"It hurts…"
This was the main thought Xu Hui had at the moment her body was flung away. When she fell on the ground, she forced herself to stand up and remain on her feet. Her face was pale, though, and she coughed up a large mouthful of blood. Her body was covered in injuries, and she looked a b.l.o.o.d.y mess, as if she could not remain steady for much longer.
She had already done her best. The level of cultivation of the person with the bow was about the same as hers, which forced her to use the Art of Lake of Phoenix. She had not mastered this Art, and every single time she used it, she would have to suffer repercussions.
But the might from that Art was definitely not something ordinary. The bow in the person"s hand had already landed in the distance. His right arm was gone, and seventeen wounds that penetrated his body had appeared on his chest.
His face was pale. He coughed up blood as well, and his body, which was thousands of feet tall, started shrinking rapidly. Only when he was a hundred feet tall did he manage to control his injuries. He glared at Xu Hui and let out a low roar.
As he did so, the sand around him gathered together to stop his blood from flowing out. It also gathered on his right arm to form a new limb. Once it appeared, he seized the air in the direction of the bow, and it swiftly flew over at him. As sand continued gathering on his body, he became thousands of feet tall once more.
He stood there as if he had never been injured before. The sand also gathered above his head to form a moon!
It was a moon formed of sand!
For the first time, despair appeared in Xu Hui"s eyes. She staggered backwards, but just as she was about to retreat, she suddenly bent her back, and out of nowhere, her body was sent to the ground. She crashed into the sand with a bang.
A semi-transparent, short person appeared in the spot where Xu Hui had previously stood and pulled back the punch he had just thrown. The short person"s figure might be indistinct, but anyone who saw him could tell that he was an old man. He… was the old man whose physical body was on the hundred thousand feet statue in the distance.
This current existence of his was an illusory body formed by his divine ability.
The old man might be short, but the moment he appeared, the person with the bow that was thousands of feet tall immediately knelt down to wors.h.i.+p him. The sand giants that were tens of thousands of feet tall in the area also knelt down and wors.h.i.+ped him.
The tens of thousands of Sand Earthlings on the round barrier also prostrated themselves on the barrier with excitement, exhilaration, and fervent fanaticism.
Xu Hui struggled up from the ground, but before she could do anything, the sand around her closed in and turned into four chains that fastened themselves to her limbs. They lifted her up and hung her in the air.
The old man with the illusory body lifted his right hand, and a sand blade appeared in his hand. He grabbed that blade and walked slowly to Xu Hui. The cries of joy from the Sand Earthlings around him grew stronger when he did that. Voices rose and fell, as if they were chanting words of some ritual.
Xu Hui bit the bottom of her lip. Her cultivation base had completely scattered due to the old man"s punch just then. A seal had also been placed in her to prevent her from self-destructing.
She looked at the sky quietly, and pictures from her past flashed before her eyes. She was born in a normal family, but when she was young, she was taken away by Phoenix Sect. Because of that, her parents" appearances had already become indistinct, and she could no longer remember them clearly.
She had returned to her hometown once, but that place had already turned to dust in the pa.s.sage of time. Her family had become old and pa.s.sed away a long time ago, and all traces of them had disappeared long ago.
Yet at this moment, the pictures before her eyes suddenly became much clearer. She saw her parents and her family…
Those pictures continued one after another, and a gentle smile blossomed on Xu Hui"s lips. She gradually closed her eyes.
"This is my life… From the moment I became a disciple of Phoenix Sect, my fate was set in stone… I had to live my whole life for a direct descendant of Morning Dao Sect.
"This was my life… but now, I can consider myself to be free from it." Xu Hui sighed softly in her heart.
When she closed her eyes and waited for death, a loud noise shot up from the barrier"s outer side. Along with it came the panicked cries of tens of thousands of Sand Earthlings.
There were also furious roars from the dozen something sand giants and a cold harrumph from the illusory old man.
Because of all of this, Xu Hui who had already given up on hope, attempted to open her eyes, and her eyelashes fluttered. However, her body had lost all strength, and she even lacked the power to open her eyes.
She could open them only a small crack, and through her eyelashes and blurriness, she saw a familiar figure ramming his fist against the barrier as he stood in the distance, right outside the barrier.
"It"s him…" Xu Hui mumbled in her heart. "He should not have come. With his personality, he should have regarded everything with his own personal interests in mind…
"So why… is he here..?
"When the Waves of Tears attacked us, he returned. Now, he also came back. Is he… really Dao Kong..? Can a person really change so quickly..? But no matter who you are, whether you are Dao Kong or someone else, thank you…"
Xu Hui"s heart was calm. As she mumbled in her heart, she was uttering words that only her soul could hear.
Su Ming rammed his fist against the barrier again, and violent sounds rang in all directions. A powerful rebound came from the barrier, causing Su Ming to stagger a few steps back.
When he lifted his head, he saw Xu Hui inside, her limbs shackled by sand chains. He saw that her eyes had already fallen shut, and her presence was like a barely discernible thread.
