Ten Billion Souls

Within the formation restrictions of the Shaoyin clan, the Loose Immortals and Earth Immortals were originally quite relaxed. Aside from those who had already finished relocating the mortals under their jurisdiction, some had even stopped the migration entirely. Their hearts had tightened only when they saw the nine hundred-plus Fiendgods; when they realized only Ji Ning remained, they relaxed.

But then—

“How… how is this possible? How could he break through the formation of eight Celestial Immortals?”

“Wasn’t there a skirmish earlier between five Celestial Immortals and Ji Ning inside the formation? They were familiar with his capabilities. How could such a catastrophic miscalculation occur?”

“Good heavens.”

This group of Loose Immortals and Earth Immortals was utterly stunned.

How noble were Celestial Immortals? And yet two had died in an instant—and they were Celestial Immortals of their Shaoyin clan.

“Quick! Resume the migration immediately,” the Fiendbreeze Patriarch transmitted with a roar. “This Ji Ning’s body is comparable to a magic treasure; even Celestial Immortal attacks cannot harm him. If our Shaoyin clan’s Celestial Immortals cannot deal with him, he will likely go on a bloody rampage.”

“Right, right.”

“Continue the migration.”

“Hurry.”

Those Loose Immortals and Earth Immortals who had not yet fully relocated hurriedly went back to moving the mortals and cultivators.

……

“Mas… master!” Little Qing’s eyes flew wide open, her expression as if she had seen a ghost. “Two Celestial Immortals—Celestial Immortals! Those are true existences who have leaped beyond the Three Realms and Five Elements, who have transcended the Heavenly Tribulation! They are far nobler and far more powerful than mere Void Fiendgods! And yet… and yet two of them fell, just like that!”

Mu Northson was also stunned.

Beside them, the Whitewater Hound was shaken to the core. Celestial Immortals were the very foundation of a truly top-tier clan. In the entire Grand Xia Dynasty, one might be born only once in a million years. And two had fallen at once?

……

Ji Ning stared at the distant flying shuttle. The vessel was completely pitch-black, over three hundred meters long. The six remaining Celestial Immortals had all retreated into its belly, with only the horned, golden-robed figure standing atop the shuttle, staring back at Ji Ning.

“They certainly fled fast,” Ji Ning mused silently.

He had killed two Celestial Immortals in a sudden burst, and the other six had immediately fled—straight into that flying shuttle. They had even sealed it shut, leaving him no opening to attack.

“How did this happen?” The Shaoyin Ancestor stood within the shuttle, glaring at Ji Ning with ice-cold fury, his voice transmitting a roar. “Chixin, didn’t you all say the eight of you together would be enough to hold Ji Ning? Didn’t you say that his strength had increased significantly compared to his last ambush, but was still only roughly on par with you?”

“We don’t know either!”

“When we ambushed him back at Mu Northson’s residence, his power was indeed quite ordinary—even weaker than Goldenbell Witheredwood.”

“Yes, that is exactly how it was at the time. Just a short while ago… the five of us fought him inside that formation, and we were already shocked. In less than half a month, his power had skyrocketed; he was nearly approaching Chixin’s level. But now, in the blink of an eye, his strength has skyrocketed again! He is now clearly a cut above Chixin!”

“This is only the span of a single cup of tea. How could he have grown so much in that time?”

“It’s not that we were careless—it’s simply too inconceivable.”

Celestial Immortal Chixin, Witheredwood, Jingyu, and the others were all feeling deeply aggrieved.

They had just fought him before. Then, after Ji Ning released the nine hundred-plus Fiendgods, he became dramatically stronger. This kind of improvement was too fast! Generally, the higher one’s level, the slower the growth. It was barely acceptable that Ji Ning had experienced a leap after being ambushed—but then, in the blink of an eye, his strength had skyrocketed again?

“Damn it, damn it!” The horned, golden-robed figure ground his teeth. Having cultivated to the Celestial Immortal level, one was typically very cautious; even if you couldn’t win, you could still flee. But this time, they had been careless—precisely because they had fought him before and knew his capabilities! That one moment of carelessness had cost two lives.

