99: A Saintly Avatar, Arriving from Another Realm
The originally clear sky suddenly cracked like exquisite porcelain being struck, revealing a hair-thin black fissure!
Though the crack was small, it radiated a chill that froze the Divine Soul. A terrifying aura, far exceeding the Xiaoyao Realm and transcending the Laws of this world, poured down from it like a bursting dam!
Heaven and earth let out an overburdened wail at this moment. The Law chains of the Nine Provinces Continent trembled violently, and the Spiritual Qi became violent and chaotic.
Countless living beings shivered under this aura, prostrating themselves on the ground out of a primal fear rooted in life's instinct.
Inside the crack, a blurred phantom slowly coalesced.
He was shrouded in dense Netherworld Death Qi, his features obscured. Only a pair of eyes burning with eerie green Soul Fire could be seen, looking down like a god scrutinizing ants.
His aura had shockingly reached the Saint Realm!
Though it was only a Clone, its essential power had already surpassed the limits of this world's Heavenly Dao!
"Trash!"
A grand, cold voice filled with endless majesty and contempt rang out from the crack, echoing through heaven and earth, as if evaluating the eight Xiaoyao Realm experts who had been obliterated.
"In a mere Lower Realm, there is actually someone who can kill those from a subsidiary force of my Netherworld Hells?"
The Netherworld figure's gaze pierced through the Void Realm, instantly locking onto Lin Dao, who had just turned to leave above the Lin Clan Small World.
"It's you?"
The Netherworld figure's tone carried a hint of surprise, which immediately turned into deeper coldness and killing intent. "To be able to exert Saint Realm power while in the Xiaoyao Realm, you do have some tricks.
Unfortunately, you shouldn't have touched the people of my Netherworld Hells."
He raised a palm condensed from pure Death Qi and pressed it down gently toward Lin Dao's direction.
"Ant, be annihilated."
The space within a ten-thousand-mile radius instantly froze, and the flow of time became extremely slow. All vitality was being stripped away, transformed into deathly Netherworld power.
This was a crushing blow at the level of Law, far beyond what the previous Xiaoyao Realm attacks could compare to!
The hearts of all Cultivators in the Nine Provinces who sensed this scene sank to the bottom.
The Saint Realm!
This was absolutely an existence that surpassed the Xiaoyao Realm!
No matter how strong Old Ancestor Lin Dao was, how could he contend with such a powerhouse who surpassed the limits of the world?
"It's over... Senior Lin Dao, he..."
"The Saint Realm... how can we fight this?"
"Netherworld Hells... is it that true Imperial Clan from ancient times?"
Facing this Netherworld palm that could instantly turn any Xiaoyao Realm expert into withered bones, Lin Dao stopped his footsteps and slowly turned around.
His face remained calm, and his eyes didn't even flicker.
He watched the slowly descending Netherworld palm and the high-and-mighty figure in the crack as if he were watching a boring farce.
"A mere Clone dares to act presumptuously before me."
Buzz!
A blurred, ten-thousand-zhang tall phantom appeared out of thin air behind him.
This phantom was not a physical entity; it seemed to be composed of the most primitive Chaos Qi currents. Its specific appearance was unclear, but one could feel a primordial aura that could create worlds and suppress eternity!
The Primordial Divine Demon Phantom!
The moment the phantom appeared, the frozen space instantly recovered, and the stripped vitality re-emerged. All the Netherworld Death Qi, as if meeting its natural enemy, made sizzling sounds and rapidly dissolved!
The palm pressed down by the Netherworld figure was blocked by the naturally radiating aura of the Primordial Divine Demon Phantom when it was still a thousand zhang away from Lin Dao, unable to descend another inch!
"What?!"
For the first time, the Netherworld figure in the crack let out a voice of astonishment, his burning Soul Fire flickering violently. "This is... Divine Demon aura?! You..."
He was unable to finish his sentence.
The Primordial Divine Demon Phantom behind Lin Dao simply opened its giant mouth toward the Netherworld Clone and the spatial crack behind it, making a silent roaring motion.
No sound came out.
But in the next moment, the Netherworld Clone radiating Saint Realm pressure was instantly annihilated from head to toe, like snow thrown into a raging fire!
Even the tiny spatial crack behind him was smoothed over by an invisible giant hand under this roar, disappearing completely!
The sky returned to its original state. The suffocating Saint Realm pressure and Netherworld Death Qi vanished without a trace, as if everything just now had been an illusion.
Only the slowly dissipating Primordial Divine Demon Phantom and the Law fluctuations in the air that had not yet fully settled proved that the shocking scene just now had truly happened.
Everyone's mouths hung open, their eyes dull, and their minds blank.
Destroying eight Xiaoyao Realm experts with a flick of a finger... summoning a phantom with a thought to annihilate a Saint Realm Clone... this Lin Dao... what Realm is he actually in?!
Lin Dao dismissed the phantom behind him as if he had done something insignificant.
He looked up, his gaze seemingly piercing through the endless Void Realm toward an unknown depth, the direction where the main sect of the Netherworld Hells was located.
"The true body doesn't come, but sends a Clone to its death."
"Netherworld Hells... I've taken note of you."
He spoke indifferently, then took a step forward. His figure completely disappeared at the edge of the Lin Clan Small World, returning to the depths of the Secret Realm.
It wasn't until long after his figure had vanished that the Cultivators across the Nine Provinces began to gasp for breath like drowning people being saved, their faces still etched with extreme shock and fear.
At this moment, in that distant and unknowable place, within an ancient hall shrouded in endless Death Qi and the power of Reincarnation.
A massive figure sitting on a bone throne suddenly jolted. Death Qi surged around him, causing the countless Netherworld Messengers standing below to kneel in terror.
"Divine Demon aura... the Lower Realm Nine Provinces... actually has a successor of the Primordial Divine Demons?"
The existence on the throne let out a low, murderous voice. "Pass down the order! Accelerate the preparations for the descent! This boy must be killed! His Legacy must be seized!"
...Outside the Nine Provinces, in the vast Star Domain collectively known as the 'Core of Ten Thousand Worlds,' many ancient orthodoxies and supreme Great Sects stood tall. Its territory was so vast and its experts so numerous that the broken Nine Provinces could not compare.
Deep within the Netherworld Hells, before the furious aura of the existence on the bone throne had fully settled, the news of an existence surpassing the Xiaoyao Realm appearing in the Nine Provinces—and suspected of carrying a Primordial Divine Demon Legacy—had already spread like a plague among the high-level powers of the Core of Ten Thousand Worlds.
"Is it confirmed? That abandoned prison land can actually give birth to Saint Realm combat power?"
"A Saint Realm Clone of the Netherworld Hells was instantly annihilated. The one who acted is suspected of summoning a Primordial Divine Demon Phantom!"
"Primordial Divine Demons... those were terrifying existences that could contend with true Great Emperors before the ancient Great Calamity! Their Legacy has long been severed; how could it appear in the Nine Provinces?"
"Interesting! It seems that wasteland still hides secrets we don't know about."
"Send people to keep an eye on the Nine Provinces. The Ancient Path is about to open. This boy... might be a key, or a stumbling block."
Powerful wills intersected in the starry sky.
The Nine Provinces, which they had long regarded as a barbaric fringe with exhausted resources, had entered the center of their vision once again because of Lin Dao's appearance.
However, while the various forces of the Core of Ten Thousand Worlds were still deliberating and observing, a one-sided 'liquidation' and 'harvest' was taking place within the Nine Provinces Continent at an alarming speed.