Chapter 1982
Tianming"s power while he was on the sun mainly came from his Omnisentient Threads, which allowed him to go toe-to-toe with a sovereign like Empress Ying. Had he been far away from the sun, there was no way he would be able to match up even with his lifebound beasts and totems combined.
The terrifying specters were all covered in lifeless white flames that emphasized their savagery, yet, Tianming"s expression didn"t change in the slightest. He gripped the Grand-Orient Sword with both hands, the hexagonal scales on his black arm glinting brightly as it applied the power of his Fiendsky Arm to the sword. "The power of the people has come to my aid! I’ll exterminate these demonic specter pests and bring peace back to the sun!" Ever since he had stepped on the path to rulers.h.i.+p, he hadn’t been fighting alone. More than twenty billion of the fifty billion threads were connected to divine wills, and the remaining heavenly wills were nothing to scoff at, either. The fighting spirit that flared at the thought of protecting their homes was all gathered on his person, and he had two sacrosuns, lifebound beasts, totems, and divine wonders on top of that.
The power from his Imperial Will congregated around the sword; there probably wasn"t a better weapon to channel it. Even in its incomplete form, it was able to take the combined power of the Omnisentient Threads. Only a sliver of that power actually came from Tianming. The sword glowed bright gold and black, blending together with the imperial star of the pandemonium sacrosun to form a domain that pushed back against the empress" lifeless white flames. The clas.h.i.+ng forces rampaged in the hall of bones.
"Your power looks rather unstable. It doesn"t belong to you, does it?" Empress Ying said, her fangs glinting as she spoke. Even her voice sounded harsh after her transformation.
"Whether it belongs to me isn"t important so long as I can use it to end you." Tianming"s form was completely swallowed up by the light of the imperial star. Boundless power coursed through his body as the seven types of grade-eight divine hazard sword ki within him formed a sword formation around him.
The phoenix spread its wings, the black cat hid in the shadows, the dragon stood at the forefront, the tree took root behind, and countless bugs spread out all over the place. Any specter that fought Tianming alone was bound to be ganged up upon. Tianming was the strongest he had ever been, bearing the shared desire of all that resonated with him to fight the specter invaders to the death. "Die!"
Tianming"s lifebound beasts seemed completely transformed by the pandemonium sacrosun, especially the three sovereign beasts. Empress Ying felt boundless flames score the top of her head from time to time, coupled with lightning bolts that rained down on her. In terms of abilities, Meow Meow still reigned supreme. Its bombardment seemed boundless and without end. The Triworld Afterlife Halls, Misty and Soulchasing h.e.l.lthunders, and Myriad Thundernet were all infused with the power of the Genesis Bolt, forming a dense web of lightning that filled the entire hall. Ying Huo"s flaming abilities blended in with the lightning bolts and weren"t as eye catching, but its Blazebane-enhanced Skyscorch Featherblast was truly terrifying, despite being hard to detect in the thunderous maelstrom.
"Mere child"s play," Empress Ying said, snorting a laugh. There were more than eight thousand stars in her eyes, as was befitting of a sovereign like her. While Tianming had killed a couple sovereigns before, only Sanctquility and Redforge had died by his own hand. The other two had perished during the destruction of their divine astrals.h.i.+p"s nova source core, so he’d obtained nothing but their cultivation resources. The fact that Empress Ying had so many stars meant that her abilities were nothing to scoff at.
Even more lifeless white flame came pouring out of her, forming a flaming tornado of crazy proportions as she came charging toward him like lightning. Specters were built for conflict, being more agile than most lifebound beasts—especially in close combat. At times, they were able to overwhelm beastmasters and totemancers despite fighting alone, and the same was the case with Empress Ying. Her starvorian tornado ability easily helped pave a path through Meow Meow"s lightning as she put Tianming in her sights.
He immediately knew that she would be hard to deal with. Lan Huang went charging toward her with its Primordial Wheel, the myriad swords growing out of its body smas.h.i.+ng the skulls in the hall before it collided with the tornado of lifeless white flame. It looked like a human trying to stop the charge of a rhinoceros, yet Lan Huang ended up being the one sent flying. The flaming tornado stripped its dragon scales off one after another in a bout of impactful, beautiful violence.
Xian Xian"s vines and roots quickly made a coc.o.o.n around the tornado while it launched Bloodrain Swords and Demise Greenloti right beside it. At the same time, Yin Chen"s bladed-wing b.u.t.terflies were on full a.s.sault alongside metallic scorpions and spiders.
All of that rained down on the empress, yet it took no more than a moment for her to come bursting out of the mess of plant and bug, tearing apart vines and roots and smas.h.i.+ng many of Yin Chen"s bodies. She was in a completely different league from Sovereigns Starfeather and Greenvoid. Even with the power of the Omnisentient Threads, Tianming"s lifebound beasts were still unable to stand up against her.
"You"ll never be able to escape me, brat. Be a good boy and you"ll get a treat. Bad boys get severely punished." Even though her body was huge, compared to Tianming, it didn"t hamper her speed and agility at all. Her b.e.s.t.i.a.l instincts seemed to enhance her intensity. Given the way she had sent Lan Huang flying, there was no doubt of her sheer power.
She wielded a tombstone-shaped s.h.i.+eld and a long spear. Tianming couldn"t quite get a good visual of the artifacts, thanks to all of the flames, but he figured that they were likely to be grade-nine divine artifacts. Considering how much mightier Skywolf was than the sun, it wasn"t surprising that they had deep pockets. Spear and s.h.i.+eld in hand, Empress Ying used battle arts that matched her abilities. The fierce specter embodied a completely different aspect of femininity, unlike the motherly and gentle aspect that Tianming was familiar with.
"Those useless lifebound beasts and sword totems can"t possibly compare to specters, who concentrate all our strengths into our bodies. We forge ourselves into the perfect whole, unlike rabble like you." Her words represented a core faith of all specters. It was both their belief and their way of life.
She isn’t wrong. Combining powers into one body is incredibly potent, but it’d be a mistake for her to think that my Primordial Chaos Beasts and decapath era G.o.dswords are nothing more than a messy rabble. Tianming didn"t feel the need to tell her that, however. The attacks he had launched before were merely probing ones, and now he wanted to feel out her attack pattern, a plan of which his lifebound beasts were fully aware.
"Charge!" Tianming led the way and slashed his sword, sending boundless divine light surging toward the empress. The decapath era G.o.dswords a.s.sembled into a sword formation, centering around the Grand-Orient Sword as they unleashed powers unique to the character of each totem to form a tidal wave of swords. The war cries of fifty billion people could be heard in the swing!
"Eh?" Empress Ying narrowed her eyes, sensing a different quality to the youth when he attacked. It was the power of the people, a congregation of countless wills that made his gaze capable of shaking souls! She felt the wrath of billions of people at once.