In the face of over nine hundred Fiendgods, they had fought with everything they had and survived.

In the face of Ji Ning, they were careless—and that carelessness cost two lives.

“You were already injured. Do not interfere with Ji Ning anymore. Leave everything to me,” the horned, golden-robed figure transmitted.

“Yes, master.”

“Yes, Patriarch.”

Each of them replied.

The horned, golden-robed figure stared across the distance at Ji Ning and roared: “Ji Ning! You have killed two Celestial Immortals of my Shaoyin clan! This blood feud runs deeper than the heavens! I will kill you! I will kill you!”

“Didn’t you already swear that oath when you pulled out that bronze pillar? That you would definitely kill me, wipe out my tribe, and slaughter all my kin? You only need to say such vicious words once. I have already engraved them deep in my heart. Rest assured… those two Celestial Immortals I just killed are only the beginning. I will slaughter every single Celestial Immortal of your Shaoyin clan. I will kill every Loose Immortal and Earth Immortal. As for the other cultivators and mortals… I trust there are plenty of major tribes who will finish them off without my intervention,” Ji Ning said.

As the saying went, “when a wall is about to collapse, everyone gives it a push.” The Shaoyin clan had no shortage of enemies. There were clans even stronger than them, such as Zhuanshui. And even if there were no prior grudges, the Shaoyin clan occupied three entire commanderies—each far larger than Anchan Commandery. How could such vast territories not inspire greed? As soon as the Celestial Immortals were all dead, the Shaoyin clan’s cultivators and mortals would be finished—easily swept away.

“You?” The horned, golden-robed man’s eyes flickered with murderous light. “I, Shaoyin Chou, have roamed the four corners of the world since the Primordial Era. No one has ever dared to claim they could kill me. First, taste the power of my children!”

The three enormous venomous insects and strange beasts, each thirty thousand meters tall, blotted out the sky as they rapidly flew over from all directions, their auras overwhelming as they lunged straight at Ji Ning.

Standing in midair, Ji Ning seemed like an insignificant speck—yet he had activated Three Heads, Six Arms. His many arms swept across the sky, golden palms forming sword-fingers that manifested enormous, thousand-meter black divine swords… The terrifying sword-intent could be felt even from afar. Anyone who saw it sensed a finality, a sense that this sword-strike was impossible to block.

Shiiick! A massive wound appeared on the body of the black venomous serpent, yet it healed almost instantly.

Ptu! The armored flying rhinoceros’s belly was incredibly tough, but Ji Ning still stabbed a hole through it. The flying rhinoceros’s iron hooves stomped Ji Ning’s palm away, and the hole in its belly healed as well.

The shelled venomous insect had even stronger defenses; Ji Ning could only barely leave a wound.

“Quite the venomous insects and strange beasts.” Ji Ning was secretly startled after just one exchange. “These three are this formidable?”

In terms of Dao comprehension, these three creatures were far inferior.

But in **close combat, they were far too powerful.

Their bodies were all extremely tough; even their thick hide and scales were on par with Heaven-ranked magic treasures, and the muscles beneath were all incredibly resilient. Every inch of flesh he tore apart met fierce resistance. And even when he wounded them… these venomous insects and strange beasts could recover in an extremely short period of time! On top of that, their strength was immense. The black venomous serpent and the shelled insect each possessed nearly half of Ji Ning’s own power when he was using the fourth-cycle Starseizing Hand with Three Heads, Six Arms! The armored flying rhinoceros, in terms of raw strength, was actually a match for all six of Ji Ning’s arms combined!

“Activate!” The horned figure in the distance stared coldly and let out a soft command.

Instantly, complex divine runes appeared on the shelled insect’s back, flashing with light. The creature rapidly shrank while simultaneously beginning to split. When it shrank to three thousand meters, it split into two shelled insects. At three hundred meters, it became four. And when it reached thirty meters in size, there were eight shelled insects in total.

