Yuhua Zhenren is a “strategic” level cultivation combatant.

According to cultivation world rules, with Dongxu not emerging, Yuhua are the strongest cultivators who can venture out and conquer in this world.

Qi Refining, Foundation Establishment, and even some Golden Cores, can generally be overwhelmed by “numbers.”

Accumulating sand to form a pagoda, with enough people and strength, as long as there are enough cultivators and their combined power is strong enough, the lower ranks can overcome the higher.

But at the Yuhua stage, it’s a different story.

Firstly, Yuhua cultivate Grand Cycles, and their cultivation differs qualitatively much more significantly from Golden Cores.

Another reason is that Yuhua can fly through the air.

Once a Yuhua ascends and flies with their Dharma, they are like an “immortal descending,” almost invincible.

Cultivators below the Golden Core stage can only operate on the ground; they cannot even touch a Yuhua in the sky, only being slaughtered by them without any power to resist.

Therefore, in warfare, every Yuhua is like a walking “nuclear bomb.”

However, the cultivation world is “divided.”

The restrictions of the Heavenly Dao provide different realms of cultivators with their respective territories to live in.

Most cultivators, throughout their entire lives, never reach the Fourth-Rank territories, never see a Yuhua Zhenren, let alone witness a Yuhua Zhenren’s flying Dharma firsthand.

But at this moment, above the Great Wilderness Royal Court, no less than seven Dao Court Yuhua and six Great Wilderness Dragon Monarchs are engaged in an earth-shattering struggle.

Spiritual energy transmutes; sword qi like wings, spells, starlight, spear might, and the Dragon Qi and vital energy of the Great Wilderness intertwine, filling the entire sky and earth.

The brilliance of the Dharma techniques is dazzling, almost overshadowing the crimson blood-sun on the horizon.

Mo Hua, mixed in with the tide-like Dao Court army, looked up at the distant sky, and like everyone else, could not hide the shock in his heart.

It wasn’t his first time witnessing Yuhua fighting.

He had also seen the Dharma forms of Dongxu.

But an astonishing scene like this, with more than ten Yuhua fully unleashing their cultivation, using all their killing moves, and their Dharma techniques shaking heaven and earth, still caused Mo Hua an almost instinctive shock, his hands trembling slightly.

This is the yearning for the power of heaven and earth in a cultivator’s Dao heart.

Only by controlling the power of heaven and earth can one truly change the world.

Mo Hua couldn’t help but clench his fists, murmuring in his heart:

“Yuhua… flying through the sky…”

The Yuhua’s struggle continued.

The power of the Dharma techniques was overwhelming, the earth cracked, mountains deformed, and yellow sand filled the sky.

The Royal Court’s city-protecting grand formation vibrated continuously.

Various Yuhua-formed powers, like crystallizations blooming, diffused into the Royal Court’s space, drifting like willow catkins, seemingly dazzling and beautiful, but containing extremely terrifying power. Below Golden Core, contact meant certain death.

The Yuhua battlefield, for ordinary cultivators, was a forbidden zone of life and death, impossible to approach.

At this time, the barbarian army of the Royal Court was stationed within the city-protecting grand formation.

And the Dao Court army was also stationed in the great camp of the Royal Domain.

Before the Yuhua decided a victor, no one dared to meddle with the battlefield.

And Yuhua are True People, their realm too high, their cultivation too strong; it was impossible to decide a victor in a short time, let alone determine life or death.

Therefore, after several days of intense fighting, when the Yuhua Zhenqi was exhausted, they each ceased fighting to rest, choosing another day to battle again, leaving behind only the cracked earth and the massive chasms created by the True People’s sword qi.

Such battles would continue for some time…

After a brief ceasefire, the Yuhua rested.

Mo Hua stood on top of the camp watchtower, looking at the distant land shattered by Yuhua power, and the Royal Court protected by the Great Wilderness grand formation, lost in thought.

A long-unfamiliar sense of powerlessness began to rise in his heart again.

