Divine Root Bone

The evil spirit's origin, its perception had already spread across a radius of ten miles. Even the slightest movement of a breeze rustling through the wild grass in the mountains could not escape its vast and far-reaching spiritual detection. When a figure slowly emerged on the horizon hundreds of feet away, the evil will that had been entrenched there suddenly tensed up. A deep-seated fear, stemming from instinct, surged like an icy tide, instantly engulfing its entire primal consciousness.

At this moment, the Daoist aura slowly emanating from the old man in the distance made it clearly perceive an insurmountable chasm. It was a heavy aura that touched the laws of shallow space. Just a wisp of the leaked Daoist aura made the Yin and evil power flowing around its body stagnate and block, and even the speed of mobilizing the Yin and evil from the ground was slowed down by several points.

The evil spirit's true nature dared not easily divert its own primordial power to scout out the enemy. The Yin Sha Grand Array, maintained underground for ten thousand years, was its fundamental reliance for survival. Every moment, the entire ancient array drained seventy percent of its primordial spiritual power. If its primordial power were to leak out in large quantities and collapse, the array would immediately develop large-scale spatial rifts, the channels for transporting pure evil energy would become unstable, and its grand plan to devour the lifespans of cultivators in the four regions of Cangxuan would collapse entirely in an instant. Constrained by its own cultivation level, it could only superficially draw upon the meager Yin spiritual energy of heaven and earth to nourish its primordial spirit, unable to touch upon the true principles of space. If it were to forcibly split off a large amount of its primordial power, its own cultivation level would even drop.

After much deliberation, the evil spirit could only reluctantly peel away the meager essence of its remaining thirty percent of power, and once again condense dozens of evil spirit clones at the peak of the Golden Core level. It wanted to use the dense Yin energy of the graveyard to conceal its aura, so that it could quietly rush forward and test the true strength of the uninvited guest.

This old man, who came from the Central Plains, was able to control the shallow space at will, and the void isolation layer around him was several times more stable than the barrier that the evil spirits could create.

The golden core peak avatar condensed by evil spirits was tightly imprisoned by layers of spatial rules. Its body was like snowflakes colliding with raging fire in front of the old man's void barrier.

bang bang bang-

A series of dense, fragmented explosions resounded in mid-air. Dozens of black shadow clones, condensed from the remaining power of evil essence, merely touched the surface of the void barrier. Their physical bodies, yin energy, and residual essence disintegrated and dissolved simultaneously. Not even a tiny ripple could be stirred on the thin, translucent void membrane. In an instant, they turned into countless fragments of black ash, which were swept away by the cold, yin winds flowing through the mountains and vanished without a trace.

at this time.

The evil source instantly sensed the complete annihilation of all its scouting pawns. Its invisible primordial will trembled violently, and an intense, overwhelming terror swept across the entire graveyard. All the scouts it had sent out with only a third of its remaining primordial power had not only failed to probe the opponent's strength in the slightest, but had not even forced the old man to move a single step or activate a trace of spiritual power. From beginning to end, the old man had easily crushed all its scouting methods by relying solely on the innate, self-operating primordial spirit void barrier.

The gap between the two was so vast it was despairing. The evil spirit's origin could only draw upon the sparse Yin energy of heaven and earth to nourish its primordial spirit, its body shrouded in faint, ethereal clouds, utterly unable to grasp the deep principles of spatial operation. Yet this old man, with a single, unmanipulated layer of void isolation, had completely sealed off all its channels of detection, proving that the other's cultivation surpassed its own by a minor realm, allowing it to freely manipulate shallow space. Between them lay an insurmountable chasm. In the brief standoff, the evil spirit's origin had already made its decision: this old man who had arrived through the air was the most powerful enemy it had encountered in its ten thousand years of entrenched existence here. If it allowed the old man to land safely, all the advantages it had built up relying on the Yin Sha Grand Array and the evil energy supply from the Heavenly Palace would vanish in an instant.

Just as the source of the evil spirit was shaken and secretly frightened, the old man who walked slowly through the air had already crossed layers of void and stood steadily a hundred feet above the entire graveyard.

The old man's beard and hair were as white as snow, and his posture was as upright as an ancient pine tree that never breaks. There was not a trace of fierceness or killing intent about him; only the profound and orthodox Daoist aura accumulated over countless years flowed slowly. He was an elder of the Zhang family who had rushed from the Central Plains to provide assistance. He had already thoroughly understood all the rules of the shallow space. With a wave of his hand, he could distort the surrounding void at will. If a low-level cultivator stepped into the spatial domain surrounding him, all his teleportation and escape techniques would immediately become ineffective.

The old man possessed a long lifespan of eight thousand years, with a solid and perfect foundation and a flawless Dao base, far surpassing the evil origins that relied on unorthodox paths and confined to a desolate mountain.

