"Damn it! Madman! Madman! He's a gods-damned madman!"
Upon realizing that Bai Liyun had merged with the Dao through the True Demon Realm, the Black Tortoise Demonic Crocodile felt its entire being turn sour.
The last time a Mahayana stage True Demon cultivator had used this method, he had slaughtered half of the demonic forces and nearly wiped out his own world, turning it into a place where demonic nature ran rampant. Ultimately, he was assimilated and swallowed by the laws of the Great Dao, becoming nourishment to strengthen those laws.
Now, here was another one!
Although the True Demon cultivator before it was only at the Unity stage, this wasn't about the cultivation level—it was about the True Demon Realm itself! Once one reached this realm, they could use the True Demon State to merge with the aura of heaven and earth while preserving a fragment of their own obsession, allowing them to carry out a prolonged slaughter.
Once this fusion was complete, the cultivator's body, soul, and Dao-fruit were all fused as part of the Great Dao. In this state, the limitations of their cultivation level were greatly diminished. What truly supported their combat power was the "aura" of this world that could be transformed into demonic nature!
And what place was this? A primordial battlefield!
The mere resentment here had formed Unity-level monsters; one could see just how horrific this region was. Most critically, a True Demon cultivator in this state was the hardest to kill. With a thought, they became a demon, and the world's demonic nature was born of them. As long as a single wisp of that demonic nature remained, they could recover instantly. It was utterly absurd!
This was the terror of the True Demon Realm.
'From the current situation, I would need to team up with several other top Saint-grade demons to have a chance at completely obliterating this guy...'
True Demon cultivators weren't impossible to kill, but the difficulty was not ordinary. Furthermore, one needed someone proficient in the Dao of soul and spirit obliteration to wipe out every trace of demonic nature—a Unity-level Thousand-Eyed Giant Demon would be a perfect candidate.
But the problem was that the crocodile couldn't find any reinforcements right now!
It had lived for countless ages, and its greatest strengths were its body and defense. It was not skilled in soul attacks. Even the True Demon's full-strength strike earlier had only managed to snap a few thorns on its shell.
"Damn it all!"
Looking at the recovered Bai Liyun, a trace of despair flashed in the crocodile's eyes. Its horrific power could shatter Bai Liyun countless times, yet it knew it couldn't kill him. And if nothing changed, death would be its own final end.
"Giggle... giggle..."
The recovered Bai Liyun suddenly let out a bizarre and perverted laugh. He twisted and stretched his newly formed body, as if it felt very comfortable. This stimulating sensation... it was wonderful!
However, seeing his demonic blade shattered into countless fragments, a flash of dissatisfaction and anger crossed his face. He raised a hand, and in an instant, the world's demonic nature boiled over. Infinite demonic essence poured into the blade, using a unique power to fuse the fragments into a single whole once more.
Even more startling, the fused blade was covered in countless hairline fractures, as if it would shatter at the slightest touch. Yet with a gentle movement, it sliced a massive rift through the world. Its power was several levels higher than before!
Under Bai Liyun's mental control, the demonic blade continuously shattered and fused, shattered and fused! Its shape and size shifted constantly. Each fragment acted like a precision-engineered piece that could form any shape he desired.
At this moment, Bai Liyun seemed to have found a fun toy... but before he could play with it for long, the crocodile's head clamped down on him again. An incredible, terrifying illusion swept through the heavens!
Under this horrific power, a vast section of the world was shattered. The earth was turned to dust. Infinite destructive force surged! Bai Liyun was once again destroyed by this power.
"Is he dead?"
After spending its strength to obliterate Bai Liyun, the crocodile's aura seemed somewhat withered. Clearly, that attack had cost it a great deal of energy. Yet it ignored its own exhaustion, releasing round after round of attacks, systematically wiping out everything in its vicinity.
It stared at its surroundings with extreme tension. It had no certainty that it could kill a True Demon cultivator in this state; it was simply unleashing every ounce of its power. The strength of a Saint-grade demon was indeed horrific; a vast expanse of the world and battlefield was reduced to absolute nothingness.