Mo Hua was silent for a moment, then collected his emotions and surveyed the Royal Court before him.

The Royal Court of the Great Wilderness stood in a massive Fourth-Rank mountain range.

This great mountain range had a round outer perimeter and a wide, square interior, shaped like a Xuanwu (Black Tortoise), while dozens of smaller mountains stretched outward, resembling snakes.

The formation of tortoise and snake created a Xuanwu.

This was the most defensible and difficult to attack place in the entire Great Wilderness, the Fourth-Rank Great Xuanwu Mountain.

And because the Great Wilderness Royal Court had been entrenched here for thousands of years, this mountain was also known as the Great Wilderness “Royal Court Mountain.”

The outer perimeter of Royal Court Mountain was almost entirely desert and barren mountains. Even the scattered tribes, due to the outbreak of war, the Great Wilderness’s militaristic policy, and the scorched-earth strategy, had all migrated or been annihilated.

At this moment, within a vast mountain range, only a colossal Royal Court lay dormant like a giant beast.

And above the Royal Court, the lights of the Four Symbols City-Protecting Grand Formation flickered on and off.

This was the Royal Court’s grand formation.

East Azure Dragon, West White Tiger, South Vermilion Bird, North Black Tortoise.

The sacred patterns formed by the Four Sacred Beasts seemed like ancient divine beasts descending, guarding the Royal Court of the Great Wilderness.

No one knew who created this Great Wilderness Four Symbols Royal Court Grand Formation, but it was clear that the formation had a very long history and had endured too many trials and tribulations; its interior was already severely damaged.

In fact, this grand formation could no longer be fully activated.

It could only use its incomplete Four Sacred Formation patterns to resist the attacks of the Dao Court Yuhua.

Otherwise, if the Royal Court were truly protected by a full-strength Four Symbols Grand Formation, even if the Dao Court sent ten more Yuhua and deployed a million more troops, they might not be able to breach the Royal Court.

In the late years of the Great Wilderness, the Four Saints were in decline, the kings and nobles were divided, and the grand formation was broken – this was a sign of the Royal Court’s downfall.

It was also the opportunity for the Dao Court to utterly destroy the Royal Court and unify the Great Wilderness.

Mo Hua’s gaze stretched further.

Behind the Royal Court, it was obstructed by layers of ancient mountains; as far as the eye could see, there were only ancient mountains, nothing else.

But Mo Hua knew that was where the Ancestral Court of the Great Wilderness was located.

The Ancestral Court of the Great Wilderness was the only Fifth-Rank mountain realm in the entire Great Wilderness, the burial ground of the Great Wilderness ancestors.

And beyond the Ancestral Court was the legendary source of all mysteries in the Great Wilderness, an ancient and eerie abyss, the origin of all greatness and evil in the Great Wilderness – the Boundless Abyss.

The Great Wilderness Ancestral Court was the forbidden land of ancestors.

The Boundless Abyss was a place no living creature should approach.

These two places had not yielded any news for nearly a thousand years.

When Mo Hua served as a Divine Priest in the Barbarian Wilderness, through his unique authority and meticulous study of ancient Great Wilderness script, he had perused historical records of various tribes.

But even so, he hadn’t found many records concerning the Great Wilderness Ancestral Court and the Boundless Abyss in the Barbarian Wilderness historical texts.

Even the few clues that existed were merely ancient legends, impossible to verify.

No one knew what the Boundless Abyss looked like at this moment.

According to the historical records of the Great Wilderness, the Boundless Abyss had been spreading outward for tens of thousands of years, and no one knew how far it had spread now.

Mo Hua looked at the Royal Court, at Great Xuanwu Mountain, and at the Boundless Abyss, which was even deeper and completely unseen, his brow furrowed.

He knew that everything in the Great Wilderness was definitely interconnected in the shadows.

But exactly how they were connected, he still couldn’t figure out…

His realm was too low, lacking too many crucial concepts in his understanding, making it impossible for him to deduce from causality.

As he watched, Mo Hua was suddenly startled, turning his head to find that at some point, a person was standing behind him.

