Sage Monarch

Young Master Shroud-Heaven was working with numerous demon-devils, plus his so-called Shroud-Heaven Alliance, to activate a massive spell formation in the Heavendawn Quarry, and use it to kill the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi had learned that, plus many other interesting tidbits. For example, he now knew that the Hanging Mountain had opened a passageway to the Hell of Suras, to give Young Master Shroud-Heaven a place to further his cultivation and prepare for the fight.

Among the innumerable different hells, the Hell of Suras was known as a fierce and terrifying place. It ranked far higher than the Hell of Euphoria, the Hell of Never-Ending, or other such places. According to many ancient records, the Hell of Suras was a place of evil fiends and devils. Far in the past, suras and fiend-devils were the strongest fighters of all, and were often appointed as leaders of the armies of hell. They were the ones who led the fight against the gods of heaven. 

The devil-ghost inhabitants of a hell like that were not the type that ordinary humans could fight.

In fact, if the Great Sages of the past had accidentally connected to the Hell of Suras instead of the Hell of Euphoria, the Yore-Wilds Continent would likely have been destroyed.

That was where Young Master Shroud-Heaven had supposedly trained, and yet, Yang Qi had the feeling it was only a rumor. Thanks to his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he innately understood certain things about hell, and could open a portal, not to the Hell of Suras, but to an aspect of space-time that had been influenced by it, where the fiend-devils were mighty to the extreme.

After all, even a Great Sage who entered the Hell of Suras would be ripped to pieces and consumed within a matter of moments.

Therefore, even getting close to the Hell of Suras, and training with the entities who had been influenced by it, would be a major affair. The Hell of Suras was known as a place of battle, and the worlds that existed in the space-time around it were so filled with a will of battle that the entities there were all demonized, and looked just like suras and fiend-devils.

Yang Qi knew of such matters, and also realized that the Rich-Lush Continent was a small place, essentially a tiny chunk of the Yore-Wilds Continent of the past. And even the Yore-Wilds Continent had been little more than a drop in the ocean of the universe at large.

The ultimate size of the universe was something Yang Qi couldn’t even begin to wrap his mind around.

And as for the heaven that the legion of gods inhabited, he had no idea where it was, and in fact, couldn’t even speculate about it. After all, in the Demi-Immortal Institute, even conclave students could only cultivate royal-class energy arts. Imperial-class energy arts were as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns, and when it came to saintly- or heavenly-class, they were unheard-of.

At the moment, Yang Qi lay in hiding and continued to eavesdrop on the blood demons.

All of a sudden, a whistling scream could be heard from far off in the distance. Then, a massive beam of sword light became visible, piercing through the sea of clouds toward Blood Demon Grotto. The terrifying sword energy was so powerful that the entire lake of blood was whipped up into a fury.

The blood demons present all began to back away, looks of terror on their faces.

Then, the sword light faded away, revealing a group of people led by a man in a white robe, who stood there ramrod straight, pulsing with an intense sword energy that was far more powerful than the Patriarch Frost-Drake that Yang Qi had encountered in the past.

This man was a Legendary.

“Swordguru Flying-Cloud!” one of the female blood demons exclaimed.

“Correct. I'm Swordguru Flying-Cloud, leader of the Hall of the Flying-Cloud Sword Dao.” Swordguru Flying-Cloud seemed to emanate the sharpness of a sword, to the point where the surrounding blood-colored mists were collapsing because of his mere presence. “I'm also one of the eighteen leaders of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. Now, where is King Blood Demon? Young Master Shroud-Heaven has ordered me to work with him to activate this section of the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation. Then, we merely need to wait for the Crown Prince of the Demi-Immortal Institute to fall into the trap. Other leaders of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance are already taking their places in other locations of the Heavendawn Quarry, waiting to do the same with other fiend-devil viscounts.”

Not waiting for a response, Swordguru Flying-Cloud spoke in a voice that stabbed like a sword into the depths of the blood-colored lake. “King Blood Demon, show your face!”

BOOOOOOOM!

A massive wave of blood rolled out as a Legendary figure appeared, clad in a blood-colored robe, who emanated shocking levels of power. He was a blood demon, but he looked like a human in every aspect. Furthermore, there was a massive, blood-red canopy that floated over his head, swirling nonstop like some sort of crimson lotus flower.

This was one of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, King Blood Demon, an expert powerful enough to stain the sea of clouds red as if with blood.

“You’re just in time, Swordguru Flying-Cloud,” King Blood Demon said, his bright red eyes flickering. “I've been waiting for a while now. There’s no time to lose. We need to carry out the task assigned by Young Master Shroud-Heaven as quickly as possible. Send your men to those mountain peaks over there. All of them are nodes in the spell formation that need to be maintained. Looks like you brought just enough people.”

“Of course I did,” Swordguru Flying-Cloud replied. “Young Master Shroud-Heaven has been setting up this trap for who knows how long. It’s only natural that I would come fully prepared. Very well, let’s begin.”

