nashuaworldcup Chapter 534 - 502 Metamorphosis 1
Chapter 534 - 502 Metamorphosis 1
"That Spirit General.... actually died...!?"
In the distance, halfway up the mountain, the Celestial Maiden supported Dongfang Mu, whose blood had been stopped, along with a pale-faced Ran Xinyue, gazing far towards this direction.
At the moment they saw Sang Lan finally explode into a mass of black ash.
Their eyes widened, and they fell silent.
The Spirit General is invincible.
This truth had long been deeply engraved in their hearts.
Not only because of the Spirit General’s horrifying defense, but also due to the Great Descent of the Divine.
Even among Extreme Realm Grandmasters, it depends on their rank; those not highly ranked are equally powerless to resist.
Only those ranked at the very top could, in a substantial sense, truly confront a Spirit General.
Yet likewise, they didn’t prefer engaging Spirit Generals, as no one could kill them; immortals do not die, Spirit Generals are inexhaustible.
Especially the terrifying defensive body of a Spirit General, which ordinary people cannot remotely imagine its might.
Holding a magical weapon still required a tremendous effort to inflict any harm. And Extreme Realm Grandmasters would injure themselves internally with every release, naturally preferring not to engage them.
"Though the fight was tough... he indeed managed to kill a Spirit General once..." Dongfang Mu said, visibly complex.
He had lived long enough and seen plenty, naturally knowing what this meant.
The shell of the Spirit General, without magical weapons, is barely resistible.
Whether it’s attack or defense, even if he held a magical weapon, maximizing his release, at most he could only ensure his survival.
Once forced into the opponent’s Great Descent of the Divine, the eventual outcome would be inevitably fatal for him.
Now, that person used no magical weapon, purely relied on himself, and hammered a Spirit General to death...
"It seems... a new Extreme Realm has emerged..." he suddenly said.
"A new Extreme Realm?" The Celestial Maiden watched Zhang Rongfang from afar, feeling inexplicably like witnessing an era.
Being able to kill a Spirit General meant that the Human Immortal Temple genuinely ascended to the highest tier of the world.
From this moment on, Zhang Rongfang would no longer be a pawn to be manipulated at will on the chessboard of the world, but a player who could lay down his own piece.
This qualification is something countless people dream of but never obtain.
From this moment on, the Human Immortal Temple, due to Zhang Rongfang, was completely different...
Human Immortal, Human Immortal, becoming immortal as a human...
Ran Xinyue turned out to be the fastest to accept it. Before, she had witnessed Zhang Rongfang and Emperor Jiang soaring in a day and a month.
She was already numbed by the shock.
Though shocked again now, habit became natural, and she quickly returned to normal.
"Now that you mention it, it’s possible. This path of the Human Immortal might indeed be a kind of Extreme Realm. The side effect is blood absorption. But compared to other Extreme Realms, the side effects of the Human Immortal Extreme Realm are more concentrated and singular." She mused.
"...Let’s go, meet the new Grandmaster who is a prodigy!" Dongfang Mu coughed a few times and took the lead in moving forward.
The three of them approached together, soon noticed by Zhang Rongfang.
At that moment, his three arms quickly reverted to two, his body shrank, releasing a large amount of hot steam, returning to his normal state.
Seeing the approaching trio, Zhang Rongfang sighed deeply and went to meet them, with a bitter smile on his face.
"I truly did not expect, fighting such an inferior Spirit General would turn out so messy. Apologies for the unsightly sight you three have witnessed."
Although his body had recovered by then, losing so much vital blood and regenerating new arms, having sustained so many injuries, he was very weak.
These were manageable, needing only more blood to recover. The key was still his spirit.
Zhang Rongfang could feel that the fight had greatly diminished his spirit. He felt faint fatigue and an urge to rest.
This type of mental damage, who knows how long it will take to heal.
If the fight happened again, it truly might not trigger another breakthrough, overcoming Sang Lan’s pressure from the Descent of the God.
At this time the trio approached and were about to open their mouths in congratulation, but upon hearing Zhang Rongfang’s remark, Dongfang Mu’s smiling face froze.
Those words... quite adept. Vaguely reminiscent of the Confucian style...
Such an existence as the Spirit General, outside, is practically a peerless strongman.
Apart from the most elite few in major forces, who else could deal with them?
Basically, before a Spirit General moves, they’ll probe around the small number of threatening areas and then avoid them.
The rest is free reign to dominate the world, unrivaled.
And now this battle, fearing that in the future, the Human Immortal Temple area might be elevated to the level to be avoided.
For such an event that suffices to stir the world, proclaim glory across the globe, this one actually... disliked himself for fighting too messily??
"Regardless, thank you, Temple Master, for coming to the rescue, or else this old life of mine might’ve ended here..." Dongfang Mu, never one to lose his composure, exhibited impeccable expression management.
"You’re too kind, old man. It was merely an opportune meeting upon discovering the Celestial Maiden and Grandmaster Ran here, being old friends, naturally lending a hand." Zhang Rongfang had fully restored by then, the blood lost with Yin Rainbow had been recreated and replenished.
"Dare I inquire, old man, are you also in the Extreme Realm?" Zhang Rongfang was quite curious about this.
Being able to fight a Spirit General and a Grandmaster for so long before his arrival, and even overcoming a Grandmaster loyal to the Spirit Court.
Such strength was impressive in the elderly before him.
Having encountered many Extremes, having witnessed many oddities, Zhang Rongfang held good impressions of this elder in front of him.
"As for Extreme Realm... one could say yes and no." Dongfang Mu nodded first, then shook his head.
"How do you mean?" Zhang Rongfang, Celestial Maiden, Ran Xinyue, all found their curiosity piqued by his words.