At this moment, the evil spirit's origin and all the supernatural powers derived from the space were rendered useless. The attacks it launched lacked the support of spatial laws and landed on the old man's stable primordial spirit void barrier. They were simply isolated and dissolved by the old man himself, and he could not even touch the old man's clothes.

The elder slightly closed his eyes, and an invisible primordial spirit power poured down, penetrating through layers of grave soil and rock, reaching the core where the evil source was hidden underground.

In the blink of an eye, all the sources of chaos in the back mountain of Shoushan Village were clearly reflected in his soul. The complete operation of the 100,000 Yin Sha Grand Array, the pure evil energy continuously supplied, the corpse puppets controlled by Yin Sha to slaughter the rogue cultivators in the southeast region, and the complete trajectory of the lifespan of thousands of mortals and cultivators being secretly stolen—all the secrets were exposed and could not be concealed.

"A sinister force in a corner steals the creation of heaven and earth, harming all living beings and spirits; its crimes are unforgivable."

The elder's voice was calm and deep, each word carrying a shallow layer of spatial law, like a decree of judgment descended from the heavens, echoing throughout the entire back mountain wilderness. The surging black mist in the mountains trembled and rose violently with his voice. As his voice fell, his deep, abyss-like gaze precisely locked onto the restless, malevolent source of evil energy deep beneath the ground.

Beneath the graveyard, the source of evil poured out its full Yin energy, condensing into a giant, skeletal shadow ten feet tall. Thousands of vengeful spirits howled and entwined around the shadow's limbs and torso, while thick, inky black mist enveloped its entire body. Two completely different and equally terrifying auras clashed violently, locked in a deadly standoff across dozens of feet of gloomy void.

On one side was the righteous and vast power of the Great Dao, naturally suppressing evil and wickedness, as heavy and stable as a mountain, with layers of fine ripples spreading around it, possessing a natural pressure to suppress all evil and filth; on the other side was the cold and bone-corroding, twisted and frenzied evil power, relying on the complete Yin Sha formation underground to surge and pull wildly, absorbing the death energy of the entire mountain and gathering it into itself. The moment the two energy fields collided violently, the entire back mountain rock layer cracked and split, earthen mounds collapsed and shattered, and fragments of stones, withered bones, and rotten wood flew everywhere. A suffocatingly heavy sense of oppression enveloped the world, and even the cold and yin wind that originally flowed through the mountains came to a complete standstill under the clash of the two forces.

The deathly silence lasted for a full five breaths.

Although the evil spirit felt a deep fear in its heart, it showed no intention of retreating or hiding. The ferocity that had been dormant for 100,000 years surged and erupted. This place was its absolute home ground, which it had personally cultivated for 100,000 years. The entire back mountain's earth veins and the Yin Sha array that connected the earth's depths were all deeply connected to its own origin. Fighting with all its might here, the Yin power it could mobilize could temporarily increase by 30%.

As long as the foundation of the great formation remains intact, its spiritual power will never run dry, and the continuous evil energy can constantly repair the loss of its essence caused by combat.

It also intends to fight to the death. As long as it can severely injure or kill the opponent, it can continue to advance its ten-thousand-year plan to devour the lifespan of cultivators from the four regions.

"You old scoundrel from Zhongzhou, stop interfering with my grand, age-old undertaking!"

A hoarse, piercing roar, like the rubbing and weaving of countless withered bones, exploded from the depths of the underground graveyard, its frenzied and violent aura sweeping across the land. The malevolent phantom suddenly raised its arms high, all the surging dark yin energy around it converging and compressing into its arms, instantly draining the yin energy from the earth's veins beneath the entire graveyard. The earth trembled violently, and countless dark yin energies shot into the sky from the cracks in the ground, coiling around the ten-zhang-tall giant shadow's arms.

It knew that the opponent controlled the shallow space, and all its escape and clone methods would be suppressed by the spatial rules. The longer it delayed, the more obvious its disadvantage would become. Only by striking first and using the home field amplification and endless evil energy supply to launch a desperate attack could it find a glimmer of hope.

"Yin Sha Soul Devouring Kill!"

A chilling, malevolent howl tore through the oppressive air. The illusory figure of the evil waved its arms, and the billowing black mist around it suddenly compressed to its extreme. The originally scattered and violent sinister power instantly condensed into a jet-black, fine, and incredibly fast beam of light that could tear at the line of sight. This was its ultimate, innate divine power, specifically designed to attack the cultivator's heart meridians and the origin of their soul. It was extremely insidious and domineering, specifically seeking out the slightest weakness or flaw in the cultivator's protective barrier to strike directly at the core of the body's blood and qi circulation.

