The moon-hound’s bellow echoed, ancient words of forgotten gods caught within its throat. Yet in an instant, before the moon-hound, the star-strewn sky tore open, a jagged rent aimed directly at Sage Xuan Bao.

Almost as quickly as thought, the very fabric of space around Xuan Bao began to crumble. Amidst the thunderous roar, the Sage remained serene. With a flick of his right hand towards the thirty-foot arrow, he uttered a soft command: “Void Nirvana!”

Yan Lei Zi’s pupils constricted, his face etched with apprehension. He remembered the arrow well; a treasure of immense power held by the Cultivation Alliance, the Void Nirvana Arrow! Legend claimed its origins were shrouded in mystery, its age spanning epochs. Whispers from the era of the Immortal Realm spoke of the arrow being stained with unearthly ichor, granting it abilities beyond mortal comprehension.

When Yan Lei Zi resolved to strike at the Alliance, he meticulously prepared for every known weapon. A cold smile touched his lips as he recognized the Void Nirvana Arrow.

“Its power is said to be unfathomable. Let us see how it fares against this moon-beast!”

At Xuan Bao’s command, the thirty-foot arrow shuddered and surged forward, a bolt unleashed from an invisible bow, aimed unerringly at the moon-hound! The moon-hound’s eyes burned with glacial rage. Sensing the imminent threat the arrow represented, it opened its maw and roared. From the nothingness before it, countless crystalline shards rapidly coalesced, reforming into a colossal Finger of the Ancient God.

This divine digit materialized and slammed forward, meeting the arrow head-on.

The moon-hound roared again, spewing forth countless lesser moon-hounds from its very being! Hundreds, thousands, each ranging from thousands to tens of thousands of feet in size, erupted forth, plunging the battlefield into even greater chaos.

The battle now was no longer between Luo Tian and the Alliance, but a struggle between the Alliance and the moon-hounds! As the lesser beasts scattered, Alliance cultivators paled, scrambling to retreat. But their speed was no match for the swarming moon-hounds, which unleashed a storm of blood and death.

The carnage swept through the battlefield, even engulfing some Luo Tian cultivators. Wang Lin, too, found himself in the path of a three-thousand-foot moon-hound. His expression grim, he deftly avoided it, refusing to be drawn into a direct confrontation.

Wang Lin understood: the purpose of the smaller moon-hounds was singular – to gather their essence and forge the ultimate Finger of the Ancient God! At that moment, the Void Nirvana Arrow hurtled toward its target, colliding with the moon-hound’s hastily conjured digit. A cataclysmic explosion resounded across the northern reaches of the Alliance! The faint, dark ichor staining the arrow flared with ancient energy, transforming into an ethereal aura that shattered the Finger of the Ancient God and pierced through to strike the moon-hound itself! Wang Lin watched, his eyes wide with shock.

The moon-hound shuddered, its roar intensified. Instantly, every smaller moon-hound, even the one pursuing Wang Lin, turned back and joined the chorus of howls.

It was not one moon-hound howling, but hundreds, thousands, answering the call of their mother! A vast array of Ancient God Fingers bloomed across the starscape, their raw divine power saturating the void. Wang Lin felt every pore on his body open, greedily absorbing the potent energy.

He could feel his ancient god body surging with power, growing stronger with each passing moment. Within his brow, beneath the veil of the third star, his dormant fourth god-star pulsed, drawing closer to full manifestation.

Wang Lin reveled in the power.

“Ancient God Essence! I never dreamed such a thing could be found here! It is faint, but undoubtedly present!”

Across tens of thousands of miles of star-strewn space, countless fingers of the Ancient Gods coalesced with unimaginable speed. Before the eyes of all, a Finger of the Ancient God materialized, practically solid in its form! The fractured, otherworldly runes etched upon its surface were starkly visible. Even Sage Xuan Bao paused, his face clouding over.

“This moon-hound differs slightly from the scrolls. However, with the Void Nirvana Arrow, even its power cannot evade its grasp!” Xuan Bao held absolute faith in the power of the arrow.

“My Void Nirvana Arrow may only be of the Ninth Rank, but if I could capture this moon-hound and forge it into a weapon, it would be a Void Nirvana treasure of the highest caliber. Combined with my millennia of preparation, I am eighty percent certain I could craft an Eighth-Rank Void Nirvana artifact! With that, my influence within the Elder Council would rival that of Chong Xuan Zi himself!”

Undaunted, the Void Nirvana Arrow surged forward, colliding once more with the newly formed Finger of the Ancient God.

The moon-hound’s roar became a physical force. Its massive body followed closely behind the Finger of the Ancient God, pressing forward. Then, as the Void Nirvana Arrow struck the finger, a cataclysmic event reshaped the northern Alliance forever! The Finger of the Ancient God shattered once more! The thunderous boom deafened all, sending ripples of concussive force that struck even Wang Lin, forcing him to cough up blood.

