He beheld a sight that chilled him to the very marrow. Ringing the plaza, amidst countless cultivators, rose eight ghastly mountains – mountains of corpses piled high against the heavens!

Countless bodies, their blood long dried to dust, formed these macabre peaks. A palpable aura of death hung thick in the air, intensifying as Wang Lin’s gaze swept across the scene.

Yet, this was not the end of the horrors revealed. As his eyes traveled further, his heart pounded with dread.

Beyond the mountains of the dead, eight colossal dragons, each easily tens of thousands of feet in length, lay petrified. Their jaws, once filled with savage fire, now gaped open in eternal silence. A strange energy clung to their stony hides, holding them suspended in the air.

Their heads were angled towards the stone dais, as if forever roaring defiance at the one who once sat upon its throne!

Beyond the dragons, across the vast plaza, stood ranks of war chariots, each a thousand feet in length. Barbed and menacing, they were stained with the dark, rust-colored blood of ages past, whispering tales of terrible battles.

Around these chariots floated legions of petrified warriors, frozen mid-stride, swords raised, their faces contorted in eternal rage. Even in their stillness, they exuded a palpable aura of bloodlust.

Behind them stretched an endless sea of cultivators, numbering in the hundreds of thousands. Each was locked in a desperate pose, forever surging towards the dais in a frenzy of attack.

Their numbers were limitless…

Within the throng, nearly a hundred towering figures stood facing away from the throne, their arms raised as if attempting to restrain the mad horde. Further back, eight immense shadows, almost as tall as the great hall itself, loomed, slaughtering those who dared to approach.

With each horrifying detail revealed, Wang Lin’s heart threatened to burst. Finally, his eyes rested upon a solitary figure standing at the forefront, directly facing the throne.

This lone cultivator held aloft an open parasol, floating serenely amidst the chaos. Though turned to stone, his left hand was raised, pointing accusingly at the empty throne!

Behind him, at the very edge of the plaza, stood another, the last amongst the petrified warriors.

This cultivator stood motionless, his eyes closed. His left hand was clenched in a tight fist, as if grasping an unseen object, while his right hand was bent in a drawing motion.

If one were to place a bow in his hands, he would be forever frozen in the act of drawing the string!

Silence reigned within the ancient hall, broken only by the faint crackle of eternal candles. After what seemed like an age, Wang Lin averted his gaze and descended to the great stone dais.

As he stepped upon it, he looked out at the endless sea of petrified faces, each twisted in a grotesque mask of hatred, each pair of eyes burning with frozen fury. It was as if, in that instant, their collective rage focused solely on him.

A tangible wave of killing intent, born of millennia of conflict, crashed against him.

Wang Lin recoiled, his feet carrying him back until he stood before the empty throne, his face paling.

He saw the massive fissure that cleaved the dais, emanating from a point directly below the throne. From it radiated a residual killing intent, like a phantom arrow that had flown from afar, ripping through the endless ranks, through war chariot and ancient warriors, until finally striking the dais itself, splitting it asunder and forever pointing to the seat of power.

In the silence, as if guided by an unseen force, the echoes of voices from the ancient tomb, heard in his mind during his prior ascensions, coalesced within him. He felt a surge of power, and his legs moved him forward, until he sat upon the throne.

The instant he made contact, Wang Lin’s body convulsed violently, swelling to an immense size, transforming him into his Ancient God form, hundreds of feet tall!

Six Ancient God stars manifested within his brow, spinning with blinding speed. But then, a wave of demonic energy erupted from the throne, surging through his left arm and into his body, finally settling within his left eye, where six phantom stars flickered into existence.

Simultaneously, a wave of celestial demon qi howled forth, rushing through his right arm and settling in his right eye, manifesting six more illusory stars.

Though these stars were but phantoms, their appearance mirrored perfectly the rotation of the stars in his brow.

In that instant, the very fabric of time seemed to unravel around Wang Lin, memories fading, identities dissolving. Slowly, an aura of immense power began to emanate from him. It was an aura of domination, of battle, of defiance against the very heavens themselves!

He looked out at the petrified hordes, his expression serene, yet the aura of power continued to swell around him, reaching a point where even the greatest third-step cultivators would tremble before him.

