The saintly might of a Nine-Step Saint King was stirring up a storm as far as hundreds of miles away.
Dark clouds had swollen in the sky, blocking out the sun.
On Earth, the wind was howling like a horror beast, Saint Qi of Heaven and Earth seemingly boiling.
“Hand of Brilliance!”
Venerable Hiddenheart’s sole arm was a riot of color. As he struck out with his hand, shock waves formed in front of his palm and moved down toward Zhang Ruochen below.
Hand of Brilliance was Jingmiao-class, intermediate Saint technique. When used together with Precepts of the Palm, it was incredibly powerful.
Facing the powerful move, Zhang Ruochen could have used a Dimensional Shift to escape back to the Royal Mountain. Even the cultivators from the Fane of Youshen were expecting him to do so.
Nevertheless, he stood unmoved on the spot with the Saint Qi forcefully revolving in his body.
Venerable Hiddenheart’s lips curled up as a thought came to mind. “When I struck my palm out and the force landed on Zhang Ruochen a few days earlier in Tongming River, it had hurt him quite a bit.”
“Brilliant Hand is my killer move that is much more powerful than that palm the other day, yet Zhang Ruochen is trying to take it head-on? Fine. I will crush your Saint body into pieces with this palm!”
Zhang Ruochen took a step back with his right leg in a lunge.
As the Eight-Dragon Umbrella opened, a bright golden glow immediately appeared on the umbrella.
Boom!
Venerable Hiddenheart’s palm hit the Eight-Dragon Umbrella as if he had hit a large bell. Shock waves of Path burst out into all directions, destroying everything in its path.
Meanwhile, Zhang Ruochen slid back a few miles before he could stop the momentum.
His body was half-buried in the ground, Saint Qi violently surging in his meridians and blood pulsing through his veins. He felt as if his internal organs were turned upside down. But at least he had survived the attack.
“How could this be?” Venerable Hiddenheart was in disbelief.
If it were Zhang Ruochen, in his Six-step Saint Kinghood, failing to kill a Three-step Saint king in one move, he would have been stunned, too.
“Breaking through into the Six-step Saint Kinghood has indeed boosted my strength considerably.”
Zhang Ruochen guffawed in excitement, his Saint Qi rushing from his body into the Eight-Dragon Umbrella.
Roar!
Eight giant golden dragons lunged out from the surface of the umbrella toward Venerable Hiddenheart in a counterattack.
Venerable Hiddenheart immediately flew backward. The eight golden dragons gave chase, circling about him and continuously striking out their claws with a whoosh and swoosh.
With the thrust of both hands, the shadow of a bell appeared and Venerable Hiddenheart successfully blew away the eight golden dragons.
“Eat my sword, too!”
As Zhang Ruochen clenched the hilt of the Ancient Abyssal Blade, dense swordsmanship precepts rushed out of his body while inscriptions appeared on the blade.
The sword arrived like a greased lightning in front of Venerable Hiddenheart.
With no time to think, Venerable Hiddenheart whisked out a Thousand-Inscription Sacred Artifact-class round shield in front of his body. The shield spun at high speed to form an ever-increasing vortex that carried chaotic energy.
Zhang Ruochen had improved on his swordsmanship during the two-year closed-door cultivation.
His Ninth Sword skill had not reached the complete stage, but there had been significant improvement compared with two years ago.
When he uttered the word “Break!”, the Thousand-Inscription Sacred Artifact-class shield broke like porcelain by his sword.
“My-My Radiant Shield!”
Venerable Hiddenheart’s eyes reddened as red as he could not accept this reality. How could a Sixth Radiance Thousand-Inscription Sacred Artifact-class shield be so fragile?
The Abyss Ancient Sword had already had fused a large number of sacred artifacts and transformed into a Seventh Radiance Thousand-Inscription Sacred Artifact in the past two years.
Standing on the altar, Feng Chengdao focused his vision. “Legend has it that both Zhang Ruochen’s sword and the Blood Dripper of Kunlun’s empress are forged using materials from nature. They could defeat every soldier in the world. I fear that it will not be easy for Venerable Hiddenheart to neutralize Zhang Ruochen.”
“Venerable Hiddenheart will become a laughingstock in the Fane of Youshen if he failed to defeat Zhan Ruochen.” The faceless man laughed.
“Venerable Hiddenheart is the weakest among the Nine-step Saint Kings in terms of combat strength. It doesn’t help that he has lost an arm and that the circulation of his Saint Qi isn’t smooth. But his biggest strength is his ability to control the Abominations. So killing Zhang Ruochen is just a walk in the park for him.”
The Abyss Ancient Sword instantly absorbed the morale and essence Qi of the broken shield. Zhang Ruochen summoned his Precept of Truth into the sword, increasing as much as six times the attack power.
Meanwhile, Venerable Hiddenheart struck his palm continuously to form beams of defensive light.
Boom! Boom!
The Abyss Ancient Sword and Venerable Hiddenheart flew past and missed each other after a series of explosions.
Venerable Hidden heart raised his palm, the white-bone armor on his arm broken, his fingers bleeding.
Even the armor made of Supreme Saint bones could not withstand the attack of the sword in Zhang Ruochen’s hand.
Venerable Hiddenheart was as mad as he was furious. Being a Nine-step Saint King, there was nothing more humiliating than being wounded by a Six-step Saint King.