Yet even so, the crocodile was not at ease. It didn't have a shred of confidence. It did not want the foundations it had accumulated over countless years to perish here.
But things did not go as it wished. Within the area where the destructive force lingered, a single wisp of demonic nature suddenly flickered into light. It was like a flame in the dark. The moment it lit, it was like a spark setting a prairie ablaze; countless wisps of demonic nature ignited within the destruction. Like fish returning to water, they treated the destructive force as fuel, growing even brighter.
The lighting of these wisps caused darkness to fill the crocodile's heart.
'I refuse to accept this!' it screamed internally.
But no one answered its refusal. The only response was a horrific demonic blade formed from countless fragments, carrying an exotic demonic nature as it hacked down!
Under this horrific strike, several cracks actually appeared on the crocodile's blood-red shell! Those few cracks made the crocodile even more terrified because... Bai Liyun's attack had grown stronger!
With its defense, it should have been able to easily withstand the attacks of a late-stage Unity cultivator. In the entire Demon Realm, there were very few Saint-grade demons with a higher defense than its own. Though its wounds could recover, it knew it was all in vain.
What was despair? Despair was knowing everything, having the power to resist, yet being unable to change the outcome—only able to watch oneself walk toward death. This was a feeling the crocodile had never experienced before, for in the past, it was the one who inflicted despair on others! With its horrific defense and ultimate attack, who could survive its grasp?
But now, the roles had reversed!
The horrific attacks that followed proved that the crocodile's guess was correct. Reborn from silence, Bai Liyun became even more frenzied and uninhibited. Every gesture displayed the essence of the True Demon State; every move gave birth to demonic nature in the world.
In this state, a fierce battle unfolded! The heavens collapsed, and mountains were reduced to nothingness. The battle between the two destroyed countless places, fighting until the sun and moon grew dark and everything in sight was a void!
The crocodile's wounds recovered and were destroyed, destroyed and recovered. By the end, its body was covered in its own flesh and blood, its entire frame deformed into a collection of irregular fragments. Even its snake head was twisted out of shape...
In contrast, Bai Liyun grew stronger as he fought. Every blade-strike was more lethal than the last. The only price was that his own autonomy was growing lower and lower.
The day his autonomy hit zero would be the day he vanished forever, becoming nourishment for the laws of the Great Dao. Even the crocodile could sense the fluctuating strength of Bai Liyun's consciousness; clearly, he was putting up a final struggle.
'It seems that maintaining one's demonic nature within a primordial battlefield is a difficult task. Is he reaching his limit? It seems the Unity stage is still a bit too weak, after all...'
Sensing Bai Liyun's state, a flash of schadenfreude crossed the crocodile's heart.
'Why bother? As a practitioner of the True Demon Realm, no one could kill you if you were willing to hide. Why not just live well? You could have even chosen to join another cultivation world...'
But soon, a sense of sorrow rose in its heart, for while Bai Liyun's autonomy was weakening, it seemed he would still be able to kill it before he vanished.
Bai Liyun responded to the crocodile's thought with an unprecedented Heaven-Cleaving Demonic Blade. One of the blade's fragments bypassed the crocodile's strongest defense and gathered at its various weak points.
As the power of the blade erupted, the crocodile's massive, deformed body was instantly dismantled.
An unknown amount of time passed, and countless mountains and lands were destroyed. Finally, the battle ended. From the region of infinite destructive storms walked a figure carrying a shattered demonic blade. In the wake of the destruction, only a pile of shriveled fragments remained.
However, after stepping out of the zone, the figure suddenly paused, as if not knowing where to go. His body became even more illusory. Invisible Dao-shackles bound his body, suppressing his autonomous consciousness. Under the pull of this power, his form began to slowly dissipate.
If this continued, Bai Liyun would soon dissolve into the Dao and vanish.
"No!"
