Primordial Era: The Three Senior Brothers of the Taiqing Clan

With Chen Qing's support, the golden light curtain continued to expand, like a giant who had been sleeping for millions of years slowly stretching its limbs.

Wherever the golden lines landed, the darkness of Guixu receded an inch as if burned, emitting a sizzling sound, like ice and snow being thrown into boiling oil.

However, the darkness was too vast, and its contraction was negligible, far from enough to turn the tide of the battle.

The gray-robed old man's figure had completely merged into the surging black tide, leaving only his eyes suspended on the dark surface, like two pale lanterns about to go out.

His voice came from all directions, deep and long, as if struggling to rise little by little from the bottom of the deepest and most distant abyss: "Pangu was indeed very strong back then, strong enough to separate chaos and define heaven and earth with the power of one person."

But the seal he left behind was ultimately a consumable item. Countless eras have passed, and generations of cultivators in your primordial world have come and gone, but has anyone ever truly come to reinforce this seal?

No. You're all so preoccupied with vying for power and engaging in magical duels within your own little world, have you ever considered that deep within this chaos lurks an existence that even Pangu couldn't completely annihilate?

These words were like icicles, piercing the hearts of the seven sages.

Lao Tzu's expression remained unchanged, but the exquisite pagoda in his hand quietly turned around, its body emitting a warm golden light, gently blocking the darkness that tried to seep in from the side.

He slowly spoke, "Pangu sacrificed himself and sealed you with his Dao to imprison you here. If you are truly unshakeable, why utter these words to disturb our minds?"

The gray-robed elder's laughter seeped from the darkness, dry and hoarse: "I'm merely stating the facts. Seven of you have come today, plus a junior who has merged with Pangu's Dao Foundation, and you think you can suppress me again?"

"Whether we can suppress them or not," Tongtian took a step forward, and the four Zhuxian Swords trembled simultaneously around him, their sword cries like the roars of dragons and the howls of phoenixes, causing the entire void to tremble slightly. "We'll only know after we fight."

Before the words were even finished, the Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation had already been activated. Four longswords flew out simultaneously, landing at four points on the edge of the Ruins of Return, their tips pointing downwards, hovering in mid-air.

Tongtian formed hand seals, and strands of sharp sword intent surged from his body, connecting the four swords along four invisible paths.

In an instant, a huge sword formation phantom slowly emerged at the boundary between darkness and golden light. The sword intent within the formation was as dense as a torrential rain, and each sword aura carried the decisiveness to sever all things.

The Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation is the number one killing formation in the primordial world. Tongtian used this sword formation to suppress all heroes, and even Laozi and Yuanshi, who joined forces, did not dare to easily break through it.

At this moment, Tongtian pushed the formation to its limit—the four swords swung endlessly, and wherever the swords pointed, the darkness of Guixu was sliced ​​away layer by layer, as if a sharp blade were used to slice open a piece of aged frozen meat.

The fragments of darkness that were cut off tumbled, struggled, and hissed in the air, trying to reassemble, but were shredded into finer black mist by the subsequent surge of sword energy, and finally dissipated completely in the light of the golden seal.

For the first time, the gray-robed elder's voice carried a hint of solemnity: "The Immortal Execution Sword... is even sharper than it was back then."

But he did not retreat. Suddenly, a thicker, more viscous black tide surged from the depths of darkness. This black tide was different from the previous one, containing countless tiny, wriggling black dots, like billions of insects indistinguishable to the naked eye gathered together.

Those black spots, attached to the sword energy of the Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation, actually began to slowly gnaw at the sword intent, gradually corroding and dulling the sharp sword edge.

Tongtian frowned, and with his left index and middle fingers together, he drew a circle in front of him.

The four Immortal Execution Swords then accelerated their rotation, and the light on their blades suddenly surged, shaking off most of the black spots that had attached themselves to them.

But he could sense that the Zhuxian Sword Formation was becoming increasingly strained, and the corrosive power of the black tide was penetrating every crevice of the formation in an extremely stubborn way.

Yuanshi did not stand idly by.

He stepped forward, slowly raising the jade ruyi in his hand. The jade ruyi was pure white, like mutton fat, with a rice-grain-sized chaotic bead set at its top, within which stars faintly swirled.

He gently stroked the jade ruyi, and a clear light shot out from the tip of the ruyi. The light was not as sharp as sword energy, but it carried an extremely clear "dividing" power—clear and turbid, good and evil, light and dark. All things that were chaotic and undifferentiated would be forcibly separated under the light of the jade ruyi.

