The enormous finger descended from the heavens like a celestial pillar collapsing, it was unspeakably awe-inspiring.
Whether it was people, objects, the entire Zangfeng Prefecture, or even this whole swath of heaven and earth, in contrast to that finger, all seemed unimaginably small, reduced to mere ants and dust.
Above the sky, at the very point where the finger's tip lightly touched, an explosion of blinding golden light erupted.
In the pitch-black night sky, it was like a false sunrise, instantly illuminating all of Zangfeng Prefecture.
The golden light condensed, slowly tracing itself in midair, forming a single character:
"Seal"
At that moment, everyone within Zangfeng Prefecture, cultivator or mortal alike, felt an almost suffocating pressure weighing down on them.
The cultivators lifted their heads, their stunned eyes reflecting this divine miracle that defied their comprehension.
Many even fell to their knees, prostrating toward the sky and crying out praises to the Saint.
Even though that giant finger was only a phantom projection, and dissipated the moment the "Seal" character finished forming, its effect was undeniable.
Chen Kuang also felt that heavy, suffocating pressure, a sensation that was all too familiar.
He drew in a deep breath.
This feeling... he had experienced it before.
When he had first transmigrated to this world, he'd witnessed a similar divine marvel wrought by a Saint's hand, a celestial go match, with the heavens as board, and the stars as pieces.
And now, this descending finger carried the same soul-shaking dread.
This was not a puppet incarnation like Martial Saint Mu Zhao's use of his soul to temporarily inhabit a mortal shell, this was the true handiwork of a living Saint!
In an instant, Chen Kuang understood the reason behind the sudden disappearance of Spiritual Energy.
It wasn't some mysterious fluctuation, it was that a Saint had taken action and sealed off this entire regional space, suppressing all Spiritual Energy within!
Around him, the cultivators who had hidden themselves to spectate now sensed that something was wrong and burst out in frantic exclamations.
"The Spiritual Energy... it's gone?!"
"No! No, no, my cultivation!"
"What's going on?! Did someone incur the wrath of a Saint?!"
"That golden light, is that a barrier? Could it be that only Zangfeng Prefecture is affected? Quick, try to contact the outside!"
"My transmission jade isn't responding... With Spiritual Energy gone, all our methods are useless."
"We have to leave, get out of Zangfeng Prefecture! If a Saint is making a move, something big is coming. Stay here, and we're just dead fish in the net!"
Cultivators, ever keen on self-preservation, sprang into action, but now that Spiritual Energy was cut off, they could only rely on their physical bodies to escape.
At this moment, those who specialized in the body, physical cultivators, gained an advantage.
Those who relied on tools or spells were left gaping uselessly, while physical cultivators leapt to rooftops and began sprinting toward the borders of Zangfeng Prefecture.
"Swish, swish, swish!"
In the night, it was as if a dozens of martial arts masters had suddenly appeared.
But alas, once they reached the border, they realized, Zangfeng Prefecture had become a one-way prison.
...
"Cough, cough..."
Chen Kuang's face was pale. He coughed twice and clutched his chest.
For cultivators, the disappearance of Spiritual Energy was equivalent to having their cultivation wiped away.
He had narrowly survived once more, his cultivation having just broken through to the sixth stage of the Tower Ascension Realm.
But now, it was nearly useless.
Many of his passives required Spiritual Energy to function, like the Fetal Breathing Technique, and all of them were now dormant.
Normally, with Spiritual Energy, his body could recover at astonishing speeds.
But now, his wounds were healing even slower than when he'd been imprisoned in the Heavenly Prison.
That final blow from Tong Shi's divine soul had struck him deep, damaging even his internal organs.
Now, he could only rely on the passive Flesh Reishi to recover slowly.
This was the power of a Saint...
"Heh... a Saint, huh? You can't beat me, so you call in a Saint? What a f***ing joke!"
Chen Kuang growled hoarsely, fury lacing his voice.
From the heavens, a faint gaze seemed to sweep over him and land on his body.
Chen Kuang raised his middle finger to the sky, expressionless, and walked over to the two mangled chunks of flesh that had fallen from the sky when the Double-Lotus Blossom disintegrated.
They were the ruined corpses of Han Shan and Tong Shi.
Mutilated by the "Demon God Flower" in the form of a blooming lotus, their flesh had been shredded like meat through a grinder. Even their heads were torn apart beyond recognition.
Chen Kuang crouched down and saw the tattoos on their necks:
"Death-One."
"Death-Two."
So, Han Shan and Tong Shi weren't even real names, just numbers.
They were deathsworn sent by Prince Jingnan.