“War Dragon! War Tiger!”
He took out a shroud. It jittered for a second, then two Abominations flew out.
Produced from two corpses of beings with an almost Supreme Saint-level cultivation and various precious metal and drugs and countless conditioning, each of the two Abominations was as powerful as Venerable Hiddenheart.
As the shroud continued to jitter, dozens more Abominations flew out.
These Abominations might not be as powerful as War Dragon and War Tiger, but they were all of Saint King levels.
Because Venerable Hiddenheart possessed the ability to produce and control the Abominations, his stature in the Fane of Youshen was a tad higher than that of Feng Chengdao, whose cultivation base was nearing the Greater Precept World.
Fighting him was akin to fighting three Nine-step Saint Kings and a group of saint king-level elites at the same time.
Even the ordinary Nine-step Saint Kings would lose their nerves at seeing Venerable Hiddenheart.
“That old geezer from the Fane of Youshen has summoned so many Abominations. Things are not looking good for the Lord. We’ve got to give him a hand.”
The Mastodon-Devouring Rabbit tried to lunge out of the Royal Mountain, but Awesome, the Little Taoist, dragged him back in.
“Don’t add to the problem. Zhang Ruochen may not necessarily lose.” Awesome, the Little Taoist stared at the black altar suspended in midair, thinking whether to shoot the thing down using his Purple-Gold Bagua Mirror.
Zhang Ruochen stood on the ground, eyes affixed at the dim sky and those hideous Abominations. “I will leave those Abominations to you. I have got to take the life of Venerable Hiddenheart,” he said into the air.
He summoned a Great Dimensional Shift and disappeared into thin air.
An enchanting lady appeared in the same spot where Zhang Ruochen was standing earlier. She was none other than Moyin, who had consumed a large amount of sainthood source for the past two years and achieved the Eight-step Saint Kinghood. Her strength was a notch higher than the ordinary Nine-step Saint Kings.
Her hair shot out, growing as long as a thousand-feet long black whip, and struck all the Abominations in the air down to the ground.
Following immediately, Moyin raised her Seventh Radiance Thousand-Inscription Sacred Artifact-class Infinite Blade. Divine Purification Flame appeared on the blade as she flew out gracefully.
“The Saint Devourer… Zhang Ruochen is letting a Saint Devourer live inside his body!”
Venerable Hiddenheart recognized the true form of Moyin and was no longer underestimating but wary of Zhang Ruochen.
Zhang Ruochen quietly appeared above Venerable Hiddenheart, condensing a Sword Way Xuangang before striking down at once.
Feng Chengdao shouted a warning on the altar. “Watch out!”
Venerable Hidden had sensed the danger and immediately summoned a defensive talisman.
Boom!
Zhang Ruochen’s sword struck the light shield formed by the defensive talisman and shattered it at once. Venerable Hiddenheart fell into the woods below and smashed up a cloud of dust.
Feng Chengdao could no longer sit by and watch. He pointed at Zhang Ruochen and a beam of light shot out of his finger.
Zhang Ruochen knew there was still a wide gap between him and Feng Chengdao, so he did not want to meet him head-on but dodge using a Dimensional Shift.
Looking up at the altar, Zhang Ruochen sneered at Feng Chengdao. “Venerable Hiddenheart and I agree to fight like men. Are you risking your reputation, trying to disregard the rule, and join hands with Venerable Heart against a junior like me?”
Feng Chengdao laughed. “I don’t care about reputation, Zhang Ruochen. I am going to kill you no matter what you say.”
Instantly, he leaped out of the black altar and reappeared a hundred feet away.
Feng Chengdao was only at the level of the Lesser Precept World, but he was many times more powerful than Venerable Hiddenheart. His body was flashing continuously and leaped across a hundred feet with each flash.
He was getting closer and closer to Zhang Ruochen. “The cultivators from the Fane of Youshen are shameless!” The Mastodon-Devouring Rabbit suddenly barked.
Upon hearing that, the Fane of Youshen’s cultivators on the altar were furious.
The faceless man holding a sacred staff guffawed and flew the black altar toward Royal Mountain.
His spiritual power had reached the early 59th order. Because of this, he could still feel the vigorous Saint Qi of heaven and earth in the Royal Mountain despite he had the shield of the dimensional array and the time array. That place could be a holy land of enlightenment.
In any holy land of enlightenment, there was surely a large number of cultivation resources.
With Venerable Hiddenheart and Feng Chengdao joining hands, Zhang Ruochen would surely die. So he could just ignore him.
The black altar must have possessed some mysterious power; because the dimensional array on the periphery of the Royal Mountain was starting to give way. Even the Mark of Time was blocked by the black light emitted by the altar.
The cultivators in the Royal Mountain started to panic.
They could not imagine the consequence once an army of the Fane of Youshen’s elites broke into the Royal Mountain.
Yet, Awesome, the Little Taoist, appeared calm. “Lend me your Saint Qi so I can shoot that thing down.”
The Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit, Demon Ape, Xie Chengzi, and a whole bunch of Saints and Demi Saints sent their Saint Qi to Awesome, the Little Taoist at once. At the same time, the Purple-Gold Bagua Mirror was slowly rising to the air and giving out a brilliant purple glow.