As the orders were passed down, whooshing sounds could be heard as people began flying toward the various caves on the tops of the nearby mountain peaks.

Swordguru Flying-Cloud and King Blood Demon took positions in the middle of the blood lake, where they sent out streams of true energy to take control of the spirit lodes in the area.

**

Keeping out of sight, Yang Qi crept closer to one of the mountains.

After all, the cave in that mountain was occupied by someone he recognized: Patriarch Frost-Drake.

**

“Dammit,” Patriarch Frost-Drake grumbled. “If that brat hadn’t taken my Ice-Soul God-Sword, then I'd be a Legendary by now, I wouldn’t be any weaker than that Swordguru Flying-Cloud. Unfortunately, I'm little more than an ordinary henchman now.”

After making his way into the dark depths of the tunnel, Patriarch Frost-Drake found an area filled with complex decorations depicting horrific scenes of torment from hell.

In the center of it all was a column decorated with totemic markings, images of extremely realistic devil-gods that belched out demon energy and emitted soundless screams.

Looking leerily at the devil-god totems, Patriarch Frost-Drake sat down. “I wonder if Young Master Shroud-Heaven is actually going to kill that fabled Crown Prince. The Crown Prince is supposed to be a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He’s definitely nobody to take lightly. Hmm. This column has the souls of numerous devil-gods imprisoned in it. Once the spell formation is activated, I need to feed it with my own blood. It’s going to be damaging, but supposedly, we’ll get compensated after the fact. Of course, we won’t get any compensation at all if Young Master Shroud-Heaven doesn't win.”

Gritting his teeth, Patriarch Frost-Drake muttered half to himself, “Damnation! If I ever run into that little punk again, I'm definitely going to use the power of Young Master Shroud-Heaven to chop him to pieces!”

“Oh really? I'm right here. Chop away.” Sealing the entire cave, Yang Qi stepped out into the open.

“It’s you…! Y-y-you….”

Patriarch Frost-Drake leaped to his feet and dashed toward the entrance of the cave in the hopes of calling for help.

Of course, it was a doomed effort. Yang Qi had been prepared for just that. Waving his hand, he summoned a True Energy Megahand that forced Patriarch Frost-Drake to the ground.

He was now like a squashed toad, incapable of rising to his feet.

“I put you in your place back then, Patriarch Frost-Drake, and I'm hundreds of times stronger now. I could kill you with the snap of a finger. You're like a ball of dough, just waiting to be squished whichever way I want. Understand? Fight back, I’ll kill you and disperse both your spiritual and physical souls.”

“I won’t! I wouldn’t dare!” Patriarch Frost-Drake groveled, knocking his head onto the ground as he kowtowed.

“Very well, that’s much better.” With that, he dissipated the True Energy Megahand, allowing Patriarch Frost-Drake to rise to his feet. Of course, Patriarch Frost-Drake didn’t dare to talk back, although he couldn’t help but wonder why he was being plagued by this fiend again.

“Tell me what’s going on here,” Yang Qi said. “You people are trying to kill the Crown Prince?”

Patriarch Frost-Drake didn’t dare to hide anything. “That’s right. Young Master Shroud-Heaven has mobilized everyone from the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. They’re here in the Heavendawn Quarry, ready to power an ancient spell formation that can kill the Crown Prince.” 

Yang Qi’s eyes flashed. “How come I wasn’t aware that there was a spell formation like that here?”

“It was a secret known only by the Demonfolk from the Hanging Mountain,” Patriarch Frost-Drake replied. “Even I just found out about it. Apparently, Great Sages of the Demonfolk hid a spell formation of immense power in the Heavendawn Quarry, long ago. Young Master Shroud-Heaven called on everyone to help, including the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, and the fiend-devil viscounts from Fiend-Devil Island. He even got a fiend-devil count to help.”

Fiend-devil viscounts were all Quinary Lifeseizers or higher, and the counts were Legendaries. That much Yang Qi had personally learned on Fiend-Devil Island.

“Oh really? Presumably, you have a map of the formation, correct? I'm curious to see how exactly it works.” Yang Qi reached out his hand expectantly.

“Of course I do. Young Master Shroud-Heaven distributed these to everyone in the alliance, and we’ve been training with it for days. Here, take a look.” With that, Patriarch Frost-Drake used his true energy to summon a huge map, complete with mountains, valleys, tunnels, and the like. After examining it for only a moment, Yang Qi noticed something strange.

“What's that?” In the very middle of the map was what appeared to be a wide-open plain, in the middle of which was a sphere that resembled a fear-inspiring eye.

“The very middle of the spell formation is called the Sura Devil-Eye.”

“What?” Yang Qi was immediately struck with immense shock as he realized that he recognized the location from his own map. It was the same place where the monster he sought was sealed. Now, he couldn’t help but feel even more confused about what the chancellor was up to.