Seeing himself on the verge of dissolution, a savage yet incredibly determined face emerged from one of the fragments of the demonic blade on his back! As that face appeared, more faces emerged from other fragments!
Soon, the entire blade was covered in a dense layer of faces. Those countless faces held the memories of Bai Liyun's life, his insights into the Dao, and his lifelong obsession with demonic cultivation and blade-craft.
This was his final struggle, and his gamble against the Great Dao.
He would use himself as bait to merge with the power of the Great Dao's laws, borrowing the strength of an entire world to arm himself. If he lost, his entire Dao-fruit would be devoured by the laws; he would lose his chance at reincarnation and be damned forever!
If he won, he would slaughter countless Saint-grade demons and secure a critical victory for the Star-Sea World... before dissolving into the Dao and vanishing.
There was also a sliver of a chance—a minuscule hope—that he might attain the Dao, devouring and controlling the laws he had merged with. Then, his cultivation and insights would skyrocket, turning him into a world-shattering True Demon cultivator. But from his current state, that was clearly a luxury. He had only slain a few Saint-grade demons, yet he was already reaching his limit.
The battle with the Black Tortoise Demonic Crocodile in particular had destroyed his body too many times. With every destruction, his autonomy faded a bit more.
After that battle, he was forced to use the contingency he had hidden within the demonic blade. This blade had accompanied him since the day he slew his enemies and stepped onto the path of cultivation; it had witnessed all his battles and hardships, recording his every memory. Thus, he had fused his most critical true spirit and demonic nature into it, solely to cut the Dao-shackles at the moment he was about to be swallowed.
But even Bai Liyun didn't know how many times he could manage such an act.
The moment the dense faces appeared on the blade, a burst of invisible demonic nature erupted. The blade disintegrated into countless shards that hacked at the Dao-shackles. Under those shards, the shackles binding his body were shattered. His dissipating form solidified once more.
Once it was done, the faces on the blade fell silent and vanished.
Freed from the shackles, Bai Liyun seemed to return to his previous state, continuing to wander the battlefield. The price of this act was a massive loss in the blade's spirituality.
One battle ended, and another began almost immediately.
As the Saint-grade demons he encountered grew stronger and he began to face multiple demons at once, the difficulty of the battles increased. Amidst continuous destruction and death, his autonomy faded further, and the Dao-shackles on his body grew more numerous. Every blade-strike grew stronger, and his movements became faster, but he was becoming mechanical. Gradually, the fluid individuality of Bai Liyun was lost.
Yet the results were horrific. One Saint-grade demon after another died at his hands, their essences swallowed whole by the laws of the Great Dao. By the end, nearly half of the Saint-grade demons in the entire sector had perished!
This horrific death rate terrified the remaining demons, causing them to huddle together. But they didn't know that Bai Liyun had reached his limit. With his last blade-strike, he failed to sever the Dao-shackles.
'Have I lost?' a final sigh echoed from the fragments of the demonic blade.
Bai Liyun's face appeared on the shards, filled with regret as he looked at the immovable Dao-shackles. How could the power of heaven and earth be borrowed so easily?
But being able to slaughter so many Saint-grade demons... he should be proud. The only pity was that he had failed to protect the world node of this sector, and he hadn't destroyed the enemy's node either.
So what if he was a True Demon practitioner, rare throughout history? In the end, he could not defeat the power of the Great Dao's laws.
In this moment, Bai Liyun finally felt the vastness of heaven and earth. It was not something human strength could easily shake.
'Star-Sea World... Old Meng... Lord Star-Emperor... I am sorry! I couldn't turn the tide in the end.'
'Lord Star-Emperor, you cannot lose! Let me use my entire Dao-fruit to give you one final push!'
With this last sigh, a bizarre smile appeared on Bai Liyun's face. To swallow him would not be that easy!
Immediately after, he erupted with his final mental strength, transforming into a True Demon to control his physical body before instantly sacrificing his entire existence!
As the power of sacrifice unfolded, a demonic blade shattered the void with peerless power, merging into Qi Ping's Dao of All Living Things!