The instant Liu Wuxie transformed into a celestial crane, all the surrounding cultivators fell into stunned silence.

"What's going on? How did Liu Wuxie transform into a celestial crane?" someone yelled.

They all knew that Liu Wuxie had cultivated the True Dragon Physique and could therefore assume the form of a dragon. But what, exactly, was this supposed to be?

The celestial crane moved with blinding speed, slipping past Cheng Meng's attack and flashing before the immortal stone in an instant. It snatched the stone up in its beak and immediately withdrew from the battlefield.

Meng Cheng and the other experts could do nothing but watch Liu Wuxie leave.

"Did I just see it right? Liu Wuxie transformed into a celestial crane?!" someone murmured dazedly.

Even immortals could not alter their bodies at will, as Liu Wuxie had. Only demonic beasts could transform into human form after their cultivation reached a certain level. Yet none of them had ever heard of a human who could take on a demonic beast's form after reaching a high cultivation level.

Liu Wuxie's transformation into a celestial crane instantly overturned everything they thought they understood. But the transformation lasted only a brief moment before he returned to human form and shot across the sky, quickening his pace as he gathered the treasures.

Every item carried numerous laws from the Fleeting Cloud Celestial Realm.

"Stop him!" Nalan Qianxun roared, mobilizing all the experts from the Nalan Clan and instantly forming an encirclement around Liu Wuxie. No one hated Liu Wuxie more than the Nalan Clan.

Liu Wuxie had not only caused the death of one of their quasi-immortals but also the deaths of their young master and young lady while destroying many of their assets. Only later did they learn that the two quasi-immortals had already left his side after he had killed the Peach Blossom Gate's sect master.

When Liu Wuxie had begun his massacre in Kaya City, the Nalan Clan had not dared to act because they feared the two quasi-immortals beside him. Now that they thought back about it, regret filled them to the core.

"Get lost!" Liu Wuxie roared. He had no interest in fighting them because collecting the treasures came first. He slashed out with a diagonal palm strike, sending all the experts flying.

At that moment, the spiritual arrays deployed by the Heavenly Dragon Sect and the Heavenly Dao Society became critically important, capturing many items. As for the remaining ones, they had not flown into that region, so the arrays could not intercept them.

The rest of the cultivators all rushed after the remaining items, trying to stop them from plunging into the depths of the universe.

Dragon aura flashed out and condensed into countless dragon claws, unleashing a force that left quasi-immortals in the dust.

After several consecutive snatches, more materials fell into Liu Wuxie's hands. This did not happen because Liu Wuxie's methods were superior. The other quasi-immortals were not slow, and they had also conjured their own palms.

Liu Wuxie's only advantage was Ghost Pupil, which allowed him to predict the trajectories of those items in advance. Because of that, he could seize them in the shortest possible time.

"Damn it! Damn it!" Meng Cheng roared in frustration, but he had no way to stop it.

Liu Wuxie was as cunning as a fox, slipping away every time they tried to surround him and never giving them an opening. He was too slippery for anyone to pin down.

Of the dozen or so items spewed from the gate, Liu Wuxie alone had taken five. The Heavenly Dragon Sect and the Heavenly Dao Society had also secured four, while the other sects picked up a few. Only several rocks had dropped into the depths of the universe and disappeared without a trace.

"Imprint!" Liu Wuxie released his aura and infused it into the treasures that had fallen into the depths of the universe.

Those items could land in any of the four astral domains, but as long as his aura remained imprinted on them, he would still be able to track them down. After all, they carried enormous amounts of laws from the celestial realm.

This wave of ejection came to an end with the Immortal Slaughter Palace, the Grand Unity Sect, the Nalan Clan, and the Loulan Race all returning empty-handed. Even the Witcher Clan had managed to seize a few items. Though the Witcher Clan had remained low-profile, no one dared to underestimate them.

Everyone continued waiting for the next ejection of items.

Ripples spread across space as a large group of the divinekin appeared among the crowd.

"It's the divine race!"

Everyone immediately parted when the divine race arrived, unwilling to make enemies of them.

The divine energy of the divine race could heavily suppress humanity's true essence, and anyone who opposed them rarely fared well.

Liu Wuxie narrowed his eyes.

"The divine son!" The divine son whom he had killed with his Eternal Divine Fist had returned to life.

"The Great Samsara Mythical Art!" He immediately understood that since he himself could return to life through that mythical art, the divine son could do the same.

However, once a person revived through the Great Samsara Mythical Art, reviving again after a second death would become extremely difficult. Only those who grasped the Gate of Samsara could revive without limit.

No one knew where the Gate of Samsara had fallen, and it had long since vanished from heaven and earth.

The divine son's gaze pierced across the sky and landed on Liu Wuxie. He merely nodded in greeting. There was little hostility between them because their relationship had always been unclear.

Perhaps fate itself had arranged things this way, dooming the two of them never to become friends.

Liu Wuxie returned the nod in greeting as well. He had already expected the divine son to revive, but he had not anticipated the divine son's cultivation to rise so quickly.

Discussions erupted all around them. "Wasn't the divine son dead? How did he appear here?"