At the same time, he saw the Sand Earthlings and the dozen something Malicious Sand Spirits, along with the person with the bow reaching up to thousands of feet tall and the illusory old man.
The mighty pressure of Lunar Kalpa Realm from the person with the bow, the power of Solar Kalpa Realm from the illusory old man, and the dozen something sand giants with the power of the later stage of World Plane Realm caused Su Ming"s pupils to shrink.
This was not something he could stand against with his current power. The dozen something sand giants were still manageable, but the person with the bow alone was already a great threat to Su Ming, let alone the illusory old man.
Su Ming remained calm. When he retreated, the dozen something sand giants in the barrier roared and took long strides forward. Their bodies could seep through the barrier, and they charged towards Su Ming.
As for the person with the bow, a scornful look appeared on his face. In his eyes, Su Ming, who was only in World Plane Realm, did not even possess the qualifications for him to use the bow. In fact, he was confident that he could reduce Su Ming to ashes with just one arrow.
Su Ming sighed in his heart. Xu Hui"s life was hanging on a thread, and with each second, her life was exposed to more danger. He did not have the leisure to think anymore, unless he chose not to save her, but since he decided to save this slightly silly girl, then exposure of his power was no longer part of his considerations.
"Oh well."
Su Ming shook his head and took a step forward. At the instant he did that, the power of Divine Essence rose swiftly in his body. Countless uneven runic symbols appeared on the Sacred Constellation Robe that had turned into sackcloth. At that instant, his power started rising.
He was so quick that in the blink of an eye, he was already on the verge of cras.h.i.+ng into a sand giant. That sand giant laughed ferociously and hurled a fist forward, but Su Ming did not even spare it a glance. In fact, he did not even bother dodging. He simply rushed forward.
With a bang, Su Ming crashed into the sand giant. At the instant they came into contact with each other, the ferocious smile on the malicious spirit turned into disbelief, and its right arm crumbled with a bang. Su Ming shot through the giant"s body, completely uninjured, then lifted his right hand and hurled a punch backwards.
With that one punch, the sand giant"s body trembled, and crumbled to pieces.
"Too weak."
Su Ming lifted his foot and took his second step. His level of cultivation had already risen to the later stage of World Plane Realm at that moment. This was due to the fusion between his physical power and his cultivation base, and it was the power that erupted from him after they synthesized with each other.
The two sand giants in front of him whipped up whirlwinds as they roared. Those whirlwinds swept up their bodies and instantly closed in on the incoming Su Ming. They crashed into each other in an instant.
Bang! Bang!
Two loud bangs shook the sky and earth, shocking all the Sand Earthlings when they looked over. Right before their eyes, the two sand giants shuddered and fell apart together as if a power they could not withstand had shattered their entire existences.
Su Ming did not stop moving and took his third step. At that moment, his rising power fused with his Divine Essence, and he obtained the power equivalent to those who had attained great completion in the later stage of World Plane Realm. With just one more step, he would step into Lunar Kalpa Realm.
This was Su Ming"s current limit, and it was also the strongest power he could muster, but that was just… if he did not use his Ecang clone!
With the next breath, when Su Ming took his fourth step forward and four sand giants appeared in front of him, a word that only he could hear came from his mouth.
"Ecang."
At the instant he said that, within Western Ring Nebula"s foreign land, which was located in Western Ring Nebula, a galaxy under the jurisdiction of the four Great True Worlds that was incredibly far away from Divine Essence Star Ocean and had Black Ink Planet situated in between them, Su Ming"s Ecang clone opened his eyes within the purple galaxy.
There was a purple tint to his eyes, and a matchless, mighty pressure erupted from his body with a bang.
At the instant Su Ming in the desert crashed into the four sand giants, his level of cultivation rose once again, and in a flash, he reached Lunar Kalpa Realm!
This did not mean that he had truly reached Lunar Kalpa Realm, because there was no moon around his body, but at that moment, the presence that came from his body gave off the feeling that… he was in Lunar Kalpa Realm!
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Four consecutive bangs shot up, and the four sand giants in front of Su Ming shattered. He took his fifth step and threw a punch against the barrier. It was just one punch, but the barrier instantly started trembling. Cracks spread out, and the barrier collapsed into pieces with a bang!
That punch was incredibly close to Solar Kalpa Realm, and it contained Divine Essence, so even though Xu Hui could not break the barrier, Su Ming could!
The expression of the person with the bow changed drastically, and disbelief appeared on his face. He saw how Su Ming continued to become stronger. With just five steps, he had managed to climb up from his initial level in World Plane Realm, which the man with the bow had scoffed at, straight up to Lunar Kalpa Realm. That last punch had also exuded a power that was incredibly close to Solar Kalpa Realm, and his heart trembled.
The illusory old man by the side also had a grim expression which had never appeared before on his face.
"Sir, who are you?!" the illusory old man instantly shouted out in a shrill voice.
"You can call me Dao Kong. I am… the husband-in-name of the woman beside you."