119: Chapter 119 Overestimating One's Abilities, Second-Class Race

But on the gates of the Ghost Gate Pass, the runes suddenly burst with a blinding light.

It wasn't a ghostly blue light, but a grayish-white one.

Within that light was the energy of countless souls absorbed by the Ghost Gate Pass, the millennium-long accumulation of the Ghost King, and the most primordial power of the Netherworld World.

The grayish-white light collided with the pitch-black torrent, erupting in a deafening roar.

Ying Yuan's pupils shrank violently.

"How is this possible?! How could the Ghost Gate Pass..."

He didn't finish his sentence. Because on the gates of the Ghost Gate Pass, those runes began to change. They were no longer static but started to flow like living things.

The grayish-white light condensed into countless tiny tentacles, reaching into the pitch-black torrent and wrapping around the Shadow Walkers.

The bodies of the Shadow Walkers touched by those tentacles began to disintegrate. They weren't being destroyed, but absorbed. Before the Ghost Gate Pass, shadow energy was like a drop of water facing the ocean, instantly swallowed.

"No!" Ying Yuan roared, desperately releasing shadow energy in an attempt to break free from those tentacles. But the suction of the Ghost Gate Pass was too strong; his shadow energy poured out of his body like a bursting flood, absorbed by the Ghost Gate Pass.

His body was shrinking, his aura was fading, and his consciousness was blurring.

"The Ghost Gate Pass... does not break... the Netherworld... is eternal..." He muttered the phrase he had seen in the intelligence reports, finally understanding its meaning.

It wasn't that the defense of the Ghost Gate Pass was exceptionally strong, but that the Ghost Gate Pass itself was a part of the Netherworld World. Any power that attacked the Ghost Gate Pass would be absorbed by it and converted into energy for the Netherworld World.

The stronger the attack, the stronger the Netherworld.

Ying Yuan let out a desperate howl as his body completely disintegrated, turning into countless shadow fragments that were absorbed by the Ghost Gate Pass.

All one hundred thousand Shadow Walkers were swallowed by the Ghost Gate Pass.

Their shadow energy merged into the Ghost Gate Pass, making the runes on the gates even brighter and the defense of the Ghost Gate Pass even more powerful.

The Shadow Walkers, exterminated.

Su Bai watched this scene from the world core, the corners of his mouth curling up slightly.

"To have ambition without sufficient strength is nothing more than a delusion."

"The Netherworld only needs true ambitious people, not delusional ones."

Su Bai shook his head gently. He had allowed Ying Yuan to discover so much information, yet he was so overconfident as to challenge the Underworld world after developing only one hundred thousand Shadow Walkers.

If Ying Yuan had focused on developing until he had a hundred million Shadow Walkers, Su Bai might have held him in higher regard.

...

The eightieth year.

The Wind Spirits of the Storm Realm began to clash with the Shadow Demons.

The Wind Spirits were descendants of the elemental civilization. Their bodies were condensed from pure wind elements and had no fixed form; they could be a breeze, a hurricane, or a tornado. Their voices sounded like wind whistling through a canyon, and their very existence was the embodiment of the wind.

Seven hundred and fifty thousand Wind Spirits were settled in the storm clouds. That layer of clouds floated above the Netherworld World, condensed from blue-gray storm clouds with lightning flashing through them and wild winds howling within.

Shadow Demons were masters of shadows and space. Their bodies were somewhere between darkness and Yin Qi, allowing them to traverse the void and perform short-distance Space Folding. Eight hundred thousand Shadow Demons lived in the Shadow Demon Abyss, the deepest rift in the Netherworld World, which was covered in liquid Yin Qi year-round.

The conflict between the Wind Spirits and the Shadow Demons originated from space.

The Wind Spirits needed the vast sky to fly, and their storm clouds covered one-fifth of the Netherworld World's sky. The Shadow Demons' Space Folding required a stable void environment, but the Wind Spirits' storms would disturb the stability of the void, making the Shadow Demons' Space Folding unpredictable.

In the eighty-first year, a Shadow Demon was swept into a void crack by a sudden storm during Space Folding and never returned.

The Shadow Demons were enraged.

Shadow Blade personally led one hundred thousand Shadow Demons into the storm clouds, demanding that the Wind Spirits limit the range of their storms.

The Wind Spirits refused.

"The sky is free," said Feng Hen, the elder of the Wind Spirits. "No race can limit the freedom of the wind."

Shadow Blade looked at him coldly. "Then are the lives of the Shadow Demons not important?"

"I am sorry that your clansman died in an accident." Feng Hen's voice was as calm as water. "But that was not our fault. Storms are the instinct of the Wind Spirits; we cannot limit them."

"Cannot limit them?" Shadow Blade's voice turned icy. "Then I will help you limit them."

He raised his hand, and one hundred thousand Shadow Demons released Space Folding simultaneously. Countless cracks appeared in the void, cutting the storm clouds into countless fragments. The bodies of the Wind Spirits were torn apart, swallowed, and dissipated within the spatial cracks.

Feng Hen let out an angry roar, and seven hundred and fifty thousand Wind Spirits simultaneously turned into hurricanes, charging toward the Shadow Demons.

The war between wind and space erupted.

The Wind Spirits' hurricanes could tear the earth apart, and the Shadow Demons' Space Folding could cut through the void. The two powers collided in the air, erupting with world-destroying energy.

The war lasted for three years.

Ultimately, the Shadow Demons won.

Not because they were stronger, but because the Wind Spirits could not adapt to the Yin Qi of the Netherworld World.

The Wind Spirits were descendants of the elemental civilization; their power came from pure wind elements, but the Yin Qi of the Netherworld World would corrode their bodies, making their wind turbid and their power weak.

Three years of war saw the number of Wind Spirits plummet from seven hundred and fifty thousand to three hundred thousand. Their storm clouds were cut into countless fragments by Space Folding, and they could no longer condense into a complete storm.

Standing on the ruins of the storm clouds, Feng Hen looked at his dying clansmen and finally bowed his head.

"We... admit defeat."

Shadow Blade hovered before him, no mercy in his grayish-white eyes.

"From today on, the sky of the Wind Spirits will be demarcated by the Shadow Demons."

Feng Hen did not answer, only closing his eyes.

The last legacy of the Storm Realm, three hundred thousand Wind Spirits, were confined to a patch of sky at the very edge of the Netherworld World. Their storms could not cross the boundary set by the Shadow Demons, or they would be torn apart by the Shadow Demons' Space Folding.

The Wind Spirits were reduced to a second-class race of the Netherworld World.