When the divine son had died back then, only Liu Wuxie had heard him say 'thank you' in his final moment.

"Since Liu Wuxie was able to revive members of the Heavenly Dao Society, the divine son could naturally revive as well," the top-tier experts said, their expressions remaining calm.

"Is the Great Samsara Mythical Art really that powerful?" Most cultivators had neither witnessed the battle between Liu Wuxie and the divine son nor seen Liu Wuxie revive the members of the Heavenly Dao Society. Everything they knew came from hearsay, so seeing it now felt unbelievable.

The divine son led the experts of the divine race to a position fifty thousand meters away from Liu Wuxie, where the surrounding human cultivators had already withdrawn.

The divine race spread out on their own and joined the competition for the items. The moment they dispersed, a massive net appeared, woven by hundreds of divine race members, and it looked even more astonishing than Liu Wuxie's Trigram Net Skywolf Diagram.

"It's a net woven with ice silkworm's threads, and it's practically indestructible!" exclaimed a quasi-immortal from the Nine Dragon Palace.

The net covered a radius of over ten thousand meters and caught any item that fell within it. By now, it had become obvious that the divine race had arrived fully prepared.

Many sects shook their heads bitterly. They knew that the Heavenly Dragon Sect and the divine race would become the greatest winners this time, while everyone else could only depend on luck. If fortune favored them, a treasure would fall straight into their hands. By now, it was far too late to notify their sects and have a similar tool crafted.

Taking advantage of the brief pause, Liu Wuxie tossed every item he had obtained into the Sky Devouring Divine Cauldron and refined them. Though his cultivation did not break through, the laws from the celestial realm benefited him enormously.

The surrounding space began to collapse as Liu Wuxie refined those items. The laws of the celestial realm were too powerful; once they appeared, they could tear through heaven itself. This was especially true for the immortal stone Liu Wuxie had obtained, whose immortal energy was purer than all the others he possessed combined.

The desolate world continued to transform as laws from the celestial realm poured into it, reshaping its structure.

Then an even stranger phenomenon emerged. Instead of continuing to expand, the desolate world actually began to shrink, leaving Liu Wuxie shocked. He had originally assumed it would keep expanding after absorbing the laws of the celestial realm, but reality proved otherwise.

"I understand now! The laws of the Fleeting Cloud Celestial Realm are tens or even hundreds of thousands of times stronger than the laws in the astral domains. This means that they'll only compress the desolate world, and it will expand again once I ascend to the celestial realm," Liu Wuxie murmured, finally grasping the reason.

The laws from the celestial realm were too powerful. It was just like when he had first entered the astral domains from the True Martial Continent; the desolate world had begun to contract then as well, unable to withstand laws that were hundreds of times stronger.

But the shrinking of the desolate world did not mean Liu Wuxie had weakened. On the contrary, it made him even stronger.

The number of immortal runes began to fall, dropping from seventy to eighty thousand down to only three to four thousand. Yet their purity and toughness had increased by more than tenfold. The quantity of his immortal runes had decreased by half, but their quality had multiplied tenfold. What did that imply?

As Meng Cheng and Luo Jingshan sensed the surging aura around Liu Wuxie, they frowned. A strong foreboding rose within them, as though Liu Wuxie were preparing something terrifying, and if he succeeded, they would not leave the Outer Astral Spacetime alive.

"Elder Luo, what should we do now? Should we strike now?" Everyone had followed Elder Luo's suggestion earlier and focused on the treasures instead of Liu Wuxie. Yet he had still seized so many treasures.

"Prepare to act," Luo Jingshan said after recognizing the problem. They could not let Liu Wuxie continue to grow, or the consequences would be disastrous.

"Prepare for battle!" Dong Wu said after sensing that war had become inevitable.

The nearby gathered cultivators turned to look over, including the divine race.

Meanwhile, Liu Wuxie's desolate world, immortal energy, and immortal runes continued their transformation. The moment he clenched his fist, the surrounding space shattered into a massive black hole.

His eyes snapped open, and he turned toward Meng Cheng and the others, a ferocious glint flashing in his eyes. Since they were so eager to die, he would no longer hold back.

He had originally planned to kill them only after collecting the treasures, but they had proven even more impatient than he was. With that, a battle between them had become inevitable.

But before the fight could erupt, the mysterious gate shook once more, its vibration ten times as strong as before.

Everyone immediately turned toward the portal, and no one paid any attention to the battle that was about to break out.

Luo Jingshan also turned toward Meng Cheng and the others, seeking their opinion on whether they should focus on the treasures first or pursue Liu Wuxie.

"Let's wait," Shi Yifan said.

The Loulan Race could now survive only by relying on others, and they craved strength above all else. Compared to that, killing Liu Wuxie had already become secondary.

After all, they could no longer return to the Celestial Jade Star and could only remain in the Laman Astral Domain.

Everyone immediately spread out and prepared for the next eruption.

The Heavenly Dragon Sect also spread out and reestablished its spiritual arrays. They knew the second wave would surely release even more treasures, and everyone braced for it.

Liu Wuxie's gaze also remained locked on the mysterious gate. After the desolate world shrank, both his speed and Ghost Pupil had improved.