217: Hunting Prelude

Mobei, sand fills the sky.

The wind howls, and the stirred-up sand grains strike faces like countless fine steel needles.

"Hold on! Damn it, hold the line for me!"

A Demon Suppression Division captain with half an arm missing was using his remaining arm to desperately prop up a cracked Formation Plate, roaring at the few companions beside him, spit and blood splattering.

"Hold what? My Flying Sword is about to shatter into dust!" Another Cultivator sat slumped on the ground, face pale as gold paper, looking at the front in despair.

Before them, a hundred-zhang-tall Void Realm Clone was being tightly trapped by a layer of twisted, glaze-colored space.

The creature was pitch black and indescribable in form, frantically crashing against the seemingly thin and fragile space barrier.

Every impact made the entire battlefield tremble and caused the hearts of all the Demon Suppression Division Cultivators to tighten sharply.

They had been dragging this out for three days and three nights.

The orders from above were very strange: do not attack, do not retreat, just drag it out to the death.

But how could they drag it out?

This was a Soul Transformation Peak Void Realm Clone!

If not for that strange space that appeared suddenly, called the Eternal Prison by those above, their small squad wouldn't have lasted even an hour.

Even so, they had reached their limit.

"Boss, I can't do it anymore... My Nascent Soul is about to dry up..." A young Cultivator's voice carried a sob.

"Shut up! Even if you die, you die right here!" The captain cursed angrily, but his own body also began to tremble uncontrollably.

It's over.

This was the only thought in everyone's mind.

Just as the Void Realm Clone accumulated its strongest power, preparing to launch a final charge to tear the Eternal Prison and them to shreds—

The wind on the entire battlefield suddenly stopped.

It wasn't that the wind weakened; it had completely, utterly stagnated.

The sky full of yellow sand seemed to have been hit with a pause button, suspended in mid-air, motionless.

Time and space seemed somewhat... viscous at this moment.

A figure appeared without warning between the crowd and the Void Realm Clone.

He wore a simple black robe, his aura restrained to the extreme, like a pebble thrown into a great lake, causing not a single ripple, yet changing the nature of the entire lake because of him.

"Who?"

The one-armed captain shouted vigilantly, gripping the Formation Plate in his hand.

All surviving Cultivators looked over, and then, they were stunned.

The man slowly turned around, revealing a face that was young yet seemed to carry the weight of eternal ages.

Most striking was the faintly visible mark between his brows—ancient, profound, and carrying a majesty that suppressed all things.

An elderly Cultivator with white hair and beard, who had been prepared to burn his Nascent Soul for a final stand, saw that mark clearly.

His cloudy eyes widened abruptly, his lips trembled, and the Magical Artifact in his hand dropped to the sandy ground with a "clatter."

"Com... Commander..."

His voice trembled uncontrollably, as if he were seeing some incredible illusion.

"It's Commander Li Dong... from a hundred years ago..."

This exclamation was like dropping a thunderbolt onto the dead-silent battlefield.

Li Dong?

That legendary commander from a hundred years ago who led the main force of the Demon Suppression Division to a final battle with "The Boss," only for the entire army to be wiped out?

Wasn't he... dead?

Li Dong ignored the commotion behind him; his attention was entirely on the big guy trapped by the Eternal Prison before him.

"Roar—!"

The Void Realm Clone clearly sensed this uninvited guest.

From Li Dong, it smelled an aura that made it tremble and feel hatred from the depths of its Origin.

It was the scent of a natural predator.

It gave up on charging the prison and instead gathered all its power, sending a silent mental roar at Li Dong across the glazed space.

This was an attack capable of shattering the Divine Soul of a Soul Transformation Cultivator.

However, Li Dong just stood there quietly, not even lifting an eyelid.

He extended a hand.

He neither cast a spell nor chanted; he simply raised it, pointed his fingers like a sword, and tapped lightly at the massive Void Realm Clone.

"Hum—"

A beam of light shot from his fingertip.

That beam of light was strange; one half was pure black that devoured all things, and the other half was holy silver-white that suppressed everything.

The black and white colors were like two fish chasing each other, intertwining and Fusion at his fingertip, finally turning into a gray beam of light that could not be described in words.

Demon-Suppression Void.

