Chapter 66 Quasi-Immortal Emperor of the Dragon Clan

"Rumble—"

The sky was a dark red, and Emperor Li's voice echoed from afar.

At the entrance of the hall.

Chong Batian gritted his teeth, his knees pressing cracks into the floor as he circulated the demonic essence within his body to resist the two sources of pressure overhead.

It was over.

A metallic, sweet taste rose in Chong Batian's throat, and his eyes were filled with despair.

He hadn't expected Emperor Li and that Human Race Immortal Emperor to arrive so quickly; the city-protecting array of Chiyan City had shattered directly under the clash of the two Emperors' auras.

But that adult was still in secluded cultivation inside the heaven-reaching tower.

What should he do?

Cold sweat dripped from Chong Batian as he glanced at the hall behind him. There were no fluctuations from the heaven-reaching tower in the Void Realm; the adult didn't seem to intend to come out.

"Chong Batian!"

On the Nine Heavens, Jiang Wuji held an immortal sword, treading upon a river of blue Sword Intent stars as he looked down at Chong Batian.

"My patience is limited. Hand over that human thief and the heaven-reaching tower immediately, and surrender!

If you are willing to reveal everything about that thief's background, I might be able to put in a good word for you before the Divine Messenger and allow a wisp of your remnant Soul to enter Reincarnation. Otherwise, today, under the Taixu Sword Intent, your form and spirit shall be destroyed!"

As soon as Jiang Wuji finished speaking, the blue Sword Qi condensed into frost in the Void Realm, freezing the erupting lava into obsidian ice sculptures.

Before Chong Batian could think of a countermeasure, another voice exploded across the world.

"Jiang Wuji, have you lived too long and lost your mind?"

Emperor Li's eyes were blood-red, like two setting suns, as he stared at Jiang Wuji. Devilish Qi surged around him, condensing into thousands of demonic god phantoms that pushed Jiang Wuji's Sword Intent back several thousand feet.

"You Human Race just love to talk such nonsense!"

Emperor Li let out a laugh. "Negotiating with a Demon Venerable? A demon that doesn't listen should simply be killed!

Once I have skinned him alive, I will throw his Divine Soul into the Nine Nether Demonic Fire to be roasted, and then use the Soul Searching Technique to search through his memories inch by inch. Do you think I'll still worry about not finding that human boy's whereabouts?"

Before his voice had even faded,

Emperor Li gave Jiang Wuji no chance to retort.

In the Demon Realm, the Law of the jungle was the only truth. To a Demon Emperor, a commander at the border wasn't even worth as much as a useful dog.

Emperor Li raised his right arm, fingers spread wide, and aimed his palm at Chiyan City.

"Die."

Two words fell.

The sky collapsed.

A dark gold demonic hand, a million feet large, emerged from the nothingness, its palm lines flowing as it pressed down toward the entirety of Chiyan City.

With this strike, Emperor Li did not hold back his strength.

He didn't just want to kill Chong Batian; he wanted to wipe out this city and the tens of millions of demons within it.

This was the price for provoking an Emperor.

In mid-air,

Jiang Wuji watched this scene, his eye twitching slightly.

"Good heavens..."

He cursed inwardly.

Emperor Li, famous for his tyranny among the Demon Race, was indeed ruthless, not even sparing his own subordinates and subjects. So many Demon Cultivators and Yao Race members below would be swatted to death in a single blow.

But Jiang Wuji did not step in to stop it.

The life or death of the creatures in Chiyan City had nothing to do with him. What he cared about were Gu Heng and the heaven-reaching tower hidden in the shadows. Letting Emperor Li lead the way and force out the boy's trump cards would only benefit him.

A shadow covered the entire City Lord Manor.

Before the demonic hand even landed, the wind pressure ground the square outside the hall into powder. The demonic armor on Chong Batian's body made cracking sounds as shards pierced into his flesh.

"Sen... Senior..."

A murmur escaped Chong Batian's throat.

He had tried to struggle, tried to burn his Essence Blood to flee, but under the lock of the Emperor's Law, space was imprisoned, and he couldn't even move a finger.

Above the immortal Realms, every major Realm was a chasm.

An Immortal King masters the basics of Law, an Immortal Venerable condenses a Domain, and an Emperor integrates Law into their blood and flesh, where their words carry the weight of Law. As a Demon Venerable, he was like a mantis trying to stop a carriage before a Demon Emperor.