The clear light pierced into the darkness, like a blade splitting a stubborn rock.

The darkness of Guixu was split in two along the path of Qingguang. The darkness on both sides surged and retreated to either side, revealing a gap about ten feet wide in the middle.

Within the gaps, one could vaguely see an extremely ancient net-like structure woven from dark gold runes—the original seal left by Pangu, which, though mostly dimmed, still stubbornly persisted.

"The seal is still intact," Yuan Shi said in a deep voice, "It hasn't completely collapsed. As long as we force back the darkness that has seeped in, the seal will repair itself."

Upon hearing this, Nuwa unfurled the Map of Mountains and Rivers. The scroll slowly unfolded in her hands, revealing lifelike mountains, rivers, sun, moon, and stars. The entire scroll exuded an extremely warm aura, as if it had condensed the vitality of the entire primordial world into this small space.

Nuwa tossed the scroll upwards, and the "Map of Mountains and Rivers" unfolded in the air into a huge screen of light, on which rivers rushed, plants grew, and birds flew across the sky.

The vitality in those images spread outwards as if it were a tangible thing, and wherever it reached, the darkness of the Ruins began to evaporate rapidly, like mist illuminated by sunlight.

Jieyin and Zhunti stood side by side, forming hand seals simultaneously. Two beams of light, one golden and one white, intertwined and transformed into a giant lotus platform of Buddha light.

The lotus platform slowly rotated, and each petal emitted a soft, bright light. The light was neither domineering nor sharp, but carried an extremely gentle "purifying" power.

When the darkness touched the light of the lotus platform, it first recoiled sharply, then quieted down like a tamed beast and slowly retreated.

The seven sages used their respective methods, and the patterns on the golden seal expanded faster and faster under the infusion of their spiritual power, already covering nearly a third of the area at the edge of the Ruins.

The old man in the gray robe rolled his pale eyes in the darkness, seemingly assessing the situation, before letting out a very low laugh from deep in his throat.

"The combined power is indeed considerable." His voice suddenly became more focused and concentrated in one direction, no longer erratic.

The darkness suddenly contracted inwards, and the gray-robed old man's figure reformed, but his appearance had changed drastically—his gray-white robe had turned completely black, like cloth soaked in ink.

Countless fine black lines appeared on his withered face, like living earthworms slowly wriggling on his skin.

His eyes were still pale, but deep within his pupils there was a hint of dark red, like the last flickering flame in the embers of a burning coal.

He raised his right hand, spread his five fingers, and gently pressed it against the expanding golden seal.

The movement, though seemingly gentle, caused the entire Ruins of Return to tremble violently.

A deep, muffled roar, seemingly emanating from the depths of the earth, suddenly erupted from beneath the seal. The extending golden patterns abruptly halted for a moment upon being pressed down, and then several finer patterns shattered like torn threads, turning into specks of golden light that dissipated into the void.

Chen Qing's body jolted violently, and a trickle of blood seeped from the corner of his mouth.

Although Pangu Dao Foundation had merged with him, supporting such a seal that covered the entire edge of the Ruins of Return was still a huge drain on him.

But he did not let go.

His hands remained in the mudra position, his ten fingers slightly white from excessive force.

He once again activated the Pangu Dao Foundation within his body, transforming more chaotic power into golden patterns to mend the broken sections.

The newly formed lines are thicker and more robust than before, and their flow is slower and more steady, like the roots of a tree taking firm foothold in the soil step by step.

"You're just putting on a brave face." The gray-robed elder looked at the bloodstains at the corner of Chen Qing's mouth, his voice devoid of sarcasm, only a statement. "While Pangu's Dao Foundation is indeed powerful, your physical body cannot withstand this force for long. At most, half an hour later, your body will begin to crumble."

"Half an hour," Chen Qing said, his voice slightly hoarse but surprisingly steady, "is enough."

The gray-robed old man's eyes flashed. In that instant, Tongtian had quietly shifted the position of the Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation by a third, and the four longswords simultaneously retracted, compressing the range of the sword formation to half of its original size.

The density of the compressed sword formation suddenly doubled, and the sword intent poured down like a storm, shredding all the darkness within three feet of the gray-robed old man.

The gray-robed old man was forced back half a step by the sword formation. The dark red light in his pale eyes suddenly shone brightly. He clenched his right hand, and a thick black pillar gushed out from the depths of the Ruins of Return, crashing straight into the towering sword formation.