Cultivators elevated to the Grandmaster Realm through secret arts and resources, their actual strength far inferior to someone like Bai Fen.
Even more telling, they hadn't truly gone all out in the end.
It was precisely because of that hesitation that Chen Kuang had managed to survive again.
"Prince Jingnan's orders ended up limiting their strength."
"Their mission wasn't to kill me. Maybe not even to capture me, just to delay and locate me."
Chen Kuang narrowed his eyes, analyzing coldly.
If Prince Jingnan had been confident those two could take care of him, he would never have summoned a Saint's power.
On the contrary, it was precisely because he was well-informed on Chen Kuang's feats that he had arranged for both the deathsworn and the Saint to act simultaneously.
Cunning. Ruthless. Patient.
As a foe, Prince Jingnan was terrifying.
And then... there was the Glazed Image-Freezing Lamp he'd planted in advance.
Chen Kuang's gaze sharpened and without another word, he dove into the river.
"Splash-"
As a merman, water was his natural domain. He swiftly swam to the ruins of the Xuni Pavillion.
Now unrecognizable, the Pavilion was submerged. Chen Kuang rummaged around and pulled out the Glazed Image-Freezing Lamp.
Colorful glazed light bloomed underwater, casting an enchanting, dreamlike glow.
"Of all the people who know the truth behind this shadow following me, only that mangy-headed Taoist might betray me... and he's probably in the Prince's manor!"
Chen Kuang muttered.
The Yang Kingdom's Saint resided in seclusion in the Ancestral Temple of the imperial family.
If Prince Jingnan wanted her help, he had to have gone there personally.
But the Lamp had only been in Chen Kuang's hands for a day.
It was impossible for Prince Jingnan to have brought others into the Temple, it was too sacred.
Which meant... that mangy-headed Taoist was also trapped in Zangfeng Prefecture!
Chen Kuang's gaze swept upward, falling on the ominous silhouette of Su Yu's shadow.
It still loomed over the ruins, haunting, ever-present, cast even underwater.
If he wanted to dispel that shadow, he had to find its creator.
And now, he had his chance.
"White Dragon Senior? Senior, are you there?!"
From the water's surface came a woman's anxious cry.
It was Liu Qingcheng.
Chen Kuang returned to himself, wrapped the Lamp in cloth, and rose to the surface.
"Splash!"
His head emerged, and he stepped onto solid ground.
Liu Qingcheng spotted him and rushed over in relief.
"Senior, are you all right? The Spiritual Energy around us suddenly vanished..."
"I know," Chen Kuang said heavily.
In fact, it was aimed at him.
He looked past her, toward Yu Xiangsi and the two snowy-white tails behind her.
After a moment's thought, he asked: "Mountain-Sea Alliance?"
Yu Xiangsi blinked in surprise, then nodded. "Yes. I am an elder of the Mountain-Sea Alliance, 'White Fox.'"
Chen Kuang raised an eyebrow. "In that case, let's go. Take me to meet your Alliance Leader."
The Mountain-Sea Alliance was a secret organization of the demon race.
Chen Kuang hadn't expected the Xuni Pavillion to be one of its enterprises.
And the reason his Piercing Insight couldn't see Yu Xiangsi's true form was simple:
She was a half-demon.
Though, her demonic bloodline was far thicker than Liu Qingcheng's.
Technically, the Mirror Stones used by Wang Yangbo's subordinates should also have failed to reveal her.
Which meant that Wang Yangbo tampered with the Mirrorstone himself, intending to scapegoat Yu Xiangsi.
Yu Xiangsi hadn't expected Chen Kuang to be so direct. Her prepared speech got stuck in her throat, and she fell silent for a moment.
She had intended to slowly pull him in, evaluate him over time, and only after gaining the elders' approval, move to the next step.
Although a Saint had suddenly intervened and sealed the flow of Spiritual Energy, there was nothing the small fry like them could do about such matters of divine rank.
Naturally, all they could do was go with the flow and wait for the storm to pass.
But then Chen Kuang... had asked to meet the Alliance Leader right away.
Chen Kuang said slowly,
"With Spiritual Energy sealed, Zangfeng Prefecture is about to descend into chaos."
"And where there is chaos, change follows."
"Did you see those cultivators who've lost their Spiritual Energy? Now, whoever has the stronger physical body holds the advantage."
He looked up, directly meeting Yu Xiangsi's gaze.
"And tell me, can the flesh of humans ever compare to that of demons?"
The pale-faced young man spoke in a calm voice,
but his pitch-black, fathomless eyes flickered with a cold, eerie light.
"This... is our chance. Don't you agree, Elder 'White Fox'?"
