398: Daoist Shihen Descends

"Disciplinary Hall, hear my command!" She suddenly raised the heavenly sound zither, its strings emitting a shrill twang.

"Bai Li, for betraying the sect and colluding with the enemy, your crimes are unforgivable! According to the palace rules, the remaining 'Ten Thousand Tribulations Green Wood Sacred Seed' in her body shall be stripped immediately, her cultivation abolished, and her Soul extracted and refined to trace its Origin! Her Soul shall be cast into the 'Nine Nether Hellfire Cauldron' and burned for ten thousand years as a warning to others! Her Physical Body... shall be hung from 'Dao Burial Cliff' to suffer the bone-eroding punishment of the astral winds, serving as a warning to future generations!"

Extreme abandonment! Soul extraction and refinement! Burning for ten thousand years! Bone-eroding suspension of the corpse!

As soon as the command was given, four Disciplinary Hall Elders with grim auras, clad in black armor, appeared around the altar like ghosts. The pitch-black "Soul-Locking Chains" in their hands, entwined with cold Law runes, instantly shot out, aiming directly for Bai Li's limbs and forehead!

"No—!!!" Bai Li let out a shrill cry that reached the depths of her Soul. Her ice crystal crown shattered under the terrifying pressure, and her Moonlight Saint Robe was torn by the Law power contained within the chains!

The emerald crack on her forehead was violently pierced by the tip of a Soul-Locking Chain. Her pure life Origin, containing endless vitality, was forcibly extracted and stripped away!

The intense pain caused her entire body to convulse. Her cultivation collapsed like a bursting dam, and blood instantly stained her torn robes and the pure white altar!

Like a fairy phoenix with broken wings, she fell from the peak of the nine-layered jade steps, crashing heavily onto the cold Mysterious Jade Square, splashing a pool of eye-catching crimson.

Despair! A bone-chilling despair completely submerged her! To be personally convicted by her most beloved Revered Master, framed with the infamy of a traitor, publicly stripped of her Origin, her cultivation abolished, and forced to endure the ultimate punishment of Soul extraction and eternal torment!

Her past glory, pride, and visions of the future were crushed into powder at this moment, leaving only boundless darkness and piercing cold. In her blurred consciousness, she seemed to see the blood-stained profile of that youth outside the Law Pagoda, and vaguely heard that roar penetrating through time and space: "Wait for me!"

At the very critical moment when those four Soul-Locking Chains were about to completely pierce Bai Li's forehead and limbs to begin the Soul extraction! At the instant that emerald stream of light representing Bai Li's life Origin was being greedily absorbed by the chains and was about to leave her body entirely—

"Buzz—!!!"

A grand "silence" that transcended sound and perception, like an invisible tide, instantly swept through the entire Piaomiao Realm, submerged the Yuqing Palace, and covered every inch of the Dao Listening Square!

Time was absolutely and indisputably frozen!

The churning immortal clouds stagnated in the air, maintaining their surging posture from the previous second; the flowing rosy light was like frozen ribbons; the noisy, boiling crowd below, with expressions of anger, greed, and fear vivid on their faces, remained motionless like the most exquisite statues.

The shooting Soul-Locking Chains were only millimeters away from Bai Li's forehead and limbs, yet they could no longer advance a single bit; the cold determination on the face of the Palace Mistress of Yuqing Palace and the triumphant ecstasy in Elder Xuan Yin's eyes were all frozen in that most vivid moment.

Absolute control over time and space! All things stagnate, only I walk alone!

In this deathly silent, frozen tableau of time and space, a figure, as if strolling from the deepest depths of the ancient river of time, appeared silently in the center of the square, beside Bai Li's blood-stained, falling body on the brink of death.

He wore the simplest silver-patterned Daoist robe, spotless and pure, his posture as upright as a Chaos divine pillar supporting heaven and earth. His silver hair cascaded freely, flowing with a star-like luster. Most heart-stopping were those eyes.

