Shangguan Zhi denied any connection to Jiang Yuanchi with stern righteousness.
According to him, Jiang Yuanchi had long since stopped being the sectmaster of the Shadow Society. He listed proofs including the fact that Jiang Yuanchi had blown up even the Shadow Society’s ancient stars.h.i.+ps in the Realm of Fragmentary Star.
After all, no one had witnessed how respectful and loyal he had been to Jiang Yuanchi when facing him in private.
Yan Bin from the Domain of Red Sunglow found this laughable. With a derisive smile, he said, “You deny any connection with Jiang Yuanchi? I distinctly remember you being there to support them when Jiang Yuanchi, You Qimiao, and Luo Wanxiang dove into the Seven Stars Realm Sea.”
“That’s right!” Gou Junhao chimed in. “Why didn’t you say that he no longer had any connection with the Shadow Society back then?”
The changes in the Seven Stars Realm Sea had attracted the attention of experts from across the human world. Many had witnessed what had happened there. Therefore, Shangguan Zhi couldn’t deny that.
“That was before,” Shangguan Zhi said with a stern face. Then, he waved his hand and added, “If any of you want to have a taste of my sect’s Wall of Shadows, then I’ll be happy to oblige.”
“Shadow Stele!”
As soon as Shangguang Zhi called out, the stone stele in the Shadow Palace shot straight up from under a sea of clouds and stopped behind Shangguan Zhi, giving rise to a loud whoosh.
Then, as numerous shadow abominations swarmed out of the Wall of Shadows and into it, the stone stele that Shangguan Zhi referred to as the Shadow Stele expanded at an alarming rate.
In merely ten breaths of time, it became a thousand times larger than its original size.
Floating underneath the stone stele, Shangguan Zhi looked like an insect. Eyes s.h.i.+ning with cold, vicious light, he said, “Nie Tian, I heard that you killed Grand Monarch Chaos Demon and refined his body in the Domain of Forbidden Heaven. I’ve got to say that was very impressive. I certainly didn’t expect that. However, don’t you naively think you’re invincible now.”
WHOOs.h.!.+
The Shadow Stele flew forward.
Like a magnificent mountain peak, it flew towards Nie Tian with an unstoppable momentum. Countless shadow abominations could be seen swimming on its surface like shoals of fish.
FIZZ! FIZZ!
A peculiar emerald green light rose from the Shadow Stele and descended towards Nie Tian like a dome.
“Corrosive...” Nie Tian’s expression flickered as he sensed Gupi’s acidic and corrosive aura from the emerald green light.
He was immediately convinced that the Shadow Society’s so-called shadow abominations had been vested with power by Gupi, which was why they carried terrifying power so similar to Gupi’s.
“What’s on earth is the relations.h.i.+p between Jiang Yuanchi and Gupi? Does he have control over Gupi, or do they have some sort of agreement? It’s hard to believe it actually expended its own power to empower those shadow abominations and strengthen the Wall of Shadows.”
With these questions in mind, he raised his hand and beckoned for the others to back away.
Pei Qiqi, Dong Li, Mo Qianfan, and the others had sensed danger upon detecting Gupi’s peculiar aura. They were already backing away.
“So they carry Gupi’s power,” Nie Tian said with a derisive snort. “Even Gupi itself didn’t scare me outside the Realm of Fragmentary Star, not to mention that these are merely a bunch of abominations that carry a bit of its aura.”
RUMBLE!
His flame domain, which connected to the Flame Land, manifested in an instant. A mysterious flame spell formation could be seen in it, enveloped in raging flames.
All of the Qi warriors from different human domains that practiced fire incantations gasped.
It didn’t matter whether they were at the Void domain or the Saint domain, they all somehow felt insecure and uneasy.
This peculiar feeling originated from their flame domains.
“This is weird. Why do I feel as if Nie Tian’s flame domain can absorb mine? This doesn’t make sense. He’s only entered the Saint domain recently, hasn’t he?”
“The strange aura coming from Nie Tian’s flame domain is making me very uncomfortable.”
“It’s as if I was pa.s.sing through the dead realms in the Domain of Flame’s End, and my saint domain could perish at any moment and disperse into that part of the starry river.”
“I have a strange feeling that I’m facing the origin of fire.”
Everyone who practiced flame power wondered while paying close attention to Nie Tian.
They soon saw that as the dome of emerald green light fell towards Nie Tian, it was ignited by his flame domain and started burning furiously, giving rise to crackling sounds.
Nie Tian looked up at the shadow abominations swimming on the surface of the stone stele. “They are powerful spirits vested with Jiang Yuanchi’s shadow power and Gupi’s toxic power.”
After pondering for a brief moment, he called out, “Come on out. Time to test their strength.”
WHOOs.h.!.+ WHOOs.h.!.+ WHOOs.h.!.+
The five evil G.o.ds flew out one after another.
