“In my name, Wang Lin, I command the thunder of heaven and earth!” Wang Lin soared forth, his right hand clenched. Thunder echoed, and countless bolts of lightning danced within his grasp, as though he held the very storm itself. With a single, earth-shattering blow, he stood before the Gates of Emptiness.

“He cannot breach it! He must not!” Zhou Jin was driven to madness. He stumbled back, despair warring with a desperate hope in his eyes. His only salvation lay in Wang Lin’s failure to shatter the gates, for only then would he have a chance to survive.

“The Gates of Six Origins, they are more challenging than any I faced in my own attempts! This Wang Lin… he… It will be a monumental task. The more Origins, the harder the breach. He shall surely fail before those doors, and in that failure, he will find his death!” The man in azure retreated as well. He understood that interfering when the Gates of Emptiness appeared could ironically aid the one attempting to cross them.

The Celestial Venerate of Void Spirits scowled, stepping back to observe Wang Lin. A cold smile crept across his face. “If the Gates of Emptiness were so easily opened, the heavens would be in chaos. Especially those formed by the Six Origins. Their difficulty is beyond comprehension. This mere youth, though graced with the fortune of acquiring the Six Origins, what can he truly accomplish? I shall see him broken upon those gates. I may not even need to lift a finger; he will likely perish beneath their weight!” They did not believe Wang Lin could shatter the Gates of Emptiness, or perhaps, they simply refused to believe.

But for the cultivators of the Inner Realm, a fervent hope bloomed within their hearts. They yearned for Wang Lin to shatter the ultimate gates and ascend to become a mighty Ascendant.

“Wang Lin, you must open those gates!” Situ Nan gripped the skull, his concern palpable. He had struggled through his own crossing of the Gates, despite the aid of Azure Frost. He knew the difficulty well, especially given that Wang Lin faced gates far stronger than his own.

Nan Yunzi’s gaze was unwavering. He took a deep breath, prepared to exert every ounce of his power to aid Wang Lin at the critical moment.

“The Gates of Six Origins, we must assist him in opening them. Once open, Wang Lin’s power will become a great strength for our Inner Realm!” Master Lu, Dragon Rampant, the Azure Dragon Sacred Emperor, and others watched with bated breath, their faces etched with tension.

The Azure Dragon Sacred Emperor was particularly anxious. He had known Wang Lin for many years and knew him to be of the Four Sacred Sects. With a gesture, he summoned the four treasures of the Four Sacred Sects, causing them to materialize around him. “In the hour of need, I shall use the treasures of the Four Sacred Sects to help him shatter those gates.”

Regardless of their individual thoughts, Wang Lin, wreathed in thunder, hurtled towards the Gates of Emptiness. Compared to the colossal doors, Wang Lin seemed minuscule, yet from his form radiated a force that made the heavens tremble. The tens of thousands of cultivators, scattered by the gates’ immense pressure, were struck into silence. Their minds emptied, leaving only the image of Wang Lin’s thunderous fist.

He had struck at the Gates of Emptiness before, but only managed to open them a sliver. Now, with his Six Origins nearly complete, his thunderous power was many times greater.

The fist landed, and the heavens roared. Wang Lin was like a primordial bolt of lightning, an undying spark unleashed at the universe’s dawn, crashing against the Gates.

A deafening boom echoed across the land. Many of the nearby cultivators coughed blood, flung back by the shockwave. They desperately tried to escape. In the chaos, the immense Gates of Emptiness shuddered, as if on the verge of collapse. With grinding groans, they slowly began to open a fraction.

At that instant, Wang Lin unleashed a long howl. From across the Kun Xu Starfield, countless bolts of lightning appeared, as if answering a long-awaited call. They converged from every direction, hurtling towards Vermillion Bird Star.

The entire Kun Xu Starfield quaked. Lightning surged from cultivation planets and darted through the cosmos. Even the Outer Realm cultivators, who hunted down the remnants of the Kun Xu, were frozen in awe. They could not comprehend what was happening. They only knew that the entire Kun Xu Starfield was consumed by lightning.

