Chapter 1832: Tenth-grade Battle

Li Luo's teasing words made Jiang Qing'e gently bump his chest with her flawless forehead, her golden eyes filled with tenderness and affection. She knew that this was his way of telling her that he had reached the tenth-grade and was now a truly unsurpassed expert. The boy who had worked tirelessly to catch up and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with her had finally succeeded.

Jiang Qing'e felt a sense of warmth and safety in his embrace. All sorts of memories surfaced in her mind, mostly of when they were children. Li Luo's childish banter had always resulted in him being subdued by her. Every time he decided to open his mouth, the young Li Luo would always stubbornly and furiously say, "Jiang Qing'e, just you wait! One day you'll call me 'Older Brother' and admit defeat!" However, his resistance would be met with even greater oppression.

At this moment, Jiang Qing'e's lips were curled up into a smile as her eyes gently closed. She shifted slightly in Li Luo's arms, as though snuggling in and finding the most comfortable position.

"Older Brother, I admit defeat," she said gently.

When those soft words reached his ears, Li Luo, now an unmatched sovereign, started shaking. An indescribable sense of comfort arose from the depths of his heart, spreading across him. How could he have forgotten the promise he had made as a mischievous child?

This represented the deep bond and affection they held for each other. He never would have thought that this arduous achievement would end up being unlocked so quietly and without fanfare. The satisfaction he was feeling far surpassed the sense of accomplishment he experienced after reaching the tenth-grade. Li Luo let out a casual laugh when he thought of that.

At this moment, the palm manifestation that had instilled fear in the other Heavenly Emperors approached him. When it was a hundred thousand feet away from Li Luo, it suddenly vanished. It was extremely abrupt, as though it had been wiped off a blackboard, out of existence.

Dumbfounded looks appeared in the eyes of the Heavenly Emperors. That palm contained the power of the tenth-grade extinction resonance! Their hearts started to beat wildly and their breathing became labored. They then stared unblinkingly at the figure standing in the sky.

Only someone who had reached the tenth-grade could deal with a tenth-grade opponent. This meant that Li Luo's secluded cultivation had been fruitful. Now the world had a chance of surviving! The Heavenly Emperors' hearts trembled with excitement and their scalps tingled.

In the end, Heavenly Emperor Jiang roared, his voice reaching every corner of the divine continents, "Congratulations on reaching the tenth-grade, Heavenly Emperor Luo!"

The rest of the Heavenly Emperors were jolted awake by his shout. They all bowed, their reverent voices booming like thunder. "Congratulations on reaching the tenth-grade, Heavenly Emperor Luo!"

Every single living creature heard them. The atmosphere immediately lifted, and the terrified living beings knelt down with devout hearts as they worshipped the young man in the sky. Their cheers were heard across the land. "Congratulations on reaching the tenth-grade, Heavenly Emperor Luo!"

Meanwhile, Li Luo lifted his head and looked towards the Shadow World, which was encroaching on the divine continents. The Dark Sect Master had kneaded countless Others into a black tide, filled with seeds of assimilation. If the corruption were to cover the divine continents, it would trigger a series of terrifying forced fusions and ruin life as they knew it. After all, the black tide was full of tenth-grade power and could not be resisted.

As Li Luo calmly watched the incoming tide, the Heavenly Emperors were shocked to sense an ethereal and omniscient power surge forward, instantly erasing it from existence. Not a single droplet had been able to touch the divine continents. It was like an invisible wall had shielded them.

When Li Luo took action, the Dark Sect Master's indifferent expression finally changed. She glared at him as she said, "This is... a tenth-grade void resonance! How did you manage to reach the tenth-grade with it?"

The Sect Master had fused with the Origin of Absolute Corruption, so the Dark Sect Master was privy to the secrets behind the void resonance. However, the Sect Master had failed to create one for herself, and the Dark Sect Master wasn't any different.

In the end, she had opted to take the power of the Sect Master and the Origin of Absolute Corruption. She then utilized Li Luo's Absolute Resonance Seed to fuse them and used the resulting energy to elevate the extinction resonance to the tenth-grade. It was clear that the Dark Sect Master had succeeded, and had gone further than the Sect Master.

When the Dark Sect Master saw that Li Luo had attained the tenth-grade void resonance, something that even the almighty Legendary Sect Master had failed to obtain, she felt a sense of incredulity despite being at the same realm.

"So it turns out that you were the final ace in the hole that was hidden away. She had indeed looked much further into the future than I did," she said.

The Dark Sect Master's eyes were as dark as the Acheronian Sea. She already knew that the Sect Master had used Jiang Qing'e as the medium to conceal Li Luo's three original resonances. That had prevented the Absolute Resonance Seed from devouring them and turning them into nutrition for the extinction resonance. This important step had turned into her largest impediment.

"How impressive. Since she was in her final moments, turning the tides would have been incredibly hard. I would have never thought that she would be able to hide her final card so deeply and outplot me," said the Dark Sect Master as she sighed emotionally.