This person wore majestic armor, emanating an immeasurable and formidable aura. It was General Yang, a Yuhua-stage cultivator.

Mo Hua saluted, “Greetings, General.”

General Yang was slightly surprised that Mo Hua had noticed him so quickly, and asked, “What are you thinking about?”

Mo Hua shook his head, and slowly said, “I’m thinking about how the war will unfold next.”

General Yang nodded slightly, but did not speak.

Mo Hua thought for a moment, then suddenly asked, “By the way, General, where are Senior Brothers Jishan and Jiyong? I haven’t seen them since we parted ways at Fengbo Ridge last time.”

General Yang said, “They were seriously injured. I arranged for them to recuperate in the rear.”

Mo Hua nodded, then asked, “What about Qianjun? He’s a Yang family prodigy. Didn’t he come to attack the Royal Court this time?”

General Yang’s gaze subtly hardened, saying, “We always need to leave some people behind… he wouldn’t be useful here.”

Mo Hua froze, then slowly understood.

The Yang family was a Dao Soldier Division aristocratic family, different from others.

The Yang family’s disciples came to the Great Wilderness truly for the purpose of fighting on the battlefield, to risk their lives for the Dao Court.

Yang family disciples could not harbor their own selfish motives like other aristocratic families, to form Golden Cores in the Dragon Pool amidst the chaos.

So if Yang Qianjun were to come to the Great Wilderness, there was only one path: to fight to the death on the battlefield, because he was a member of the Yang family, because he was a Dao Soldier.

Mo Hua sighed inwardly.

He turned his head, looking at the vast Royal Court Mountain and the ancient Royal Court within the mountains. After a moment of silence, he suddenly said:

“General, if the Royal Court is breached, will it truly…”

Mo Hua paused slightly, his gaze solemn, “will it be a massacre?”

General Yang looked up at the sky, his gaze desolate, but his voice was unwavering:

“The Dao Court has ordered: once the Royal Court is breached, any who resist shall be killed without mercy.”

Mo Hua frowned, “General, what if… the karma of slaughter is too heavy…”

General Yang glanced at Mo Hua, sighing, “I am a Dao Soldier General, commissioned by the Dao Court to fight on the battlefield, it is my duty. Whomever the Dao Court wishes to kill, shall die.”

Mo Hua’s gaze dimmed.

General Yang looked at Mo Hua, his expression softening slightly, “You are still young. When you achieve something in the future, and your position is higher, you will understand. Many times, people are always… involuntary.”

“Involuntary…” Mo Hua murmured, “Is it because… my strength is not yet strong enough?”

General Yang was startled, as if seeing his former self, he couldn’t help but smile, but couldn’t speak.

Finally, he just reached out and patted Mo Hua’s shoulder, “Take care.”

After speaking, General Yang turned and left.

Mo Hua watched General Yang’s retreating figure, feeling that his tall back was as straight as a spear, and as sharp… as a blade.

A “blade” used to kill with a borrowed hand.

Two days later, the great battle between the Yuhua resumed.

General Yang, True Person Zhuge, True Person Hua, True Person Qingmu, and three other Dao Court Yuhua, along with six Great Wilderness Dragon Monarchs, engaged in a desperate battle on the front lines.

Astonishing power permeated heaven and earth.

The fighting continued for three days, then they each ceased hostilities.

One day later, both sides battled again; after two days of fighting, they ceased hostilities again, rested, then battled again…

This continued for more than half a month, and the mountains outside the Royal Court, along with the entire landscape, completely changed.

The remaining ancient sacred patterns on the Four Symbols Royal Court’s city-protecting grand formation were all destroyed.

The earth-shattering battle of the Yuhua finally determined a victor.

On the Dao Court side, one Yuhua died, one was severely injured, and the others also sustained minor injuries.

Of the Great Wilderness Dragon Monarchs, two died, one was severely injured, and the remaining three Dragon Monarchs were also wounded and retreated back to the Royal Court.