Having gathered more soul fragments from the Nether River branch in that mysterious place, they had become even mightier than before. Each and every one of them was thousands of meters tall, and looked every bit as awe-inspiring as the so-called Shadow Stele.
RUMBLE!
Five negative emotions, hatred, fear, despair, rage, and bloodl.u.s.t, burst forth like seas, causing stirs in the souls of almost every powerful expert present.
Even the G.o.d domain experts felt apprehensive merely by staring at them from afar.
FIZZ!
With a casual swing of its arm that looked like a sharp bone blade, the evil G.o.d of fear unleashed a heaven-tearing, earth-shredding aura, which made Shangguan Zhi’s heart jolt.
As the evil G.o.d of bloodl.u.s.t stared into his eyes, the desire to spill blood in the depths of his heart seemed to be instantly ignited.
At the same time, the evil G.o.d of despair and the evil G.o.d of rage pounced towards him from his flanks, soul-drowning despair and rage spreading in an overwhelming manner.
Shangguan Zhi broke almost immediately.
“Ahh!”
With a sharp scream, he morphed into a streak of light that flew through the Wall of Shadows and back into the Realm of Looming Shadow.
Each and every evil G.o.d exuded an aura as mighty as that of an early tenth grade Phantasm grand monarch.
How could he not cower when the five of them attacked him together?
After all, he was only at the early G.o.d domain.
Only as he fled did he realize why Nie Tian could kill Grand Monarch Chaos Demon of the Demons so easily.
He had originally a.s.sumed that Pei Qiqi, Dong Li, and Mo Qianfan had contributed to Grand Monarch Chaos Demon’s death.
However, the moment the five evil G.o.ds had pounced towards him, he had realized that these peculiar puppets of Nie Tian’s alone were powerful enough to tear that newly-made Demon grand monarch to shreds.
Therefore, he could only escape and think of other plans.
After he left, the Shadow Stele stood alone in the deep starry river. Countless shadow abominations started flas.h.i.+ng about like spiders spinning a web of light, which gradually morphed into a gruesome symbol.
“Shadow. Silence.”
Ancient chanting seemed to echo from within the stone stele.
It didn’t matter whether it was Nie Tian or the observers in the distance. They all heard the two words echo in their ears, not very loudly, but strangely clearly.
WHOOs.h.!.+
The shadow abominations in the stone stele suddenly swarmed out and swirled towards the five evil G.o.ds.
The evil G.o.ds’ arms, backs, and legs, which had many sharp bone thorns growing out of them, seemed to be instantly wrapped in extremely strong and sticky rubber, as every movement had become laborious and hard.
The worst part was that cyan smoke started rising from the evil G.o.ds.
That was a sign of their bodies being corroded by the acidic toxins.
Having observed for a while, Mo Qianfan from the Heavenly Thunder Sect couldn’t help but say, “Such strange shadow abominations... Like the fire element sect’s Four Manifestations Flame Soul Cauldron, this Shadow Stele is also an Immortal grade divine tool that protects a realm. It’s just that Shangguan Zhi doesn’t practice the shadow incantations that the Shadow Society is known for. Therefore, he can’t display the true might of the Shadow Stele.”
With these words, he turned to Dong Li and Pei Qiqi, who were next to him, and added, “If it were controlled by Jiang Yuanchi close to the Wall of Shadows, the Shadow Stele might display such might that even late tenth grade grand monarchs and late G.o.d domain experts wouldn’t be able to get anywhere near him.”
The girls nodded, fully convinced.
Their current cultivation bases, strength, and knowledge allowed them to see through the wonders of the Shadow Stele.
Seeing that even the evil G.o.ds were having such difficulty handling the shadow abominations, Dong Li was prepared to release her dark power and see if she could suppress the Shadow Stele.
Nie Tian gradually lost his patience. “I could confine even Gupi’s toxic essence. You’re nothing in comparison.”
At this point, he had noticed that it wasn’t shadow power that was giving the evil G.o.ds a hard time, it was the terrifying toxic power that Gupi had vested these shadow abominations with.
“Illusory Ancient Talisman.”
With a cold snort, he made hand seals facing the five evil G.o.ds.
However, before a talisman could form, the numerous sticky shadow abominations that had wrapped around the five evil G.o.ds sensed danger.
WHOOs.h.!.+
They shrank back into the Shadow Stele like intelligent beings.
Then, the stone stele slowly returned to the Wall of Shadows. As soon as it fell into the realm barrier, the shadow abominations that had come from the Wall of Shadows returned to it.
“Since attacking with the Shadow Stele and the shadow abominations didn’t achieve good results, we’ll have to put all of our strength in our defense.” Shangguan Zhi’s dark, cold voice echoed remotely from behind the realm barrier that protected the Realm of Looming Shadow.