“ROOOAAAR!” The armored flying rhinoceros also bellowed. Its four powerful hooves began to merge into its body, while from the center of its belly, a single, much thicker, much longer leg rapidly grew.

It transformed from a four-legged, winged rhinoceros into a one-legged rhinoceros.

“HISSS~~” The black venomous serpent suddenly bit its own tail. Instantly, divine runes flared across its entire body, and its scales began to change, becoming longer and more slender, slowly taking on a golden light.

“Die!” The horned figure unleashed his signature technique.

Ji Ning, however, suddenly transformed into a wisp of the Ninth Firmament Annihilation Wind and shot straight toward the armored flying rhinoceros.

“Kill!”

Like a simple-minded Fiendgod, Ji Ning’s six massive arms attacked the armored flying rhinoceros with wild abandon, engaging it in brutal close-quarters combat!

“CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!” The eight shelled insects attacked him repeatedly, but Ji Ning completely ignored them. The only sounds were the metallic clangs against his body.

“WHOOSH.” The black serpent, now coiled into a loop, directly wrapped around Ji Ning, trying to constrict him.

Ji Ning immediately split off two palms, transforming them into two sword-lights. In terms of Dao profundity, how could the serpent compare to him? Ji Ning’s sword-light sent it flying away with a single slash.

“This brat.” The horned figure’s eyes flickered coldly.

His shelled insects were completely suppressed by Ji Ning. He had hoped Ji Ning would be careless enough to let the black serpent coil around him—once bound, even if Ji Ning’s power was far greater, he would find it impossible to break free. But Ji Ning simply wouldn’t let the serpent get close.

“Kill!”

“DIE!”

Ji Ning and the one-legged winged rhinoceros exchanged frantic blows. Ji Ning was completely unharmed, but the flying rhinoceros’s flesh was being torn apart in massive chunks. Under Ji Ning’s razor-sharp hands, with a furious roar from Ji Ning, he ripped the flying rhinoceros’s head clean off its body.

“What do I do? What can I do?” A feeling of powerlessness arose in the horned figure’s heart, followed by… hesitation!

“Should I have my other avatars rush over as well?”

He had more venomous insects and strange beasts!

If he gathered all the creatures he controlled here, he could crush Ji Ning with overwhelming force.

“No. I cannot let my avatars appear one after another. That would bring me closer to death.” The horned figure knew this well. His cruelty and treachery had earned him countless enemies throughout the Three Realms. For example, that Empyrean God of the Zhuanshui clan wanted nothing more than to kill him. But precisely because his many avatars were scattered and hidden in different places, that Empyrean God had held back, never truly launching a war to exterminate the Shaoyin clan.

……

Ji Ning, relying on his indestructible [Arcane Art] , was even more ferocious than the three venomous beasts. He forcibly tore the flying rhinoceros apart, and its shattered remains flew back toward the horned figure, shrinking back down to a thirty-thousand-meter flying rhinoceros before finally flying into the horned figure’s mouth.

“Rend!” Ji Ning’s six arms raged against the black serpent. Two arms carved wounds into its body while the other four arms grabbed hold and pulled mightily in opposite directions. RIIIIIP! The black venomous serpent was torn straight in half, spraying black, stinking blood through the air.

Ji Ning was terrifyingly savage, completely dominating the three venomous insects and beasts.

……

“What do we do?”

“Is our Shaoyin clan unable to stop this Ji Ning?”

“This Ji Ning is too terrifying.”

A group of Earth Immortals and Loose Immortals watched this scene from within the formation barriers, all of them trembling with fear.

“Fiendbreeze, all the cultivators and mortals within the formation’s reach have been relocated. Even if Ji Ning breaches the formation, he won’t be able to harm our clansmen.” This group of Loose Immortals and Earth Immortals all looked to Fiendbreeze Patriarch as their leader. In the Chenyu Mountain Range, Fiendbreeze was the highest authority.