He was doomed.

Chong Batian gave a miserable laugh and gave up all resistance. He closed his eyes, waiting for his Physical Body and Soul to be crushed.

One breath.

Two breaths.

Three breaths...

Time stretched out in fear, but the pain did not come.

"Eh?"

Chong Batian's eyelids trembled as he opened his eyes in confusion.

Three feet in front of him,

A figure had appeared with their back to him.

The person wore a green robe, with grey-and-white hair draped over their shoulders and a pair of dark gold dragon horns on their head that looked like the gnarled branches of an ancient tree.

The dragon horns shimmered with the vicissitudes of time.

He stood there, and the shattered space around him healed automatically, as if the Laws of heaven and earth were crowding around him.

Emperor Li's million-foot dark gold demonic hand stopped a hundred feet above the man's head, as if it had sunk into a swamp, unable to press down any further.

Chong Batian stared blankly at this back, a memory of a figure inside the tower hugging a pillar, crying, and acting sycophantically flashing through his mind.

"Is it... that Little Loach?"

Chong Batian blurted out, but as soon as the words left his mouth, he immediately realized how terrifying this aura was. He slapped himself and stuttered as he corrected himself:

"Bah!... Dragon Clan Senior?"

Hearing this, the green-robed figure turned his head.

It was an ancient and majestic face; within his golden pupils, stars seemed to be born and extinguished.

The old man frowned slightly upon hearing the words "Little Loach."

However, he ignored the kneeling Chong Batian and instead looked up at Emperor Li and Jiang Wuji on the Nine Heavens.

The old man simply raised his chin, his hands clasped behind his back.

"You two."

"In this place, there remains a wisp of the aura of my Dragon Clan's The Chosen Son. To preserve the clues of my clan's Bloodline, I ask you two to... please stay your hand."

As soon as these words were spoken,

The complexions of the originally arrogant Jiang Wuji and Emperor Li both froze simultaneously.

In the sky, the river of blue Sword Intent stars shook violently, and the immortal sword in Jiang Wuji's hand let out a whine. Cracks also began to appear on the surface of Emperor Li's demonic hand that was suspended in mid-air.

The pupils of both the demon and the immortal shrank to the size of needles as they stared at the dragon-horned old man below, their breathing coming to a halt.

This aura...

This was not the Realm of an Immortal Emperor or a Demon Emperor.

The moment the old man spoke, Jiang Wuji and Emperor Li clearly felt that the power of Law they had painstakingly cultivated for tens of thousands of years had been forcibly severed by a higher level of power.

That feeling was like a Mortal facing a god.

"A Rule aura... comparable to a Quasi-Immortal Emperor?!"

Jiang Wuji cried out in shock. He couldn't understand why a being who had touched the Emperor Realm Rules would suddenly appear in this remote border of the Demon Realm.

Emperor Li's blood-red eyes were full of wariness.

"Are you... an Elder of the Dragon Clan Ancestral Land?"

Emperor Li gritted his teeth; he had recognized that the one before him was an Elder sent by the Dragon Clan.

Rumor had it that the Dragon Clan lived in seclusion and possessed unfathomable foundations. But Emperor Li hadn't expected that for the sake of finding a The Chosen Son, the Dragon Clan would actually send a Quasi-Immortal Emperor. Furthermore, he had arrived even faster than the two of them.

With a Quasi-Immortal Emperor standing here, let alone slaughtering the city, whether they could even leave today was an unknown.

A deathly silence filled the air.

Since the Quasi-Immortal Emperor hadn't spoken, Jiang Wuji and Emperor Li didn't even dare to retract their Divine Abilities; they could only stay frozen in mid-air, enduring the pressure of the Rules.

The wind stopped.

The Quasi-Immortal Emperor's Rule power was like an invisible net, completely sealing off the world for hundreds of millions of miles around.

Jiang Wuji felt as if a mountain were stuffed into his chest. He endured the trembling of his Divine Soul as he calculated a way out of this dead end.

To go head-to-head with an old dragon who had touched the power of Rules for the sake of a Gu Heng whose background he hadn't even grasped? That was seeking death.

Just as Jiang Wuji was hesitating on how to back down, the Jade Slip deep within his sleeve began to vibrate urgently.