A jet-black killing light tore through the surrounding void, accompanied by a piercing, sharp whistling sound. Ignoring the dozens of feet of void barrier, it struck with pinpoint accuracy towards the heart of the old man in mid-air. The heart meridian is the core of a cultivator's blood and qi circulation, and a crucial node in the circulation of the body's protective power. Once breached, blood and qi become disordered, protective power dissipates, and cultivation will suffer a significant loss. The surging evil energy beneath the graveyard surged wildly, layer upon layer reinforcing this deadly blade of light. The evil source poured all its available power into a desperate gamble, attempting to severely injure or even kill this elder of Zhongzhou in one strike.

As the deadly black light arrived in an instant, the old man standing high in the sky remained expressionless, calm to the point of indifference. Facing the fatal blow, there was not a ripple in his eyes, and he didn't even bother to raise his hand to block.

Just as the dark killing light was about to touch his clothes, a faint ripple appeared around the old man's innate, ever-flowing primordial spirit void barrier.

Naturally passively protected, it requires no activation or operation and can isolate all low-level temporal and yin-evil attacks. The Soul-Devouring Kill, which evil spirits unleash with all their might, is ultimately just a low-level evil technique derived from the yin energy underground and is no match for the stable void barrier.

Ding--

A crisp, melodious sound, like the clinking of gold and jade, suddenly rang out.

The primordial spirit's void barrier remained completely still, without a single crack or sign of collapse. The next second, the backlash from the inherent laws of shallow space erupted suddenly. The void isolation layer, imbued with the rules of the Great Dao, trembled slightly, forcefully shattering, disintegrating, and completely dissolving the pitch-black killing light from the middle. The overwhelming black evil energy crumbled into nothingness inch by inch. The previously overwhelming killing technique vanished in an instant, failing to even cause the slightest disturbance to the old man.

The evil spirit's source beneath the earth trembled violently, its enormous ten-zhang-tall phantom shaking and shuddering, its invisible primordial will filled with unbelievable terror. Impossible! This was its ultimate technique, unleashed with seventy percent of its power, relying on its home ground. Even a cultivator of the same level would not be able to withstand it so easily, and would likely suffer severe damage to its source instantly. Yet this old man before it easily neutralized its trump card move with just a layer of void barrier that didn't require activation, without even scratching its skin.

If Zhang Yang saw this at this moment, he would definitely fall into deep thought... The difference between the levels of cultivation is so vast that it's like heaven and earth.

Resentment, madness, and violence instantly overwhelmed the evil spirit's reason. Never before had it felt such a frustrating and powerless battle. Its home-field advantage remained, and pure evil energy continued to flow into its very being, its spiritual power inexhaustible! It refused to believe that, having exhausted all its resources, it couldn't even scratch its opponent!

"I don't believe it!!"

A fierce and frenzied roar echoed throughout the entire Yin Sha graveyard. The source of evil spirits went completely berserk. The ten-zhang-tall illusory skeleton expanded wildly outward, and the black aura of skeletons surrounding it was so dense that it was almost solidified. It drew upon all the deep Yin Sha from the earth veins of the entire back mountain graveyard without reservation.

The underground rock strata exploded and collapsed with a deafening roar, unleashing endless, dark, malevolent energy that surged skyward and converged around the illusory figure. This energy transformed into countless bizarre and evil spells, layer upon layer, relentlessly and without gaps, bombarding the old man relentlessly. Yin Wind Bone-Eroding Claw, Ten Thousand Corpses Devouring Heart Curse, Nine Netherworld Annihilation Miasma, Thousand Fiend God-Shattering Needles—one after another, these insidious and evil spells, inherited from the Heavenly Palace beyond the heavens, were unleashed without reservation.

The black, evil light obscured the entire sky, corroding the surface of the surrounding space. It densely covered all directions around the old man, completely sealing off all escape routes. It attempted to use its endless, sinister power to grind down the seemingly thin void barrier around the old man, utterly obliterating his physical body and soul.

At this moment, the entire cemetery on the back mountain became a living hell. The yin energy surged to the heavens, the evil energy tore through the air, and the killing intent permeated every inch of the mountain space. The extremely gloomy and desperate sense of oppression was enough to freeze the souls of ordinary cultivators.

Faced with this devastating, relentless onslaught that could level an entire mountain range, the Zhang family elder remained upright, standing quietly in the void, his robes unwavering, calmly looking down at the evil spirits struggling madly and in vain below, like a god looking down at ants struggling futilely in the earth.

Countless evil spells and countless deadly divine abilities bombarded the old man's primordial spirit barrier layer upon layer.

Boom boom boom!

