On the gray-blue mountain plain, the battlefield that had just been filled with the deafening sounds of battle had now fallen into an unsettling silence. For dozens of miles, the corpses of beasts lay scattered across the shattered earth, and dark red beast blood flowed slowly along the ravines. Residual traces of the True Annihilation Dao continued to rise between the broken rocks. In the center of this devastated battlefield, tens of thousands of disciples of the Shangguan Lineage had all retreated into the great formation.
Several thick light curtains rose from the ground and reached the sky. Sword souls, ancient bells, destiny wheels, mountain and river diagrams and countless Innate Martial Soul intertwined and floated in the array. Thousands of Fate Soul origins converged into a vast river of light, flowing continuously along the array patterns, illuminating the entire array like a huge star standing between heaven and earth.
Shangguan Wan'er stood at the very front of the formation, dressed in a deep purple robe with fine dark gold ancient patterns embroidered on the edges of the lapels and wide sleeves. Her long black hair was tied up with a purple jade hairpin, and a few strands of hair gently swayed with the surging primordial energy within the formation.
Her features were dignified, and her expression was aloof. The composure and dignity she usually possessed as a Shangguan Lineage had been greatly diminished by the terrifying aura that was constantly approaching from the front.
The powerful Dao foundation of the Eternal Silence Realm · Supreme circulated endlessly within her body, and the origin of her life Fate Soul firmly maintained several key array eyes in front of the great formation. However, at the very moment that angry roar came from afar, a series of tremors suddenly arose deep within her Fate Soul without any warning.
The palpitation came in an extremely strange way. It was neither directly impacted by any external supernatural power nor caused by any clearly discernible cause and effect. Instead, an inexplicable fear quietly grew along the depths of the Fate Soul and gradually permeated the limbs and bones.
Shangguan Wan'er's fingers tightened slightly, and a layer of sweat had already seeped into her palms. She stared intently at the churning dust ahead, a hint of bewilderment and panic flashing across her eyes. Although no enormous beast shadows had yet appeared, she had already sensed an ancient aura that was almost irresistible. Her cultivation, Dao foundation, and Fate Soul all trembled in the face of that aura, and even her once proud Eternal Stillness Dao Aura had unconsciously diminished somewhat.
She took a slow breath, forcibly suppressing the surging fear in her heart, and turned her head to look at the elders beside her. She found that their expressions were equally solemn. One Elder White Brow was gripping the bronze staff tightly in his hand, another tall and thin elder was staring into the distance, and fine beads of sweat had appeared on his forehead. Several Shangguan Lineage stewards were stationed in various places in the formation, their robes fluttering without wind, and their Fate Soul essence was constantly being injected into the formation patterns in their palms, but their faces were all looking worse than the last.
Behind them, tens of thousands of Shangguan Lineage disciples held their breath. Some of the younger disciples gripped their swords with both hands, their knuckles turning white from the excessive force. Some had just experienced a series of battles, and large patches of beast blood remained on their chests, but they didn't even bother to wipe it away. Thousands of eyes were all looking ahead.
Although the entire formation still maintained its complete form, the Fate Soul essence flowing within it had experienced several extremely subtle tremors. Shangguan Wan'er noticed this change, her brows furrowed sharply, and she immediately turned around, her gaze sweeping across everyone's faces. Her voice, imbued with the profound essence of the Eternal Silence Realm · Supreme, clearly resounded throughout the entire formation.
"Listen up, everyone! Calm yourselves, hold your positions, and do not panic! You must stabilize your Fate Soul force!!!"
She raised her right hand, her five fingers slowly closing, and a deep purple Fate Soul halo rose behind her, stabilizing the several trembling array patterns in front of her. Then she raised her voice, her tone stern and unyielding.
"Everyone must not panic. Otherwise, if a fatal flaw appears in the formation, it will affect the entire formation, and tens of thousands of clansmen will be in danger. All deacons must immediately check all the formation's key points. Elders, stay with me to guard the front. No one is allowed to leave without permission!"
"Yes, sir!" Several deacons immediately bowed in response, then turned and rushed off to different locations within the formation. The thousands of disciples also focused their attention again at the elder's command, and their previously slightly disordered Fate Soul essence gradually resumed its flow. The multiple layers of defensive light screens once again shone with dazzling brilliance.
However, just as everyone was barely suppressing their fear—BOOM!—a deep, muffled thud suddenly resounded from the distant earth.
The sound pierced through the continuous mountain ranges and spread in all directions along countless rift valleys. At the same time, the towering columnar rock peaks on the bluish-gray plateau were covered with dense cracks. Crack! Crack! Crack! Countless boulders rolled down the mountain walls, and then a large part of the mountain collapsed with a roar, and dust billowed up, completely obscuring the distant sky.
The ancient divine beasts and supreme divine beasts that had been charging wildly suddenly stopped their advance. One after another, the ancient beasts at the initial to the Supreme of the True Annihilation Realm · Initial Stage lowered their heads, and the enormous nine-headed ancient serpent slowly lowered its body.
The six-legged behemoth carrying the ancient city retracted its three prominent spines, and hundreds of black-gold divine rhinoceroses retreated to the sides. The crimson-feathered ancient birds, Star Bone-Winged Beast, and pale bone-armored divine beasts in the sky also gave way. Even several ancient ferocious beasts that had just been frantically tearing apart the corpses of their own kind now concealed the ferocious glint between their fangs.
