, intense silver light!
The Milky Way reversed direction, starlight went berserk, and the once tranquil flowing silver river transformed into billions of incomparably sharp blades of light, which rushed towards the twenty-eight people in the formation without warning!
The killing began.
The illusory figure in black robes remained standing in the same spot, surrounded by starlight and Daoist aura, its indistinct face revealing no expression.
Only those cold eyes, reflecting the infernal scene of wildly dancing starlight and rampant killing intent, remained calm as ever.
When the countless starlight blades struck down, the spacetime within the array seemed to be shattered into countless fragments.
The man in red armor roared and swung his halberd. Before the phantom of the fire dragon could fully rise, it was shredded by three intersecting star blades.
He watched helplessly as his right leg was severed cleanly at the root, the cut surface as smooth as a mirror, the spurting blood instantly vaporizing in the starlight.
Before the excruciating pain could even reach his brain, the fourth star blade pierced through his brow.
The gray mist figure screamed and transformed into countless shadows, scattering and fleeing.
This is his secret technique for survival; each shadow contains a trace of the origin, and as long as he escapes one, he can be reborn in another body.
But the star blades rained down, covering every inch of space.
The shadow collided with the starlight, like snow meeting a hot iron, and vanished in a sizzling sound.
The last, most deeply hidden shadow Manifestation at the edge of the array. Just as it condensed into half a human form, a spear made entirely of starlight pierced through the Void, pinning him to the flowing galaxy.
A few breaths.
The giant roared and swung his remaining right fist. The illusory image of the savage god reappeared, but it shattered upon impact with three miniature stars that fell from the sky.
The first bullet shattered his fist, the second pierced his chest, and the third crushed his skull.
The headless corpse swayed, then slowly knelt in the starry river, its blood staining the silvery light.
The old woman screamed and raised her snake-headed staff. The emerald green venomous snake at the head of the staff swelled into a hundred-foot-long python, spewing out poisonous mist that corroded the Void.
When the poisonous fog met the starlight, it emitted a piercing hissing sound and annihilated each other.
The stalemate lasted only a moment before a beam of starlight, condensed to its utmost, slashed down like a sword of divine punishment, splitting the giant python and its snake-head staff in two.
The old woman retreated in terror, but the galaxy beneath her feet suddenly churned, transforming into chains that bound her legs and dragged her into the depths of starlight.
The piercing screams abruptly ceased, with only a string of bubbles rising from the spot before disappearing.
Death takes many forms.
Someone summoned an ancient bell for protection, and the sound of the bell shattered dozens of star blades, but it was struck head-on by a quietly appearing phantom star. The bell collapsed, and the person inside was crushed into a bloody pulp.
Someone unfurled a divine map, from which thousands of divine birds and beasts flew out and pounced on the star blades, but they all wailed and vanished when illuminated by the starlight. Immediately afterwards, the divine map was torn to shreds, and the person holding the map was dismembered by three intersecting star blades.
Some tried to tear through space to escape, only to find that the surrounding space was as solid as divine iron, and even a full-force attack could only create slight ripples.
When they turned back in despair, they saw a deluge of falling stars, each trailing a long silver flame, carrying the terrifying power of a full-force attack from the peak of the Immortal Two, densely packed and obscuring all vision.
"No!!!"
The final screams were drowned out by the explosion.
The resistance within the formation weakened.
The star blades continued to slash and cut, the meteors continued to fall mercilessly, the galaxy churned and writhed, and weapons formed from starlight pierced out from every angle.
Of the twenty-eight Mighty Figure figures, most of them have now fallen.
Severed limbs floated in the starlight.
Those who had not died were covered in blood, their magical artifacts shattered, their Dao principles dimmed, and only primal fear remained in their eyes.
The seven leaders were the ones who persisted the longest.
Seven tattered ancient shields floated around him, their surfaces engraved with ancient sacrificial runes. They were now emitting their last faint light, struggling to withstand the slashes of the star blades.
The mask had long since shattered, revealing a pale, distorted middle-aged face.
His lips trembled, as if he wanted to say something, but in the end, he couldn't utter a single word.
For the first time, that black-clad phantom standing above the starry river moved.
The phantom raised its left hand, pointed its index finger at him, and gently tapped him.
"Laugh."
A beam of starlight, condensed to its utmost fineness, thin as a hair, faster than thought, pierced through the seven ancient shields, through the protective divine light, and through his brow.
The seven leaders froze, their eyes quickly losing their sparkle.
He opened his mouth, as if wanting to take one last look at the cocoon of light that was still emitting starlight, but his head drooped limply.
The corpse slowly leaned back, falling into the Milky Way, splashing up a small patch of silvery "water."
The eighteenth breath.
The final scream subsided.
Silence returned to the formation.
The star blades dissipated, the fallen stars vanished, and the turbulent Milky Way returned to its calm flow.
However, within that silvery radiance, there were many dark red, fluffy substances—residues of holy blood.
Twenty-eight corpses, some intact and some mutilated, floated silently in various parts of the Milky Way.
The black-clad figure indifferently surveyed the surroundings, its blurred face revealing no emotion.
He slowly raised his hand, his five fingers grasping at the Void.
"Splash!"
