*Dao Era, Seed World, Heart of the Mirror Dimension*

Under the titanic pressure of the azure domains deployed by the seven Great Ancestors, every facet of the domain became covered in cracks, and these cracks spread like spiderwebs until they threatened the very integrity of space. Pieces of mirror regularly detached from the walls, and they spun in the void before crashing to the ground.

Yi Lan was in no condition to fight and BaiShe was out of breath. And it was then that Long Huang intervened.

Two pairs of dark membrane wings, with a span exceeding ten meters, suddenly burst from her back. The porcelain skin of her shoulder blades tore... Black and burning blood flowed along her shoulder blades, but this blood evaporated instantly upon contact with the air due to its extremely high temperature.

The black flames enveloping her changed nature under the effect of this metamorphosis: they became an extremely dense Yin, a glacial darkness that seemed to freeze the lava itself for several hundred kilometers around. The cold it emitted literally hurt, a spiritual bite that attacked the soul directly rather than the body, and BaiShe felt his own thoughts slow down under the effect of this cold.

Long Huang turned her head toward the Demigods, and her eyes had transformed into two pits of nothingness. Her mouth opened, and what came out was no longer a human voice.

"... We are going to crush them ..."

The ground beneath her feet became covered with thick Yin qi, then this frost shattered into a thousand pieces under the intensity of her spiritual pressure.

Simultaneously, BaiShe released the entirety of his Devourer power. He raised his Draconic Bone Sword, and the dragon vertebrae that composed the blade began to sizzle under the influx of Chaotic Qi. Each vertebra emitted a pulsating violet glow, and the dragon skull adorning the sword’s guard seemed to open its empty orbits to stare at the enemies.

"Lan’er, stay back. Your mission is to maintain this domain, no matter the cost..."

Yi Lan, kneeling a little further away, could no longer take an active part in the fight. She had crossed her nine tails behind her, and these tails formed a protective circle around her frail body.

She drew on her last strength to stabilize the mirror dimension, each tail vibrating with a silvery energy that poured into the cracked ground. Her hands were pressed against the broken crystal, and black veins climbed along her forearms, a sign that the effort was consuming her from within.

She watched her beloved with anguish, her sapphire eyes wet with tears of blood.

Long Huang propelled herself forward, and the ground beneath her feet exploded under the thrust. Her four wings beat once, yet this single flap created whirlwinds of black fire that devoured the azure domain of the Demigods.

The air itself caught fire, and the dust particles burned while emitting a smell of sulfur. She collided with the first Ancestor, an old man wielding a giant axe whose blade was wide.

The old man raised his weapon to parry, but the dragoness had already passed through his guard. With a swipe of her claws, she cleanly severed the opponent’s arm, and the limb fell to the ground spinning, still gripping its axe. Before the old man had time to scream, she sank her teeth into his throat.

The sound of the cervical vertebrae giving way was clear, a dry crack like dead branches being broken, and this sound was immediately followed by a fountain of golden blood that sprayed the dragoness’s face. She raised her head, her jaw dripping with this divine blood, and her eyes of nothingness shone with a bestial satisfaction.

As a result, the balance of the coalition was shaken. The Demigods looked at each other, and for the first time since they had set foot on this battlefield, fear crept into their gazes.

BaiShe took advantage of this breach.

He raised his Draconic Bone Sword, and the dragon vertebrae stirred as if they were still alive. He concentrated all the Khao that his Omega Heart provided him, and this chaotic energy poured into the blade forming violet arabesques.

Then he activated his <Arts: Abyss of the Thousand Hungry Hands>.

The space behind him tore.

From this tear, hundreds of frail limbs sprang out. Each arm was of a cadaverous thinness, the skin stretched over bones that were too prominent, and each hand had a mouth in place of the palm. These mouths were toothed, rows of teeth sharp as needles that clacked in the void with a macabre castanet sound. The frail limbs stirred like hungry tentacles, then they rushed toward a second Demigod.