Yu Xiangsi's heart trembled.
At that moment, she felt as though she were looking at a bewitching, otherworldly demon.
But she couldn't suppress the thoughts surging within her.
Yes... with Spiritual Energy sealed, all cultivators were now no different from ordinary mortals.
But demons were different, the strength of their bodies was what made them fearsome.
The Department of Shennong, which had once relied on cultivation to suppress demons, was now nothing in the face of raw physical power.
And the Mountain-Sea Alliance, after lurking in the shadows of the Yang Kingdom for so many years...
Wasn't this the moment they had been waiting for?
This idea, once it took root, spread like wildfire through her mind.
She had a vague feeling that this youth before her... might just be the one to change the Mountain-Sea Alliance's fate.
Yu Xiangsi exhaled and said, "Very well. I'll take you to see him."
Chen Kuang smiled.
Prince Jingnan would definitely be sending someone soon.
Now that he couldn't leave Zangfeng Prefecture, he had to find shelter, a foothold, a base of power.
The Mountain-Sea Alliance was a good choice.
But... It was not enough.
This time, he didn't just want to turn the tables.
"Whatever the enemy wants, I will destroy it!"
Before they departed, Liu Qingcheng removed her jade bracelet and silently cast it into the Rouge River, as an offering.
Chen Kuang stood by the side, watching the scene, his heart heavy and his expression colder than ever.
He sighed, then threw the bodies of Han Shan and Tong Shi into the river, which had now widened into something closer to a lake.
...
"Gululu..."
The jade bracelet and corpses sank beneath the water, sending up a flurry of fine bubbles.
The soft radiance upon the surface quickly faded,
and the bracelet slipped into the deeper, darker parts of the riverbed.
Click.
The bracelet knocked into a golden leaf wrapped in a strip of pink cloth, nudging it slightly.
That long strip of torn fabric was soaked with blood, still wrapped around the leaf, drifting ceaselessly with the current.
The water below was pitch-black and utterly silent.
Elsewhere, Han Shan and Tong Shi's corpses sank deeper into the gloom.
No one knew how much time passed before:
Whoosh...
The water's flow began to shift.
At first, it was just a slight current gathering force, then a vortex formed, pulling in the bracelet and the corpses.
And not just them.
Everything near the whirlpool, the dead, the rubble, the fish, the river-life, all of it was swallowed whole.
The vortex expanded further, consuming everything near it, but because it was underwater, even with such turbulent currents, no one noticed.
Soon, the whirlpool faded away.
From the depths, came a chilling, grotesque sound of chewing, mixed with bubbling water, echoing through the deep darkness.
As if... something massive lay hidden in the blackness, quietly devouring its prey.
Again, no one knew how long passed.
Until..
Whoosh...
The water split silently as a slender, snowy-white hand reached up from the dark waters..
Around its wrist hung the jade bracelet Liu Qingcheng had tossed into the river.
Then came an arm, a shoulder and finally... the fair and delicate face of a young girl, brows faintly furrowed in confusion.
The pale girl's naked body emerged from the shadows, floating in the current.
She was no longer the seemingly thirteen or fourteen-year-old child from before but a well-developed girl approaching sixteen or seventeen.
Her long lashes trembled gently before she opened her eyes.
Golden.
They were golden, molten and luminous, glimmering in the darkness, both calm and eerie, with a touch of demonic charm.
At the corner of her mouth, hung crimson streaks of blood..
She wiped it with a hand, then stuck out her tongue and licked it clean.
"Hee hee..."
She squinted and smiled.
"They tasted pretty good. No wonder it woke me up."
She looked up at the water's surface above her.
Then turned to glance at the drifting pink fabric beside her.
The girl drifted over and plucked the golden leaf wrapped inside.
After studying it for a moment, she pouted and tossed it aside.
"Stupid man. He talked so big, but when it came down to it, not the least bit reliable."
"All bark and no bite! Whatever, I don't want it anymore!"
She gave a disdainful snort, then turned and swam gracefully toward the riverbank, her form as weightless as a dancing immortal, gradually fading from sight.
The golden leaf sank silently to the pitch-black depths once more.
...
Roughly fifteen minutes later..
A pale little hand quietly slipped out of the darkness like a thief, snatched the golden leaf... and vanished again.
Only a trail of bubbles remained, rising gently to the surface.
Gululu...
When Chen Kuang arrived at the hidden stronghold of the Mountain-Sea Alliance, his long-stagnant status screen suddenly updated.
[You have awakened a Heavenly Demon Lord. You have gained the passive: "Heavenly Demon Mimicry.": Any technique used against you can be instantly mimicked.]