The black pillars collided with the sword formation, sparking dazzling sparks. The two forces tore violently at the boundary, producing a sharp sound like metal scraping against metal.

Tongtian gritted his teeth.

The power of that black pillar exceeded his expectations. The four swords of the Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation trembled slightly, and the light on the swords flickered like a candle in the wind.

He could sense that the power contained within that black pillar was extremely ancient, completely different from ordinary demonic energy. It contained a suffocating feeling that made him almost want to retreat, like staring into an abyss.

"I'll do it." Yuanshi stepped forward.

This time, instead of using the jade ruyi, he aimed the Chaos Pearl of the Ancestral Dragon at the bottom of the black pillar—the fissure deep within the Ruins of Return, where black tides were still surging forth.

The Chaos Pearl slowly rotated, and the Dao within it suddenly accelerated. A powerful suction force emanated from the pearl, like an invisible vortex, frantically drawing the black tide surging from the rift towards it.

The Chaos Pearl is an extremely special innate spiritual treasure; its essence is chaos.

Although that black tide was violent, ancient, and corrosive, it was ultimately a variant of the chaotic energy.

The Chaos Pearl absorbed the black tide, which was then filtered, refined, and transformed through the miniature world within the pearl. When it was expelled, it had become relatively mild spiritual energy, which then dispersed in all directions.

This tactic is extremely effective.

The black tide surging from the depths of Guixu could not keep up with the speed at which the Chaos Pearl absorbed it. After losing its subsequent replenishment, the black pillar that crashed into the Zhuxian Sword Formation rapidly weakened, and the pressure on the Tongtian Sword Formation decreased sharply.

The four longswords exerted their power simultaneously, shredding the remaining black pillar in one fell swoop.

The gray-robed elder's expression finally changed. He stared at the jade ruyi in Yuanshi's hand, and for the first time, a clear sense of apprehension appeared in his pale eyes: "The Chaos Pearl... Pangu actually left this behind as well?"

Yuanshi did not answer.

The operation of the Chaos Pearl was exacerbating his spiritual energy consumption. This level of absorption and conversion was also strenuous for him and could not be sustained for long.

But as long as we can hold out until the golden seal covers the edge of the Ruins again, that will be enough.

Nuwa captured the moment when the gray-robed elder was distracted. She suddenly thrust the Mountain and River Map forward, and the entire scroll pressed down on the gray-robed elder like a rushing wall. The mountains and rivers on the scroll transformed into tangible projections, directly enveloping the gray-robed elder within them.

The gray-robed old man's figure suddenly froze in the projection, as if he had fallen into a quagmire—the world of the Mountain and River Map has its own set of rules, and any being that is involved in it must first adapt to the laws of this world before it can act. Even if the adaptation time is only a few breaths, it is enough for the seven saints to complete a joint attack.

Lao Tzu did not miss this opportunity. The exquisite pagoda in his hand flew out and spun rapidly in the air, each layer of the pagoda radiating dazzling golden light.

The golden light did not directly attack the gray-robed elder, but instead shot into the projection of the Mountain and River Map, transforming into a golden cage inside the projection, trapping the gray-robed elder in the center layer upon layer.

Jieyin and Zhunti simultaneously activated the Buddha Light Lotus Platform. The enormous lotus flower on the platform slowly bloomed to its fullest extent, and a thick beam of platinum light shot out from the lotus heart, piercing straight into the golden cage projected in the Mountain and River Map.

The platinum light carried a purifying power, peeling away the black aura within the cage layer by layer, like unraveling a cocoon.

Tongtian pressed down on the sword formation, concentrating all his energy on maintaining its operation.

His task was to block the gray-robed old man's escape route—as soon as the old man tried to escape from the Mountain and River Map, the Immortal Slaughtering Sword Formation would immediately seal off the void in all directions, leaving him with no way to retreat.

The gray-robed old man was suppressed layer by layer, and the golden cage around him continued to shrink, the light scorching his black robes and emitting a burnt smell.

The dark red light in his pale eyes flickered rapidly, and suddenly, he stopped struggling.

He paused for a moment, then slowly raised the corners of his mouth to reveal an extremely strange smile.

"Why do you think... I'm standing here waiting for you?"

Before the words were finished, the black tide that had been absorbed by the Chaos Pearl in the depths of Guixu suddenly stopped flowing out—not because it dried up, but because it was like a door being suddenly pushed open from the inside.

An aura a hundred times stronger than all the previous black tides combined surged forth from the depths of the rift. The aura was so heavy it was almost tangible, causing the seven saints to gasp for breath.