The entire star array seemed to be stirred by an invisible hand, the Milky Way reversed, and starlight gathered and dispersed.
The twenty-eight corpses were drawn together by an invisible force, converging in the same direction and eventually piling up at the edge of the formation.
Immediately afterwards, a ripple spread across the starry sky surrounding the formation.
"Thump."
The first body was thrown out and crashed into the dark blue sea below, splashing up a high wave.
Then came the second, the third...
Like clearing out a garbage dump.
From the moment twenty-eight Mighty Figure brazenly stormed the formation, to the violent fluctuations of the star curtain and the flashes of divine light, to the return to calm, and finally the throwing out of the corpses...
The entire process took only a few dozen breaths.
So short that some of the onlookers hadn't even had time to adjust their spying devices or exchange a glance with their companions.
When the first mangled, lifeless corpse of Mighty Figure being crashed into the sea, several suppressed gasps of surprise rang out from the nearest hiding spots.
Corpses fell one after another.
Some only had their upper bodies left, with large holes torn in their chests;
Some skulls were shattered, with a blackened spot between the eyebrows;
Some were emaciated, as if all their energy had been drained away;
Corpses crashed down one after another, spreading murky dark red hues across the sea.
The last few bodies thrown out could hardly be called "corpses" anymore; they were more like humanoid chunks of flesh that had been repeatedly pounded and torn by an invisible force, barely stuck together, mixed with fragments of bone and internal organs, before sinking into the dark blue water with a thud.
"2, the 28th,"
A young cultivator dressed in a gray-blue Daoist robe nearly collapsed onto the flying sword beneath him, his legs buckling.
His face was deathly pale, his lips trembled uncontrollably, and his eyes were fixed on the wreckage on the sea surface that was being swallowed by the waves, as if most of his soul had been ripped away.
He came from a medium-sized sect in the Eastern Wasteland. He came with his master to pay homage to the legendary Heavenly Tribulation of Severing the Dao Heavenly Tribulation, and perhaps even to sense a trace of the rhythm of the Great Dao from afar.
Who would have thought I would witness such a Hell scene?
A fellow disciple hurriedly helped him up, his own voice trembling violently:
" Junior Brother Chen! Calm your mind!"
The young cultivator seemed not to hear.
He abruptly covered his mouth, a sour, rotten smell rising to his throat, and he barely managed to hold it in so he didn't vomit on the spot.
These Mighty Figure figures, who usually only appeared in rumors or in the reverent conversations of their teachers, were now transformed into cold, broken corpses in such a tragic and humble way!
"Dead, all dead,"
He repeated it in a daze, feeling the solid flying sword beneath his feet tremble, as if the very foundation of the world had shattered at that moment.
" Mighty Figure! Those are truly Mighty Figure. In the past, the accidental fall of Half-Step Great Power could shake an entire region, trigger a sect war, and lead to years of relentless investigation. But now, thirty-two are being thrown out like trash. What has happened to this world?"
His last sentence was almost a scream, his voice filled with incomprehensible fear and bewilderment.
It wasn't just fear of Li Qingshan's power, but also fear of the complete collapse of a certain solid order.
The idea that Mighty Figure beings have long lifespans and overlook the mortal world is almost universally accepted common knowledge among lower-level cultivators.
But now, this common sense has been shattered before his eyes.
After a brief silence, there was a volcanic eruption of uproar and commotion, but within this commotion, there was also a deeper level of trembling, just like that of the young cultivator.
The deathly silence lasted for less than a breath.
Immediately afterwards, the suppressed fear and shock, like a powder keg that had been lit, exploded with a roar!
"Thirty-two! Including the four who were initially brought into the formation, that's a total of thirty-two Mighty Figure!"
A burly man with a full beard and draped in animal skins roared at the top of his lungs, his voice cracking with excitement. The bronze pot he was using for observation clattered to the ground, wisps of malfunctioning smoke still rising from its spout.
"In just a few dozen breaths! They were all gone! What the hell kind of formation is this?!"
" Eastern Exalt is still inside that cocoon!"
From another direction, a scholar-like cultivator with a deathly pale face screamed, snapping all the ribs of a jade folding fan in his hand.
"Who is in charge of the formation? Who can control the formation to such an extent, so perfectly and rapidly? This is simply illogical!"
"Idiot!"
A sparsely haired, sunken-eyed old monk suddenly shouted. In his hand, a tortoise shell had been cracked into several pieces, indicating that he had just performed some kind of hasty divination.
His cloudy old eyes were fixed on the faint, now much dimmer, black-clad phantom deep within the starry sky, his voice filled with an almost manic terror:
"That's not a living person controlling it! That's 'god'! It's a wisp of divine thought that Li Qingshan separated before he Severing the Dao, mixed with his understanding of the laws of stars, and injected into the array flag in advance!"
He was breathing rapidly, his chest heaving violently.
"This isn't a person controlling the formation; it's the 'Dao' operating on its own! A wisp of divine thought serves as the catalyst, the celestial power of the heavens as the fuel, and the residual power of the tribulation lightning as the fire!"
These words caused an immediate silence to fall, followed by an even deeper chill.
A wisp of divine thought?
He could slaughter all thirty-two Mighty Figure and cunning individuals who had dominated their respective regions within a few dozen breaths, as easily as mowing grass.