Fiendbreeze Patriarch nodded. “Give me your Universe Pearls.”

“Fine.” The assembled Loose Immortals and Earth Immortals each produced their own Universe Pearls.

A Universe Pearl was a type of cave-realm magic treasure! Generally, it was created by a Celestial Immortal who had deep insights into the Grand Dao of Space, carving a small pocket of space inside the pearl. There were many such treasures—bags with inner dimensions specially used to collect people or magic treasures! The interior space of a Universe Pearl was quite large, measuring nearly five thousand kilometers across. However, it could not support plant life and therefore could not sustain life indefinitely; it could only serve as a temporary living space.

It was the most suitable tool for large-scale relocation.

“Good.” Fiendbreeze Patriarch collected all the Universe Pearls.

……

“Damn it.” The horned figure in the distance watched with fury, yet he could do nothing about Ji Ning.

Ji Ning was busy savagely tearing apart the black serpent. Even when the serpent was split in half, it merely became two smaller snakes, though their auras clearly weakened. Ji Ning pursued them relentlessly.

Suddenly, a spatial fluctuation appeared—a Greater Teleportation.

“Hm?” Ji Ning turned and saw Patriarch Fiendbreeze appear out of nowhere in the distance.

“This Fiendbreeze old fiend is not dead?” Ji Ning was stunned.

“Fiendbreeze, don’t lose your mind!”

“Fiendbreeze, retreat!” Mystic Secrets, Chixin, and the others had long been observing the battle with their heartforce. When they saw Fiendbreeze suddenly appear, they all transmitted urgently.

“He killed my disciple and destroyed my true body. This feud is irreconcilable!” Fiendbreeze Patriarch waved his hand, and suddenly, densely packed points of starlight appeared—hundreds of them. A gigantic phantom of the Taiyin Star manifested in the sky above, and all of these points of light shot directly toward Ji Ning.

Ji Ning sneered coldly. “You old fiend, you still have a Primaltwin. I haven’t even gone to kill you yet, and here you are, throwing your life away.”

How could Ji Ning take this Fiendbreeze old fiend seriously? He waved a massive golden palm, pressing down and crushing everything in its path. BOOM BOOM BOOM!!! Those hundreds of Star Sand pellets were immediately sent flying backward.

SLAP!

An unusual sound rang out.

Like an egg cracking.

But those masses of Star Sand were, after all, Immortal-ranked magic treasures. How could Ji Ning have crushed Immortal-ranked treasures with a single slap?

“AHHHH~~”“NOOO~~”“NOOO~~”

Countless screams.

Within a certain pocket of space, countless mortals and cultivators had been gathered together—these were the people who had been relocated. But now, that pocket of space had collapsed and shattered! Though it was only a small pocket dimension, how could mortals withstand the collapse of space itself? One by one, they were ground to shreds. Only a few powerful cultivators managed to endure.

A cluster of people appeared out of thin air beneath Ji Ning’s golden palm—the survivors of the collapsed space. But the force of Ji Ning’s palm strike against the Star Sand was immense; even its mere aftershocks were enough to crush the cultivators who had just emerged into dust.

An endless wave of despair… a suffocating surge of despair… instantly engulfed Ji Ning.

Boundless resentment!

Hatred!

“No, I don’t want to die.”

“Heavens!”

“Who… who…”

“Who killed us?”

Countless voices seemed to ring directly inside Ji Ning’s mind.

“HAHAHAHA…” In the distance, Fiendbreeze Patriarch had gone completely mad. “Killing ten billion mortals—this is a sin of the highest order! A sin of the highest order!”

BOOM~~~

The sky turned blood-red—a terrifying, blood-curdling crimson. An intensely dense, heart-shaking red flame appeared out of nowhere, and both Ji Ning and Patriarch Fiendbreeze were instantly wreathed in this horrifying crimson fire. It was the legendary… Karmic Hellfire!

Two great masses of crimson hellfire blazed in resonance with each other.

Karmic Hellfire had descended!