If he suffered so, how much more those around him? One by one, cultivators exploded into crimson mist, crushed by the sheer force of the blast. Even Blood God Son and his ilk faltered, their expressions paling as they retreated. In moments, no cultivator remained within the moon-hound’s immediate vicinity. Only the four golden-armored Immortal Guards remained, struggling to contain the beast, aided by the nine black butterflies that stirred the tempest.

As the Finger of the Ancient God disintegrated, most of the lesser moon-hounds also shattered, showering the starscape with azure blood.
The very firmament seemed awash in azure, stained with the hues of some celestial wound! It was a sight Wang Lin had never beheld: a Wang Yue, in utter collapse! Though merely a lesser moon-beast, the sheer scale of its disintegration sent tremors through his very soul. For the Wang Yue was born of the Ancient God, its hide possessing an unyielding fortitude beyond mortal ken. Even these lesser kin were thought impervious to the might of cultivators. Yet, before his very eyes, that understanding shattered like glass.

“The Sub-Void Nirvana Arrow! What manner of arcane artifact is this?!” Wang Lin gasped, wiping blood from his lips, his mind reeling at the spectacle before him.

Not only did countless fragments of the lesser moon-beasts and the petrified finger of the Ancient God splinter into dust, but the esteemed Xuan Bao Shangren’s own Sub-Void Nirvana Arrow met a similar fate. A web of hairline fractures spiderwebbed across its surface, until, under the incomprehensible strain, it shattered into a million pieces.

Xuan Bao Shangren’s eyes blazed with an unholy light. He strode forward, for though the scene unfolded somewhat differently than he had anticipated, it remained largely within his grand design.

“This Wang Yue…it belongs to me!” Xuan Bao Shangren roared, his voice echoing through the void. As the fractured Nirvana Arrow dissolved, a wisp of ebony emerged from its core.

It was an arrow, a miniature replica of the thirty-zhang behemoth that preceded it, barely three inches in length. Yet, unlike its predecessor, the bloodstains upon it were not dried and blackened, but fresh, vibrant crimson, as if freshly dipped in the lifeblood of some cosmic beast! *This* was the true Sub-Void Nirvana Arrow! It shot forth with unimaginable speed, striking the Wang Yue squarely between its eyes!

At the moment of impact, a torrent of raw, unbridled power erupted from within the arrow, shaking the very foundations of the star-strewn sky. The immense body of the Wang Yue, for the first time in its eons-long existence, shuddered, recoiling in pain. A swirling vortex of darkness blossomed in its eyes, spewing forth a geyser of cerulean blood that rained across the heavens.

The arrow bored deeper, spinning within the vortex, each rotation a cataclysmic impact, each impact tearing further into the moon-beast’s flesh.

A piercing, agonizing wail ripped from the Wang Yue’s throat, reverberating through the void. Wang Lin felt the echoes of that pain as if it were his own, a searing agony that spread through his very being. He watched the suffering beast, retreating with desperate haste.

Never before had the Wang Yue suffered such a grievous wound. Its anguished cries ignited a chain reaction among the remaining lesser moon-beasts, causing them to implode in a cacophony of destruction. Within a radius of tens of thousands of li, every lesser Wang Yue was obliterated! The eyes of the great beast burned crimson with a rage that dwarfed all fury it had known in countless millennia. This time, it was a matter of survival. The arrow embedded in its eye threatened its very existence.

Driven by an unbridled fury, the Wang Yue unleashed a deafening roar, and seven indistinct celestial bodies coalesced around it.

They spun in a circle, and with another earth-shattering bellow, one of the luminous spheres detonated in a blinding flash. A Godstar Shattered! Wang Lin’s eyes widened with a mixture of awe and trepidation.

As the star collapsed, a wave of unimaginable power surged from within the Wang Yue, tearing apart the dark vortex that had formed in its eyes.

Even the cursed arrow was forced out, expelled from the Wang Yue’s flesh! This unexpected turn of events caused Xuan Bao Shangren’s face to contort in disbelief. “Impossible! Ancient texts claim that no Wang Yue could survive the Sub-Void Nirvana, Even with its size, it should have suffered grave damage!”

High above, among the celestial spheres, Yan Leizi watched, a cruel smile twisting his lips.

“The Elder spoke of it: the purpose of delivering the moon-beast to the Alliance was to incite its rage. The greater its fury, the more grievous its wounds, the greater the destruction this beast will unleash!”

The Wang Yue’s fury had reached its zenith. It was a white-hot fire, fuelled by a pain that bordered on madness. With the shattered starlight as its weapon, it had expelled the cursed arrow. Every fiber of its being throbbed in agony, and its mind was consumed by a single, primal urge: kill, kill, KILL!