Pure silver pupils, deep and boundless, as if reflecting the birth and death of billions of galaxies and the rotation of eternal ages, without a trace of human emotion, containing only the absolute indifference of looking down upon all living beings and the supreme majesty of dominating time and space.

Dao Lord Shi Hen, Time Without Trace!

He had descended, as if time itself had descended!

Those cold silver eyes ignored the frozen masses around him, ignored the Palace Mistress of Yuqing Palace on the high platform radiating saintly prestige, and ignored Elder Xuan Yin's frozen smile.

His gaze fell only upon Bai Li, who was curled up in a pool of blood, her breath faint, and the crack on her forehead shocking to behold.

A tiny, almost imperceptible ripple passed through the depths of his heart, which had been tempered by the Time Venerable into something akin to the absolute will of the Heavenly Dao.

The strong emotional resonance originating from his main body, combined with the extreme tragedy before his eyes, transformed that ripple into a tangible... cold anger.

That anger was not directed at any specific person, but at this "world" that turned black into white, trampled on justice, and bullied the weak!

Bai Li's consciousness was already blurred, her Divine Soul on the verge of dissipating, but she seemed to sense something in the dark. Her lips moved with difficulty, using her last remaining life force to utter two broken syllables: "Lin... Yuan..."

She thought it was the figure who had given her hope in her darkest hour, yet she felt this aura was as cold, vast, and majestic as the Heavenly Dao itself, carrying a suffocating sense of detachment.

Time Without Trace slowly crouched down. His movements were as gentle as if he feared disturbing a fragile bubble of time.

He stretched out his slender fingers, their tips entwined with warm time power, and very carefully wiped away the stains of blood and tears from Bai Li's cheeks.

As his fingertips touched that cold skin, a strand of pure time power was quietly transferred, like the gentlest thread, instantly stabilizing her Soul core that was about to dissipate completely, and temporarily freezing the fatal injury of the stripped Origin at the moment "before it happened."

"Sleep." His voice was flat, without any fluctuation, yet it carried a power that soothed all wounds and brought peace to time and space. "Those who insulted you shall suffer the tribulation of time's order. Those who took from you shall return to their starting point."

After performing this seemingly insignificant act that contained supreme power, Time Without Trace slowly straightened his back.

Those silver eyes that froze time and space, like two divine swords forged from eternal ice and silent starlight, finally swept toward the Palace Mistress of Yuqing Palace and Elder Xuan Yin, who were frozen in time on the high platform.

"Time, flow." The indifferent voice was like a proclamation of the Laws of the Universe.

The frozen time and space were instantly restored! The immortal clouds continued to surge, the rosy light continued to flow, the expressions of the crowd began to change, and the Soul-Locking Chains continued to strike down... However!

A vast pressure, a thousand or ten thousand times more terrifying than the saintly prestige of the Palace Mistress of Yuqing Palace, crashed down like the weight of the entire Universe! An absolute suppression originating from the strongest Time Dao Fruit, the Eternal Dao Bone of the Cosmic Tribulation, and the status of the Son of the Primordial!

Boom—Rumble—Crack—Snap—!

Indescribable, terrifying pressure descended!

Thump! Thump! Thump! Thump!

As if struck by an invisible giant hammer, on the Dao Listening Square, except for a few Old Ancestors of the Hunyuan Realm with deep foundations and special protective treasures who could barely manage not to kneel—their bones cracking throughout their bodies, faces as pale as paper, and sweat pouring down like rain.

Everyone else, including the most vociferous Disciples of the Xuan Yin faction, representatives of various forces, and even most of the Elders of the Yuqing Palace, all fell like mown wheat, their knees uncontrollably slamming onto the hard Purifying Heart Mysterious Jade!

The massive impact even caused spiderweb-like cracks to appear on the mysterious jade ground! The sound of shattering bones and terrified groans were heard incessantly! Countless people bled from their seven orifices, their Divine Souls shaken, their faces filled with nothing but boundless fear and horror!