Jiang Wuji's brow twitched as he sent a wisp of Divine Sense into the Jade Slip.

In an instant,

His pale face changed several times.

Inside the Jade Slip was a Divine Decree personally issued by the Divine Messenger stationed at the Divine Court: The thief of the heaven-reaching tower has appeared, and the nine Immortal Emperors of the Human Immortal Realm have received the decree and are preparing to assemble their true bodies to descend upon the border of the Demon Realm.

"The nine Immortal Emperors... are coming personally?"

Jiang Wuji sucked in a breath of cold air.

Those were Immortal Emperors.

The Peak of the Human Immortal Realm, nine living legends.

To catch a Profound Immortal boy and a tower, the Divine Court was actually going to use a lineup capable of shattering a Realm.

After the brief shock, Jiang Wuji's mind began to race.

Since those above were going to get serious and the nine Immortal Emperors were going to personally intervene, why should he continue to risk his life here?

Even if he managed to snatch the heaven-reaching tower back today, the credit wouldn't fall to him. If he failed and was swatted to death by this Quasi-Immortal Emperor dragon, his tens of thousands of years of cultivation would become a joke.

No matter how he calculated it, it was a losing bargain.

Thinking of this, Jiang Wuji's eyes darted around as he retracted the blue Sword Intent surrounding him.

He placed his immortal sword behind his back, took a deep breath, adopted a solemn expression, and turned to look at Emperor Li.

"That... Emperor Li."

Jiang Wuji cleared his throat and said with an air of righteous indignation, "I just performed a quick calculation and found that the sect-protecting array of my Taixu Sword Sect has suddenly fluctuated; I fear some petty scoundrels are taking the Opportunity to cause trouble.

The Sect's affairs are of the utmost urgency. As the Supreme Patriarch, I must return immediately to take charge."

As he spoke,

He cupped his hands toward the Dragon Clan Elder below. "Since the Dragon Clan Senior is searching for someone here, I naturally wouldn't dare to disturb you. As for the grievances of Chiyan City, you of the Demon Race can settle them yourselves. I shall take my leave first!"

Before his voice had even faded,

Without looking at Emperor Li's unbelieving face, Jiang Wuji's feet flashed with sword light as he tore open a spatial rift and dove halfway into it.

"You..."

Emperor Li's eyes widened as he watched Jiang Wuji flee in disbelief.

"That old Human Race bastard!"

Emperor Li cursed in his heart.

He felt that humans were even more devious than the Demon Race. One moment he was clamoring to trample Chiyan City, and the next, as soon as a Quasi-Immortal Emperor appeared, he made up a pathetic excuse and sold him out.

Leaving him, a single Demon Emperor, to face this old dragon alone.

Emperor Li gritted his teeth, his mind spinning rapidly.

He knew very well that between an Immortal Emperor and a Quasi-Immortal Emperor, there was a gap of half a Realm, but that half-Realm was the difference between a Mortal and a god.

The reason a Quasi-Immortal Emperor had the word "Emperor" in their title was because they had touched that sliver of Origin Rules of heaven and earth. Under Rules, all Laws were mere illusions.

This was an unbridgeable chasm.

If he fought head-on, the outcome would be him being ground into meat paste.

"No, I cannot throw my life away here."

Emperor Li weighed his options. "Since the Dragon Clan has intervened, this is no longer a level I can handle. Instead of staying here to seek death, it's better to retreat to Demon Emperor City immediately, inform my superiors, and let those few Devil Emperors descend personally to handle this."

And so it was decided.

Emperor Li took a deep breath and dissipated the million-foot demonic hand.

A smile was forced onto his face as he coughed twice and cupped his fists toward the Dragon Clan Elder.

"Cough... Senior, your presence is a great honor, and I apologize for failing to welcome you properly.

It's just..."

Emperor Li gritted his teeth and made up an excuse. "It's just that my cultivation of Demonic Techniques went awry a few days ago, and I suddenly feel... my stomach hurts a bit, and my Devilish Qi is backflowing. I urgently need to return to secluded cultivation to rest.

I won't disturb Senior's search for The Chosen Son any further. Farewell!"

With that,

Emperor Li didn't want to stay for another second. He gathered the sky-filling Devilish Qi and turned to vanish into the Void Realm.

However.

Just as the two of them were about to leave, dark gold ripples suddenly appeared in the stagnant space around them.