The earth-shattering explosions continued one after another, echoing across the heavens and the earth. Black evil light exploded wildly and scattered in all directions, and a storm of yin energy swept across the entire back mountain. The mountain trembled violently, all the abandoned graves collapsed, rocks rolled down, and vegetation turned to ashes in an instant. The world was pitch black, with only endless yin energy surging and churning.

But once the dust and smoke slowly dissipated and the turbulent flow of yin energy subsided, the void reappeared.

The old man remained standing in place, his translucent void barrier as smooth as new, without a trace of dimness or damage. All the domineering and sinister spells had failed, dissolving into the void barrier, not even having the chance to shake this passive protective membrane.

All the ferocious attacks were like a child punching an ancient sacred mountain—futile, laughable, and utterly pointless.

The enormous, withered skeleton phantom of the evil source trembled and shook violently. The density of the evil energy flowing around it became visibly disordered and sluggish. It could clearly sense that all the supreme divine powers it had unleashed, exhausting its source, depleting its home-field advantage, and relying on the infinite replenishment of evil energy from beyond the heavens, were utterly ineffective in the face of the opponent's innate void barrier.

The natural barrier created by different realm levels is a chasm that cannot be bridged by any home advantage or endless spiritual energy supply.

The old man cultivated the orthodox Dao of Heaven and Earth, and the void barrier around him contained complete shallow spatial laws, naturally suppressing all unorthodox and evil forces. Meanwhile, the Yin energy attacks generated by the evil array lacked the support of spatial rules and were simply isolated and dissolved by the void barrier. Ten thousand years of accumulated strength, a continuous supply of evil energy, and a ten-thousand-year-old home-field advantage—all these reliances became ineffective.

An overwhelming sense of powerlessness, despair, and fear instantly and completely overwhelmed the mind of the evil source.

"How dare an ant's power shake the heavens?"

The old man's indifferent voice rang out again, his words carrying no trace of surging killing intent, but rather an absolute crushing and indifference emanating from a high-level Dao.

As soon as he finished speaking, he slowly raised his right hand. He hadn't made a move the entire time, having only observed the evil spirit's futile struggles, but now he had lost the patience to continue watching.

There was no earth-shattering accumulation of spiritual energy, no complicated and obscure hand seals, no magnificent and boundless burst of spiritual energy; it was simply a casual raising of the hand and a light, indifferent tap forward.

This gesture was unremarkable and extremely simple, without any dazzling phenomena appearing. It was as plain as an ordinary mortal raising his hand to brush away dust, yet it contained the supreme laws of shallow space that a great being had thoroughly understood.

Upon pointing it out, all things in heaven and earth instantly fell silent.

The chaotic and surging evil energy instantly froze and solidified, the rolling black mist completely stopped, the howling and flowing yin wind suddenly ceased, and all the turmoil and noise in the entire back mountain returned to zero, plunging into a deathly silence.

After an eerie silence, a pale golden finger beam, condensed to its fullest extent, silently burst forth from the old man's fingertip. The finger beam was slender and gentle, seemingly devoid of any overwhelming power, yet it easily pierced through layers of stagnant Yin Sha black mist, traversed dozens of feet of void, and instantly struck the core essence of the ten-foot-tall evil ghost skeleton phantom.

puff--

A deep, muffled thud exploded in the void. It didn't have the violent power to shatter the heavens and earth, but it possessed the supreme power to directly pierce through the primordial soul.

The originally violent and ferocious, struggling evil giant shadow suddenly convulsed violently, twisted and trembled wildly. The evil principles on which it relied were instantly pierced by the power of shallow space, and the evil essence that it had condensed for many years was strongly washed away and baptized by the power of the orthodox Dao.

hum-

The invisible divine soul's origin trembled violently, and excruciating pain swept through all consciousness. The black mist on the surface of its enormous skeletal phantom rapidly thinned and dissipated at a visible speed, and the originally thick and powerful Yin energy around it continued to fall downwards layer by layer.

The evil spirit felt its soul dazed, its primordial power rapidly dissipating uncontrollably. The primordial spiritual energy maintaining the Hundred Thousand Yin Fiend Array was disrupted and disordered, and the continuous flow of spiritual energy could no longer fill the huge deficit caused by the damage to its primordial power. With just a casual flick of the old man's finger, it severely damaged more than half of its accumulated Yin Fiend foundation. All the confidence it had built up by relying on its home ground was completely destroyed under this one finger.

It huddled at the bottom of the graveyard, its ten-foot-tall skeletal phantom constantly shrinking and withering. The dark, malevolent mist slowly sank and dissipated, and the biting, cold aura of the entire back mountain faded away with the fall of the evil spirit's original aura, leaving only endless fear and despair, firmly locking this malevolent source that had been entrenched in the tunnel of the desolate mountain for 100,000 years.