156: The more setbacks you face, the stronger you become!

Three hundred meters beneath Kunlun Academy, Ning Xiwei slammed open the doors to the ancient archives.

She rushed to the management area, searching for ancient records.

Finally, from a pile of Incomplete Manuals, she found the one she was looking for.

Ning Xiwei's pale fingers brushed over the Incomplete Manual of Taiping Guangji!

"Found it, this is the one!"

The yellowed pages recorded a story: an ancient Immortal fell in the North Pole in a strange object that the Immortal called an Escape Pod... The last section of text provided coordinates in the Universe—the location of Betelgeuse in Orion was clearly marked as the "eye of guixu".

Just like before!

It was still Orion.

Fortunately, they had already left a Teleportation Formation there.

On the other side.

Holding the exhausted Morning Dew, whose magic was spent, Lu Chen rushed out of Vatican X, the tianwen sword trailing streaks of light behind him.

At this moment, Ignis was covered in Holy Light bandages, but the flames at her fingertips burned more fiercely than ever!

She looked at Lu Chen and said resentfully, "Let's go straight to the North Pole. I'm going to burn Xu Fu's coffin into fireworks! That's no longer your old friend, but merely a Heavenly Dao Puppet. I want to kill him, and that bastard Heavenly Dao too!"

At the North Pole ice cave, Shelley's ice crystals were clashing with the Heavenly Dao runes on the bronze coffin.

When the Absolute Zero touched the inscriptions on the lid, a message from a hundred thousand years ago suddenly echoed across the ice:

"To those who come after, if you hear this recording, it means the Heavenly Dao has penetrated the timeline."

The blizzard swallowed the latter half of the sentence; only the pair of giant bronze eyes deep within the ice reflected the firelight of the starship hovering in the sky.

The North Pole ice dome trembled under the roar of the starship's engines, and Xu Fu's bronze coffin finally emerged within the vertical pupil of the Heavenly Dao eye.

Quantum Frost had condensed on the surface of the coffin.

The next moment, when Lu Chen teleported back via the starship.

Shelley and the others had already been holding them off for a long time.

Lu Chen drew the tianwen sword, leaped from the starship, and slashed at Xu Fu's coffin.

Just as he touched the inscriptions on the lid, the blizzard suddenly materialized, carrying powerful magic as it raged wildly across the polar region.

"Get back!" Shelley's Ice Crystal Chains bound the coffin, but the Absolute Zero caused blood-vessel-like patterns to appear on the bronze surface.

Aboard the starship, Ignis had no desire to rest; she tore off the bandages burned by the Holy Light, and her Flame Demon Tattoo surfaced once more!

She leaped down, climbing the high ice wall against gravity, summoned her flame demon greatsword, and threw herself forward. Dragging her injured flame demon true form, she jumped to a high point and swung her greatsword down with a wave of intense heat!

"I'm going to see if this heaven can really be destroyed! — Blazing Slash!"

A furious shout.

With an Aura that could split a mountain, the powerful blade of flame slashed toward the coffin standing before the vertical pupil.

Suddenly, the lid popped open, and an airwave sent her flying!

At the starship's hatch, Morning Dew saw this and used the magic she had just recently recovered to summon a Holy Light Barrier to catch Ignis.

Lying inside the coffin was not Xu Fu, but a lifeless Clone riddled with Quantum Tubes.

It was merely an ancient container for storing the power of heavenly dao contamination.

The Heavenly Dao had prepared many such Clones this time.

It was also evolving.

It was even adept at combining technology with various civilizations to deal with current ones.

The pages of Ning Xiwei's book of the dead transformed into Bone Chains, binding the Clone's neck!

"Undead Explosion—!"

Sun Feifei's five elements flags were driven into the ice. The young girl took flight, chanting a spell, "Activate! — Marsh-Water Oppression."

The Clone's eyes snapped open, still lifeless, but a bronze star map flowed within his pupils. His mouth spoke mechanically, like a recording:

"You've finally come. I am experimental Clone number 1,427, and also the masterpiece of the Heavens, created specifically to wait for you—Lu Chen, the Lord of the Undead!"

His voice was laced with electronic static.

A powerful Laser suddenly shot from his fingertips.

It fired directly at Lu Chen.

Behind him, the vertical pupil turned even more blood-red.

The blizzard across the entire polar region grew increasingly terrifying.

A powerful airwave surged into the sky.

Even the starship, thousands of miles above, had to warp back to the outskirts of the polar region.

Everyone watched the polar region, standing ready.

Concern filled everyone's hearts.

Lu Chen swung his sword to cut the Laser, the Sword Qi colliding with the Lightning Snake to create a vortex of immense power.

It even caused the space here to become greatly distorted.

Seeing this, Morning Dew immediately flew down to support him. Her Six-winged Seraph Wings unfurled uncontrollably, and Holy Light transformed into spears that pierced the ice!

She deployed several brilliant barriers, intending to slow the power of the blizzard.

Lu Chen looked at the Clone in the coffin, pointed his sword, and said coldly:

"You are not Xu Fu!"

"And certainly not my old friend."

"You are nothing more than a Puppet, a mere creation of the Heavenly Dao."

"My old friend and those experts have already gone where they belong. A hundred thousand years ago, he and they left a message for your master: '—Fuck the Heavens!' That's the message for the master behind you. Through you, it must have heard it, and that is also my sentiment."

Morning Dew swept a wisp of Holy Light across the Clone's chest, revealing a core hidden between the ribs.

A powerful, contaminated magic core.

Furthermore, this core was actually in the shape of a Chip.

How truly bizarre.

The Heavenly Dao really had learned everything.

For every world destruction, it evolved just as quickly.

The Dao grows a foot, the demon grows a rod.

Did they grow alongside each other just to prevent one day failing?

It seemed to be gaining more sentience and becoming more like a human—could it also feel fear? Could it also worry?

Lu Chen gave a cold sneer.

"Lu Chen, my master says that in modern terms, Xu Fu is just a program of his, and I am the software executing that program... while you are a virus!" The Clone's body began to crack, revealing mechanical viscera. "The Heavenly Dao is the spark of civilization from the previous Universe. Your so-called cultivation and magic... are all products of the Heavenly Dao, and the birth of these products is itself a defilement of the Heavenly Dao's will. You are all viruses."

The mechanical eye within the aurora began to completely distort into a blood-red vertical pupil.

It was situated right behind the Clone and its coffin.

Clearly, this Clone was the Formation Eye.

It was the source of power for the thing behind it.

Such a powerful blizzard tornado was intended not only to sweep through the polar region and completely destroy the ecology here.

It even intended to spread this extreme environment.

By destroying the polar region, it would produce an effect like the movie "Acquired".

How malicious, and how clever.

Who was still using traditional methods for the heavens to destroy all living things?

After all, a hundred thousand years had passed. If its methods didn't evolve, it wouldn't be the heavens.

It is the heavens; how could it be more foolish than living beings?