Although the Sect Master had failed to reach the tenth-grade, she had successfully hatched up a plan to nurture one. As expected of the Dark Sect Master's original self.

Li Luo set Jiang Qing'e down, but he continued to hold her hand. Then he calmly replied, "I promised her that I would rectify the mistakes she made."

The Dark Sect Master shook her head, and a bemused smile appeared on her face. "That's good. I was worried that everyone in this world would be akin to ants and things would get boring after I reached the tenth-grade. This is a great result. I can finally see how amazing the void resonance is for myself. After all, the Sacred Void Resonance Sect pursued it for countless years."

She stretched out her pale, slender hand, and enough power to destroy the world condensed within her palm. As the black light flickered, a world devoid of life and only filled with destruction was created in her hand. Within it were countless minor spaces, and they were all lacking life. This was known as the World Within One's Palm, the ability to create an entire world. Just how powerful was she?

The World Within One's Palm caused a suffocating pressure to descend on the divine continents, causing the Heavenly Emperors' faces to instantly become pale. How could they possibly resist such power? If Li Luo had not reached the tenth-grade, some of them might have chosen to self-detonate in a moment of despair.

Li Luo closely examined the World Within One's Palm and the boundless extinction energy inside. It possessed nothing but destructive will, and if it landed on the divine continents, everything might very well be erased from existence. A single mistake in a battle between tenth-grade experts would result in a catastrophe being unleashed on the world.

Despite all that, Li Luo was unfazed. A formless and colorless mote of light appeared behind him. It then ascended into the sky, gradually expanding without end and transforming into a titanic halo. The halo of light was vibrant and filled with a myriad of colors, and one could see countless resonances transforming and taking shape within it. This was the void resonance, and also the Absolute Resonance! The halo was thus named the Void Resonance Halo.

As it floated into the air, it moved towards the World Within One's Palm. When the two attacks clashed, tenth-grade extinction resonant power poured downwards in a mighty torrent, attempting to obliterate the Void Resonance Halo.

The Void Resonance Halo continued to slowly turn. As it did so, the countless resonances within transformed, negating the incoming attack.

The Dark Sect Master's expression remained unchanged as she traced a path through the void with her slender finger. Immense amounts of tenth-grade extinction resonant power poured out of countless spatial rifts that had been opened right above the divine continents, attempting to extinguish all life.

Li Luo grinned as he had expected her to do that, and he had made preparations. With a thought, a Void Resonance Halo appeared at each of the billions of spatial rifts, blocking the extinction resonant power and protecting the divine continents. The meaning of the void resonance was that it could appear wherever one willed. It was everywhere and everything.

The Heavenly Emperors couldn't even sense the billions of clashes that were occurring between Li Luo and the Dark Sect Master. Heavenly Emperor Jiang and the rest weren't able to perceive the battles raging across all of the spatial rifts above the divine continents, but they could sense an uneasy tribulation being resolved quietly. They thus stared at the youthful figure in the sky in awe, as he was doing his best to defend their world.

Li Luo coolly observed the calamitous Dark Sect Master. He knew that a battle between tenth-grade resonances would not be easy; it would be a long struggle across countless battlefields. That said, with the tenth-grade void resonance's ethereal protection, the Dark Sect Master's plan to fuse the two worlds had become almost impossible to achieve.

The Dark Sect Master coldly glared at Li Luo with her abyss-like eyes. "You have reached the tenth-grade, so you can protect the divine continents, but what will that achieve? The chaos still remains. After all, I am the source of it. Even if I'm unable to enter the divine continents, I can continue to rule over the Shadow World and transform it into my training ground. The battle between us will rage endlessly for years to come."

She waved her hand, and the extinction resonant power took the shape of a gigantic black serpent that one couldn't see the end of. The giant serpent coiled beneath her, serving as her throne. She sat atop it like a devil god, indifferently overlooking the divine continents.

Li Luo looked at Li Lingjing's familiar face, which was now masked with frigid coldness and apathetic indifference. He knew that she was right. With him and her being at the tenth-grade, determining the victor would be no easy task. If victory couldn't be decided and the Dark Sect Master remained, the chaos plaguing the world would never end. This was not the result he wished for. This wasn't the Sect Master's will either, especially after planning for countless years.

However, how could killing someone with a tenth-grade resonance be an easy task? The only way was if his cultivation level exceeded his opponent's.

He waved his sleeve, and a twelve-petaled golden lotus was conjured beneath him. Countless resonances formed and transformed into numerous Authorities, floating and sinking around him until the vicinity looked like a starry sky. A while later, a magnificent sound akin to the chiming of a grand bell resounded throughout the divine continents.

"The world reveres the Emperor, but the Emperor is not the end of the road. There should be another realm at the end of the road. Today, I'll pave a new path for all the living beings in the world. This will be a level above the Emperors. I will call it... the Ruler Stage," Li Luo declared.