It was as if all the lightning in existence had found its rightful king, a ruler it had sought for countless millennia. Now, with a single cry, that thunderous monarch summoned them to his side.

The lightning blazed across the Kun Xu, a roiling ocean of power. It swept past cultivation planets, traversed the void, and passed by the Outer Realm cultivators, heedless of their presence.

“What is happening?!”

“Heavens… what is going on?!”

“So much lightning! Has some treasure of thunder appeared?”

“All the lightning is heading in one direction… to where?”

“That direction… is Vermillion Bird Star! Has something earth-shattering occurred there?”

Panic and confusion spread across the Kun Xu Starfield. They were bewildered. Some were struck by the lightning and were instantly obliterated, causing further terror among the Outer Realm cultivators.

Divine senses probed the cosmos, desperately seeking answers.

From above, the Kun Xu Starfield was a sight of terrifying beauty. Lightning surged forward, drawn to Vermillion Bird Star, drawn to Wang Lin, who stood before the Gates of Emptiness.

Despair deepened in Zhou Jin’s eyes. He could scarcely believe what he was seeing. He heard the distant thunder, and when he looked, he was rendered speechless. He saw too much lightning, illuminating the darkened void, a blinding spectacle.

“This… This…” The man in azure was pale and blinded by the light. Although he was an early stage Emptiness Profound cultivator, the sight of the endless lightning sent shivers down his spine.

Even the Celestial Venerate of Void Spirits was stunned, then shocked. He never imagined that Wang Lin’s Origin of Thunder held such power.

“This is no ordinary Origin of Thunder! I have seen great thunder cultivators, but none possessed such strength! How did Wang Lin’s Origin of Thunder form? How can it be so potent?” The Celestial Venerate’s eyes flashed.

“Bah! Even if all the thunder of the Kun Xu…” His thoughts were interrupted by an even more deafening boom, one that dwarfed the Kun Xu thunder. He was appalled, and a quick scan with his Divine Sense caused him to stagger back in disbelief.

“Impossible!” the Celestial Venerate cried.

Only one thing could shock the Celestial Venerate of Void Spirits, one of the Five of the Ancients, so deeply. His Divine Sense revealed an unending tide of thunder pouring forth from the Cloud Sea Starfield!

Drawing upon the Kun Xu was one thing, but summoning the Cloud Sea was beyond belief!

Lightning erupted across the Cloud Sea Starfield, tearing through continents and answering the ancient call. Even the thinning mists of the Cloud Sea churned with thunder, and countless bolts of lightning shattered the barrier between the Cloud Sea and the Kun Xu.

And as if that was not enough, Wang Lin’s howl echoed through the Summoned River Starfield, and then the Cloud Sea Starfield, and the Kun Xu Starfield. Even beyond these realms, lightning streaked through the black sky, a river of silver dragons.

The roiling thunder washed over the Summoned River Starfield, leaving its outer cultivators awestruck. “What… is happening?” they mumbled.

And finally, after the Kun Xu, Cloud Sea, and Summoned River Starfields were ablaze, the last to be drawn into the vortex was the Radiant Heaven Starfield, which was controlled by the Inner Realm, and not yet overtaken by the Outer Realm. Here, these Inner Realm cultivators stared in disbelief as the thunder roared into the sky in the direction of the Kun Xu Starfield.

This crescendo of Wang Lin’s howl, the summoning of the heavenly thunder, ended in the Radiant Heaven Starfield when the doors to the Thunder Immortal World began to quake. From within, a bolt of lightning, a never-ending torrent that had existed since ancient times, broke free for the first time in countless eons, flying like a celestial river towards the Kun Xu Starfield.
With that, the spectacle was complete.

The Kun Xu, Radiant Heaven, Cloud Sea, and Summoned River, the four starfields of the Inner Realm. All of the thunder, now surging towards Vermillion Bird Star and toward Wang Lin as he stood, his long hair billowing in the wind, a white-clad figure roaring at the heavens!