Both sides suffered heavy and extremely tragic losses; when a Yuhua died, the remaining fluctuations stirred up changing winds and clouds, and the ground shattered like porcelain.

At this point, neither side’s Yuhua dared to act easily again.

True Person Zhuge then set up a mysterious Fourth-Rank Seven-Star Formation outside the Great Wilderness Royal Court, locking its killing intent onto the Royal Court.

Should the injured Great Wilderness Dragon Monarchs dare to show themselves again, this formation could draw starlight from the heavens to suppress and kill the remaining Dragon Monarchs.

At the same time, to maintain the formation, True Person Zhuge had no spare energy to act further.

General Yang and others also had to guard True Person Zhuge.

The Yuhua battle thus temporarily concluded.

The Yuhua on the Dao Court side paid a considerably heavy price, suppressing the Great Wilderness’s Yuhua combat power with a slight advantage.

And the Royal Court’s already dilapidated Four Symbols Grand Formation was completely废弃 (廢棄).

Next, it was the real army’s brutal battle.

After the Yuhua clash, the army, led by Golden Cores and supported by Foundation Establishment cultivators, became the decisive force in this war.

A series of orders from the Dao Soldier Division were passed down.

Millions of Dao Soldiers, vast and boundless, stood ready.

General Yang of the Yang family, serving as the Grand Commander, ascended into the air, waved his arm, and spoke with solemn authority:

“The barbarian tribes of the Great Wilderness despise the Dao Court and have declared themselves kings, a crime beyond forgiveness. Today, our Dao Court army shall level the Royal Court, execute all rebels, and those who obstruct us shall be killed!”

“Kill!”

“Kill!!”

For a moment, countless shouts of killing pierced the clouds.

On the other side, the barbarian soldiers of the Great Wilderness were also shouting “Kill!” in their barbaric tongue.

For them, the Dao Court was an enemy, the Dao Soldiers were lackeys, and these were the culprits who oppressed their royalty and threatened them with extinction. There was a blood feud between them, an endless struggle to the death.

The Dao Soldier Division issued military orders.

The Great Wilderness side lit signal fires.

Between the vast heavens and earth, killing intent erupted like thunder, shaking the earth and changing the color of the sky.

Countless Dao Soldiers and barbarian soldiers began their final charge.

Like oceans clashing with great rivers, towering waves crashing, the two armies met in a desperate struggle.

People fell into a vortex of life and death; the entire land instantly became a feast of slaughter.

Shouts of killing, roars of anger, screams, and cries of fear, mingled with blood qi, resentment, malevolence, and killing intent, shot straight into the sky, shaking the heavenly mechanisms, turning the black and white into a chaotic blur.

And Mo Hua was trapped in this ocean of slaughter.

At this moment, he could no longer look up at the sky, because all he saw around him was bloody fighting.

Dao Soldiers had their heads cut off, limbs severed, chests pierced, bodies split open, blood and flesh splattering.

Barbarian soldiers were torn to shreds by sword qi, burned to ashes by fierce flames, frozen into blood by ice, suffocated and swallowed by earth prisons…

In the blink of an eye, many fresh lives died before him, and their deaths were tragic.

With every breath, countless transformations of life and death occurred.

Mo Hua, clad in Dao Soldier armor, moved alone through the Dao Soldier formation, weaving back and forth.

He didn’t follow any aristocratic family’s contingent, nor did he stick with the Situ family.

Firstly, in such large-scale wars, the flow of people was too chaotic; even if they formed a team at the beginning, they would inevitably be scattered in the end.

Secondly, he had to bring his junior senior brother, and to avoid suspicion, it was inconvenient to be with others.

After all, his junior senior brother and he were still “enemies.”

And Bai Zisheng followed closely beside Mo Hua.

Superficially, he was chained and held captive by Mo Hua, but in reality, it was this junior senior brother protecting the safety of his junior brother, Mo Hua.

Mo Hua could not kill indiscriminately now.