The first to feel this surge was the Spirit Daoist within the Heavenly Furnace in Wang Lin’s brow. He had been desperately battling Zhou Jin, attempting to refine him within the Furnace, but at the moment this overwhelming power erupted within Wang Lin, his face turned ashen, his eyes wide with primal fear. He abandoned all pretense of resistance, forcibly ejected from the Furnace, from the star point, from Wang Lin’s very being.

It was as if, if he remained a moment longer, he would be crushed, body and soul, by the sheer force of the oppressive aura. With a flash of light, the Spirit Daoist emerged from Wang Lin’s brow, falling to his knees upon the dais before Wang Lin.

Only then did the terrifying pressure abate, though it still weighed upon him like countless mountains. No longer a third-step cultivator, he felt like a mere mortal, trembling, daring not even to lift his head.
Within the Emperor’s Furnace, dwelled Zhou Jin, a Third Step Ascendant of unyielding spirit. No force, it was said, could bend his will. Even the most brutal refinement would be met with defiance. Only the oppressive artistry of Lingdong and the threat of the eight venomous droplets surrounding him held his rage at bay.

But now, a power radiated from Wang Lin, striking Zhou Jin with a chilling fear that turned his face ashen. The aura resonated deep within him, causing the venomous droplets to falter and the twenty ancient seals woven from the Breath of Ages to crack.

In that fleeting moment of weakness, Zhou Jin shattered his prison within the Emperor’s Furnace, bursting forth from the center of Wang Lin’s brow.

The instant he materialized, the force emanating from Wang Lin slammed into him, forcing him to recoil in abject terror.

This presence…it filled him with dread, with a trembling that threatened to shatter his very being. He felt like an ant before a titan, utterly insignificant, vulnerable to obliteration with a mere thought. Even the Five Sovereigns of the Ancient Star Realm had never inspired such fear.

It was as though all life itself, before this being, should tremble, should kneel in supplication. Disobedience was death.

The pressure amassed within Wang Lin was building to an unfathomable degree, an unrestrained power, befitting a King, an Emperor.

Even the heavens themselves seemed to bow before it, the very earth to recoil in reverence.

Zhou Jin, struggling and bloodied, staggered backward. The oppressive force crashed against him, like spectral hands forcing his shoulders downward. He must kneel!

But he was not Lingdong, broken and enslaved. He was Zhou Jin, elder of the Feng Tian Wolf Clan, a Third Step Ascendant who bowed to no deity and knelt before no mortal. The greater the force, the fiercer his resistance. Red-eyed with rage, he refused to yield.

He knew that such power could not be Wang Lin’s own. He saw, with a chilling clarity, that it was borrowed.

Drawn from the infernal throne!

This aura, this pressure, would fade, but to yield before it dissipated would forever scar his Dao, trapping him in the shadow of this moment. His progress would halt, and he would become like Lingdong, a thrall of the lesser being.

He roared in defiance, sweat pouring from his brow. His legs trembled, but he held firm, teeth clenched, blood staining his clothes.

Yet, as Zhou Jin strained against the impossible, the borrowed power within Wang Lin reached its zenith. The star points in his eyes and brow, swirling wildly, froze.

At that instant, the pressure amassed within Wang Lin erupted, magnified a thousandfold, blasting through the palace, overwhelming all.

Zhou Jin cried out, his spirit torn asunder. The pillars of his Dao shattered. He saw Wang Lin as an unconquerable Emperor, radiating a power that could shake the very foundations of existence.

With a final, desperate gasp, the elder of the Feng Tian Wolf Clan fell to his knees, trembling, like Lingdong. He dared not look up… he was broken.

Wang Lin, seemingly oblivious to the surrender before him, stared ahead, his gaze piercing through Lingdong and Zhou Jin. In his eyes, the assembled cultivators around the stone dais dissolved, replaced by visions of ages past.

The air crackled with the phantom echoes of a thousand battles. But the conflict raged not among the long-dead souls outside the dais, but in Wang Lin’s heart, in the visions that emerged from the depths of time.

A scene unfolded: A single umbrella, unfurled against the chaos.

Beneath it stood a middle-aged scholar, watching silently as countless warriors charged forward. He raised a hand, pointed at the figure upon the throne.