Regarding Confucianism, a massive force once buried in history, they were all curious.
It should be known that Confucianism of old could be said to be the faith in the hearts of scholars worldwide.
The strength of the force was akin to today’s amalgamated Buddhism and Daoism.
Yet unexpectedly, after Chen Junchen was defeated by the Imperial Tutor, it quickly fell into decline, soon suppressed, and eradicated by the Spirit Court.
Today it can only be degraded to the lower nine streams, alongside prostitution. Thus one sees the Spirit Court’s hate and wariness toward Confucianism.
"In reality, the path practiced by our Confucianism predates the Extreme Realm. Back when we flourished and were at our peak, where was the talk of the Extreme Realm?" Dongfang Mu coughed a few more times.
"Since we’ve met by fate, why don’t we find a place to have a detailed chat first?"
"I was thinking the same." Zhang Rongfang nodded.
All of them were quite injured, even the Celestial Maiden appeared somewhat listless at this moment. This was a natural phenomenon after the intense concentration earlier, immediately followed by the oppression from the Spirit General and the Grandmaster, leading to a sudden relaxation.
*
*
*
At the instant Sang Lan was defeated.
A ripple of invisible energy rapidly expanded outward from the area where he turned to black ash and vanished.
An invisible signal, traveling at a speed unimaginable to ordinary people, crossed thousands of kilometers, with a diameter of over ten thousand kilometers, and in the blink of an eye, it covered all the temples, Daoist temples, monasteries, etc., of the Great Spirit.
Every place where gods and Buddhas were worshipped, at that moment, subtly fed back a new signal along with the spread of that invisible signal.
’Forbidden.’
’Forbidden.’
’Forbidden.’
’Forbidden.’
One divine decree after another fell like raindrops into the minds of the priests, practitioners, and monks praying before the statues.
In the Maitreya Hall of the West Sect True Buddha Temple.
A Buddhist bead in the grandmaster’s hand suddenly shattered with force, turning into countless specks of wood debris flying around.
"Sang Lan...." His round face instantly scrunched into a frown.
Putting down the Buddhist beads, he took out a silver-blue token from his waist.
The token was exquisitely ornate, carved with numerous patterns of flying birds, insects, and fish, with a vague image of a water dragon in the center.
This was the protective spiritual token belonging to Sang Lan’s sect, containing a Spiritual Line from Sang Lan’s body.
Under normal circumstances, because this token had a Spirit General’s spiritual line, it would emit a faint silver glow, appearing quite divine.
But now, the surface of the token was dull, without its previous luster. It looked like an artifact that had aged for centuries, ugly and corrupt.
"He’s actually dead?" The divine light in the grandmaster’s small eyes gradually became grave and serious.
"Who did it? The Inverse Society? Zhenyi? The Great Dao? Or.... the hidden power of the Five Kings?"
As for the others, he didn’t believe anyone could kill Sang Lan.
Even the Earth Mother walkers worshiped by the noble Spirit People could only match Sang Lan at most.
These divine and Buddha walkers, one per family, were mostly fraudulent Spirit Generals like Sang Lan.
They relied entirely on the gods and Buddhas to elevate themselves, and then they indulged in luxury every day, looking down on all beings from a lofty position, enjoying the wealth and glory provided by countless people, treating human lives as cheap as grass.
Such people could only bully those below the Spirit General level, while any master on the same level could easily defeat them.
Although the grandmaster also disdained those like Sang Lan. But... this time, it’s different...
A trickle of invisible information seeped into his mind from an unknown direction.
This abrupt, jarring message was the usual way divine decrees appeared.
The grandmaster was already used to it.
He quickly scanned through it, and his expression became even more solemn.
"Forbidden... Human Immortal Temple... The Temple Master could actually kill Sang Lan head-on!?"
From the divine decree, Sang Lan did not die from a similar spiritual line devouring him; his spiritual line was now entirely shattered and partially dissipated!
This dissipation represents permanent loss!
So in the end, the God of Cold Heaven behind him decisively abandoned the Great Descent of the Divine, self-destructing its body, to prevent more Spirit General spiritual lines from being eroded and permanently lost.
"It truly is forbidden!!" A chill arose in the grandmaster’s heart as well.
The last time this was accomplished, it was by Confucianism.
Confucius did not speak of strange forces.
Back then, Confucianism advocated disbelief in gods and Buddhas, which once led to a significant and permanent reduction in the number of sectarian spiritual lines.
Only after multiple great wars was Confucianism completely suppressed and eradicated.
How many years has Confucianism been gone, and now a new Human Immortal Temple has emerged??
"This world... truly, great chaos is approaching..." A growing sense of foreboding filled the grandmaster’s heart.
Every time chaos arises, a demon appears on the river to disrupt the nation, bringing disaster to the world.
The Confucianism of the past was like this, and now, this path of the Human Immortal is too.
"Someone!" He suddenly shouted in a sharp voice.
"Yes!" A novice monk quickly entered.
"Notify the Yaksha Hall that Yuan Feng is dead; the Grandmaster behind can worship the gods to fill the vacancy." The grandmaster said calmly.
"Um...." The novice monk stood in place, looking a bit troubled and unmoving.
"What? Don’t you understand what I’m saying!?" The grandmaster’s eyes turned cold as he looked at him.
The novice monk shivered all over.
"No, abbot! Just yesterday, the Yaksha Hall and the Asura Hall both had grandmasters who left overnight. Now.... now...."
A sense of unease suddenly arose in the grandmaster’s heart.
"Speak!"
"Yes!! Now, only one Grandmaster candidate is left in the two halls... the other three... have all run away!" The novice monk was on the verge of tears, quickly explaining everything in one breath.