Even in such a bloody war, where life and death turned in an instant, he did not take a single life, at most relying on movement techniques to maneuver, or using spells to trap or defend against enemies.

The death-malevolence in his destiny still lingered, and he could not break the killing taboo at will.

For every person he killed, he had to use a straw dog to offset the karma, otherwise, the malevolence would backfire, with unimaginable consequences.

And although he worked day and night harvesting wild grass and weaving destiny spells, the number of straw dogs was only six.

This meant he could kill a maximum of six people.

In truly desperate times, each “killing quota” was precious and absolutely could not be wasted.

Therefore, charging into the Royal Court, mixed within the Dao Court army, required a personal bodyguard.

And his junior senior brother, with his third-stage Dragon Blood Xuanhuang (Black Yellow) cultivation, was undoubtedly the strongest “bodyguard.”

Throughout the subsequent campaign, Mo Hua kept his eyes and spiritual senses wide open, discerning good and bad fortune from the chaotic karmic energies, avoiding harm and seeking advantage, constantly guiding Bai Zisheng.

Bai Zisheng, wearing heavy armor, relied on his formidable physical body to charge ahead, clearing a path for Mo Hua.

The two fellow disciples once again joined hands, fighting their way through the tide of chaos.

Only this time, the war was thousands of times vaster and thousands of times more dangerous than before.

Even Mo Hua felt exceptionally strained.

It wasn’t that the killing was hard to deal with, but that the pressure from the karmic energies was too immense.

Mo Hua possessed strong spiritual consciousness and high comprehension, making him extremely sensitive to karmic energies.

Even a slight wisp of karmic energy was vividly clear in his perception.

Now, personally in the midst of the killing battlefield, he witnessed severed limbs flying, countless lives dying, and human lives instantly vanishing with every breath.

The emotions of people before death—the desire to live, the fear of death, the malevolence of killing, the sin of causing death—converged, forming a swirling vortex of resentment that judged life and death. This vortex tightly pulled Mo Hua, whose nature was acutely sensitive, into its center, tormenting his heart with the agony of clinging to life and fearing death. The sheer psychological pressure was almost suffocating for Mo Hua.

Every time Mo Hua turned his eyes, he seemed to see thousands of people, their life experiences, loves, and hatreds from childhood to adulthood.

But in an instant, these “flashback”-like memories were all shattered.

These people’s lives died on the battlefield.

Their memories were all as if ground through a “meat grinder,” transforming from the beauty of life into the despair of death, mixing into distorted malevolence and fear.

This realization of “life and death” made Mo Hua’s body cold and his face pale.

“Junior Senior… Mo Hua!” Bai Zisheng, seeing something was wrong, quickly shouted, “Wake up.”

Mo Hua knew the situation was dire and quickly bit his tongue, forcibly activating his spiritual sense to shield all perception of human emotions.

Afterward, he focused on discerning karmic good and ill fortune, guiding his junior senior brother as they hurried across the battlefield.

Although it wasn’t easy, Mo Hua could only rely on his mental strength to endure.

He didn’t know how long they had fought in the ocean of the battlefield, nor how long they had been immersed in the karma between life and death.

Mo Hua felt that the sky seemed to have darkened several times and brightened several times.

But the surroundings were full of blood, the ground was also full of blood, the sky was red, and people were red; he wasn’t quite sure.

Finally, after an unknown period, the vortex of life and death slightly dispersed. Mo Hua looked closely again, and before him lay a magnificent and colossal city wall.

This was the city wall of the Great Wilderness Royal Court.

At this time, the city wall was already dilapidated, and earlier, True Person Hua had cleaved a huge gap in it with a single sword strike.

The Dao Court’s Dao Soldiers were killing their way into the Royal Court.

Mo Hua and Bai Zisheng exchanged glances, then, along with other Dao Soldiers, surged through the gap in the city wall and into the Great Wilderness Royal Court.

This was their first time setting foot in the Great Wilderness Royal Court.

Their first visit coincided with the day of the Great Wilderness Royal Court’s demise…

(End of chapter)