This was a Divine Ability he had prepared specifically for "The Boss" after fusing the memories and powers of two lifetimes.

The gray beam made no earth-shattering sound.

It ignored the distance of space and the barriers of the Eternal Prison, instantly sinking into the body of the Void Realm Clone.

No explosion, no screams.

A bizarre scene occurred.

The massive Void Realm Clone that blotted out the sky, the moment it was hit by the gray beam, had its huge body erased like a drawing being wiped from the inside.

The twisted Laws that constituted its form began to disintegrate rapidly in a reverse manner.

Its indestructible Void Realm shell turned into the most primitive energy particles; its violent and chaotic internal core was forcibly combed into a docile stream of energy.

It was not destroyed, but "deconstructed."

From a complex, malicious life form, it was reduced to the most basic "building Materials."

The entire process was so quiet it made one's heart crawl.

Under the dull gaze of all the Demon Suppression Division Cultivators, the Soul Transformation Peak monster that had plunged them into despair simply, silently, from head to toe, completely... disappeared within three breaths.

No, not disappeared.

The mass of the purest Origin energy it turned into after disintegration seemed to be attracted by some fatal pull, turning into a torrent that rushed frantically toward Li Dong, finally being swallowed in one gulp by the mark between his brows.

"Hiccup."

Li Dong subconsciously let out a burp.

Hmm, the taste isn't bad, just a bit strong.

This vast energy poured into his body, instantly filtered, purified, and converted by the divinity core and the ancient stone slab.

His Nascent Soul, which had just stabilized at the Late Stage of Soul Transformation, felt like it had eaten a great tonic, instantly becoming incredibly solid, flowing with radiance, his cultivation completely solidified at the Late Stage of Soul Transformation, and even faintly climbing toward the Peak.

Almost at the same time, in the depths of the infinitely distant Void Realm.

That huge eye spanning the darkness suddenly contracted violently!

A sharp pain, as if a piece of flesh had been cut out alive, struck its will core.

It wasn't the energy loss of a Clone being destroyed—it had experienced that many times, which was just a bit heartbreaking.

This time, it was a true "death."

A part of itself, along with the Laws and Origin it carried, had been completely erased from a conceptual level by another higher-order existence, then digested and absorbed, becoming nourishment for the other's growth!

"Roar—!!!"

The silent roar shook the entire Void Realm dimension, and the surrounding dead-silent Star Domains instantly turned into powder.

That fragment... that damn thief!

It was no longer a threat; it had become a... predator!

And itself, had become its prey!

Mobei battlefield.

Silence.

After a long silence came a carnival like a volcanic eruption.

"We won... We won!"

"Oh my god! What did I just see? One strike... just one strike?"

"It's the Commander! It really is Commander Li Dong! He's back! He's back to save us!"

The one-armed captain could no longer hold on, sat down on the ground, and looking at Li Dong's back, this man who bled but didn't cry suddenly burst into loud sobs.

Hope.

After the deepest despair, the hope that descended was enough to break any strong nerve.

Li Dong turned around, looking at these crying and laughing, disheveled colleagues, or rather... subordinates.

He had no superfluous words, his Divine Thought sweeping across the entire field.

"Everyone who can still move, clean up the battlefield immediately."

His voice was calm, yet carried unquestionable majesty, directly resounding in everyone's mind.

"The remaining power of this Eternal Prison can purify the polluted land and your injuries; don't waste it."

Hearing this, everyone immediately gathered their strength, helped each other stand up, and began to act according to his instructions.

Li Dong watched them, and a long-sealed corner of his heart seemed to be touched.

Once upon a time, he was like this too, leading his brothers, struggling to survive in battle after battle of despair.

Cleaner?

No.

From today on, I am no longer that person who passively cleans up trash.

I am here to... collect debts.

He shifted his gaze, seemingly piercing through ten thousand miles of yellow sand, looking in another direction.

There, another bigger "fish" was struggling in the Eternal Prison.

Time to go to the next place.

As the thought arose, the space in front of him silently cracked open a pitch-black gap.

"Commander! You..."

The white-haired old Cultivator hurried forward, wanting to ask something.

Li Dong didn't look back, just left a sentence, and stepped into the rift.

"The hunt, has begun."