"Buzz—"

The Rule aura instantly sealed all of Jiang Wuji's and Emperor Li's paths of retreat.

Jiang Wuji's foot, which had stepped into the spatial rift, was forcibly squeezed out. The black cloud of Devilish Qi that Emperor Li had transformed into was also reshaped back into human form by an invisible giant hand, falling into mid-air.

"You two, why such a rush?"

The Dragon Clan Elder still had his hands behind his back, his voice playful.

"Since you've come, you are both guests. Although the scenery here is a bit dilapidated, the show that is about to be staged is rarely seen in the Three Realms."

The old man looked up, his golden pupils seeing through the nothingness to a certain point in the Void Realm. "Why don't you two stay and accompany this old man to watch a good show?"

The Quasi-Immortal Emperor had spoken to keep them there. Jiang Wuji and Emperor Li looked ashen, frozen in place, not even daring to breathe loudly.

At the same time.

Inside the heaven-reaching tower,

The starry sky was vast.

Everything happening outside was reflected in the void within the tower.

Gu Heng sat on a floating meteorite.

Lin Qingyue stood by his side, clutching her sword. The Old Dragon King was coiled nearby, staring at the image in the water mirror, his dragon eyes wider than copper bells.

Gu Heng sensed the Quasi-Immortal Emperor pressure that was sealing the world outside, and then looked at the majestic green-robed old man in the water mirror, his expression a bit strange.

He turned his head, looked over the curled-up Old Dragon King, and spoke with a half-smile, "Little Loach, that old man outside with the horns and the majestic air—is he an Elder from your Family?"

"Eh?"

The Old Dragon King was stunned and shook his head in a daze.

"Master, this... this old servant really doesn't know!"

The Old Dragon King said aggrievedly, "So many years have passed, and those old fellows in the clan have long been replaced by new generations. As for a clan Elder... although the Bloodline aura on him is the same source as mine, I swear I've absolutely never heard of such a dragon!"

Gu Heng fell into deep thought upon hearing this.

The situation outside had already exceeded his expectations.

Originally, it had only attracted an Immortal Emperor and a Demon Emperor; with the power of the heaven-reaching tower, he could still barely manage to deal with them.

But now, a Dragon Clan Elder at the Quasi-Immortal Emperor level had appeared, and seeing Jiang Wuji's rush to flee, he estimated that the Human Race Divine Messenger's side had also received word, and perhaps the Human Race Immortal Emperors were already on their way.

With Immortal Emperors, a Quasi-Immortal Emperor, and even Immortal Emperor-level combat forces gathering outside, his current Immortal Venerable Middle Stage cultivation, which he had gained by Passing By, wasn't enough to fill the gaps between these old monsters' teeth.

Leaving the tower? That would be asking for death.

"This is a bit tricky..."

Gu Heng rubbed his chin.

Suddenly, his eyes lit up. The space within the tower was its own world, and the flow of time was different at different levels. The higher the level, the greater the difference in time flow.

Since he couldn't win a fight, he would just idle and level up in the tower.

Thus, Gu Heng turned his head and said to Lin Qingyue with a serious face, "Qingyue, look at that group of old men outside fighting and killing; it's so bad for harmony.

How about... we use the time difference in this tower to enter a long secluded cultivation right here? We'll wait until both of us have reached the Immortal Emperor Realm before going out to clean up the mess. What do you think?"

Hearing these words, Lin Qingyue took a deep breath and looked at Gu Heng as if he were a monster.

"Young Master Gu, are you serious?"

Lin Qingyue was speechless to the extreme.

The Immortal Emperor Realm was a shore that countless billions of Cultivators in the Three Realms spent their entire lives failing to reach, and many brilliant Prodigies were stuck at the threshold of the Quasi-Immortal Emperor until their Lifespan was exhausted. This man made it sound as easy as going to the market to buy two heads of cabbage.

"Of course I'm serious. There are countless opportunities in this tower, and with the addition of the Time Law, is it really that hard to become an Immortal Emperor?"

Gu Heng gave a laugh, stood up, and walked over to Lin Qingyue.

His gaze didn't stop on Lin Qingyue's face, but instead stared at her forehead, where a silver-white mark was faintly flickering and emitting an unusual aura.

"However, before that..."

"You must first let me know just what secret this thing on your forehead entails?"