"AAAAAHHHH"

The frail hands had seized him by the arms, by the legs, by the neck, and each toothed mouth sank into his flesh to reach his Dantian. One could hear the cracking of the thoracic bones under the pressure of these multiple bites, and the hiss of the Qi sucked in with monstrous voracity. The Demigod emptied himself of his substance in a few seconds, his skin withering before the eyes of his comrades, his muscles resorbing, his organs drying up. His body became a gray and dry envelope that collapsed into dust as soon as the frail hands released their grip.

"One more..."

BaiShe murmured these words, and his violet gaze shifted to fix on his next target. Yet, deep inside, he felt alarms going off. The use of such techniques at this stage of his divine cultivation pushed his meridians to the point of rupture.

Because he could not absorb this power without weeks of Cultivation.

Fulminating pains shot through his back, climbed along his spine, and each pulse of his Omega Heart sent an electric shock into his limbs. He felt his Qi begin to stagnate, an unbearable heat rising from his Dantian as if someone had lit a brazier in his belly. He risked a major Qi deviation, and this thought made him shudder.

His Omega Heart was pumping too much Khao for his first-stage Overlord body, creating an instability that threatened to consume him from within, melting his meridians.

Long Huang, for her part, had already neutralized two Demigods, and she was rushing toward a third without the slightest hesitation. She seized the man by the head, her fingers sinking into the orbits and cheeks with a force that made the skull bones crack.

With a brutal pressure, she made his head explode. The gray brain, mixed with the golden divine blood, flowed between her fingers like a thick mush, and she burst into a laugh that no longer had anything human about it.

Yet, despite this feat, she was starting to slow down. Her wings beat with less vigor, her movements lost precision, and on her torso, black marks appeared where the azure domain had touched her. The four remaining Demigods, aware of their imminent end, decided to synchronize their law attacks. They placed themselves in a circle, hands joined in front of their chests, and they chanted a millennial incantation with a single voice.

"Die!"

A massive and compact wave of azure light formed between their hands. This wave was dense as a steel wall, bright as a fusion sun, and it rushed straight toward Long Huang before she had time to dodge. The impact was of unheard-of violence. The dragoness was thrown backward like a rag doll, crossing several mirror walls that shattered in a rain of sparkling crystals.

She crossed three walls, four, five, before crashing heavily against a basalt pillar at the end of the domain. The pillar cracked under the shock, blocks of stone detached from the ceiling, and Long Huang remained inert at the foot of this shaken structure.

Her four wings hung pathetically along her back, broken, twisted, and black blood flowed from her temples in long viscous streams.

Seeing the Dragoness out of combat, the Demigods focused their attention on BaiShe.

Taking advantage of BaiShe’s instability, with a backhand of the sleeve charged with divine authority, he sent a shockwave that pulverized the last mirrors sealing the space. The crystal fragments exploded with a deafening noise, and the dimension regained its original fragility, its walls becoming covered in gaping cracks through which currents of icy air from elsewhere infiltrated. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

BaiShe tried to raise his blade to parry the imminent attack, but a spasm of pain nailed him in place. His muscles contracted violently, his back arched despite himself, and his Dantian groaned like a wounded animal. His Qi turned against him.

He felt his meridians twist, his veins swell, and a wave of nausea rose to his throat at the moment he spat out a trickle of silvery blood.

It was at this precise instant that the leader of the Demigods appeared before him.

The man had crossed space in a fraction of a second, and he held in his hand an azure light sword, a weapon made of pure condensed divine law and planted the blade directly into BaiShe’s chest.

A sound of meat being pierced, and immediately after, the cracking of the ribs giving way under the pressure.

The tip of the sword came out through the shoulder blade, carrying with it fragments of lung tissue that dangled at the end of the blade like shreds of fabric. BaiShe spat out a gush of blood.