As all the beasts retreated and the mountains fell silent, an extremely wide road slowly emerged from the center of the dense beast tide. When the Shangguan Lineage family saw this, the chill in their hearts grew even stronger.
"Elder... look, why have all those divine beast supreme beings retreated?" A young disciple's voice trembled, and his right hand, which was holding a sword, began to shake uncontrollably.
No one answered him. For at that very moment, the dust curtain that had blotted out the sky in the distance finally began to slowly split open from its center.
Whoosh—a wisp of grayish-white mist emerged from the depths of the dust cloud. The mist was extremely faint, not even stirring up any wind, yet wherever it passed, the falling dust underwent a strange transformation.
Some dust particles disappeared before they even landed, while some dust that had already settled on the rocks floated up again and then Wuhen in mid-air. Even the few remaining True Annihilation Dao patterns nearby quietly dimmed.
Immediately afterwards, a small, grayish-white figure slowly emerged from the deepest part of the dust curtain. Shangguan Wan'er was stunned, and the other elders also widened their eyes at the same time. What they saw was a small, grayish-white beast no bigger than a palm.
It hovered silently in mid-air, its limbs slightly curled up, its whole body round and compact, looking quite similar to ordinary rodents from a distance. But when everyone really looked closely, they discovered that the little beast did not have the slightest trace of the aura that an ordinary life should have.
Its curled-up body was surrounded by a very faint gray-white primordial mist. With each breath, tiny specks of stardust rose and then quietly extinguished with the next breath, repeating the cycle endlessly without leaving any complete Extinction Trace.
Its fur is grayish-white, and each hair is so fine that it is almost indistinguishable. The tips of the hairs are almost transparent and float gently with each breath. If you look closely, you can see deep in those hairs lines of time that have not yet fully unfolded. They intersect with each other but have no beginning and extend outwards but have no end.
Twelve extremely ancient star spots are arranged on its back. The rat-shaped star spot at the front always emits a faint glow, while the other eleven star spots are hidden in the gray-white primordial darkness, only occasionally revealing a blurry outline.
Its eyes were tightly closed; beneath its left eyelid lay a profound and unfathomable ancient charm, while beneath its right eyelid lay a deep and immeasurable mystery.
Even without opening their eyes, the location of those two eyes created an indescribable silence in the surrounding space. Occasionally, when people caught a faint glimmer of light through the gaps in their eyelids, they would feel a sense of dread, as if their consciousness was about to fall into an endless abyss.
That ghostly light had no gold or silver hue, nor any luster that could be described in words. The little beast's ears were extremely thin, their edges almost blending into the surrounding void, and countless tiny lines flowed faintly on the inner side of its earlobes, each one subtly echoing the true name deep within some kind of life.
Its mouth was slightly closed, with two short, sharp teeth on the top and two on the bottom. The four teeth were a chillingly blank color, without any cold light or sharpness. Even the dust that had passed by had quietly disappeared where the tips of the teeth were close together.
The most bizarre feature was its long, thin tail. The tail was grayish-white, as thin as an elongated ancient thread of cause and effect, yet its end could never maintain its complete form; one moment it was clearly visible, the next...
It suddenly disappeared in the next instant, and then reappeared in a more distant place. There was no continuous trace left between the disappearance and the appearance, as if some invisible thing had bitten a gap at the end of cause and effect that could never be healed.
It hovered there silently. Behind it was an endless tide of ancient beasts, and in front of it was a vast array composed of tens of thousands of cultivators from the Shangguan Lineage. The two formed an extremely disparate contrast in size. Those ancient divine beasts and divine beast supremes that were thousands or tens of thousands of feet tall all bowed their heads before this palm-sized gray-white beast, not daring to utter a single growl.
But just as everyone was gazing at it, another, extremely large, ancient outline suddenly appeared around the small, grayish-white figure. This outline wasn't fully unfolded; only a section of its grayish-white spine was visible, yet it already spanned several distant mountain ranges, its spine stretching to the very edge of the sky. Twelve star-like spots hung in the boundless high, with the ever-bright mouse-like spot illuminating the entire mountain range.
A slender tail slowly swept across the horizon, traversing twelve layers of faintly visible primordial chaos. Where its four feet trod, there were no shadows, and even the ancient patterns that originally existed in the space had not yet had a chance to appear before quietly falling silent.
That was a wisp of form left behind before its true form was fully unfolded. If its true form were to fully unfold, its spine would stretch like Endless mountain range, its long tail would sweep across the twelve primordial realms, and its four legs would stand before the beginning of everything, so that even its own shadow could not be born.
"What... what is this?" A Shangguan Lineage struggled to swallow, cold sweat trickling down his face. He instinctively wanted to take a half step back, but then suddenly remembered that he was maintaining his position, so he could only grit his teeth and nail his feet back to the spot.
At that moment, an Elder White Brow standing to Shangguan Wan'er's left suddenly trembled. He abruptly raised his hand, which had been gripping the bronze staff, his eyes widened, and the color drained from his aged face in an instant. His lips trembled a few times before he finally managed to squeeze out an extremely hoarse sound.
"That... that is..." He stared intently at the ever-shining, mouse-shaped star-shaped mark on the back of the small beast in the distance, and involuntarily took half a step back. "Gongpiluo Huang?!"