Chapter 1074: Cleaning Vegetables

Atop the huge sea, inside the horrifying magenta tumor, a voice spoke, and an aura spread out.... A storm sprang up on the transparent sea, giving birth to a tsunami. A screaming sound shook everything, and huge waves swept back and forth that seemed capable of overturning heaven and earth. The sky of flesh quivered. Countless fleshy tentacles swayed back and forth. And the opening the group had just come through was already closing. The area had become a deadly danger zone.

The mocking voice that had just spoken echoed within the danger zone, reaching the ears of the Imperial Sovereigns, causing grim expressions to reach their faces and filling their hearts with regret. They should not have come here.

Sometimes, though, the advancement of the cultivation base did not reduce one’s capacity for greed. It all came down to how much something was worth. Powerful experts like Imperial Sovereigns were not people who lacked the capacity to fight hard for what they wanted. And they were not cowards. Otherwise, they would not have been able to tread their path to the current position. Therefore, it made sense that they would take a chance by coming to a place like this.

Right now, all of them were instinctively backing up and activating their most powerful defenses. At the same time, they were trying to come up with ways of dealing with the situation, while simultaneously putting most of their hope in Grand Emperor Devilbird. All of them, with the exception of the fifth Imperial Sovereign, had come here, not because it was their idea, but because Grand Emperor Devilbird had persuaded them and even sworn dao oaths to convince them.

The way things played out wasn’t set in stone. That was especially true about the empress joining forces with Devilbird. In other words, it was still possible that they could get their hands on authority legacies or Grand Emperor treasures.

As for Xu Qing and Erniu.... They each had their own unique objectives.

Xu Qing’s goal was relatively simple. He wanted a way to break through the shackles confining his cultivation base. And the power emanating off this transparent sea, though neither spirit power nor god power, did contain a life force that gave him a bit of hope.

This is the perfect place for cultivation base advancement!

Erniu, meanwhile, was looking at that huge tumor. Specifically, he was licking his lips as he looked at the figure inside. His original goal in coming to this place had been to gain control of a Grand Emperor’s corpse.

Of course, a goal like that was not going to be easy to accomplish. So he had a second goal as well, and that was to activate the bone cauldron made from his past life to find the memories of his third life. The reality was that he was missing memories from his first, second, and third lives. And he had the feeling that the only way to start finding the memories from the first and second lives was to start by getting control of his third life memories.

Therefore, he had multiple objectives in mind as he slowly backed up.

At exactly the same moment that the empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird were already shooting toward the tumor...

As Grand Emperor Netherflame sat within the huge tumor on the transparent sea, he lifted his right hand. The dome of heaven trembled and then sank downward.

The sight of it struck everyone to the core. This was a case of heaven destroying earth! Everything was being crushed.

The air vibrated as if it were turning solid, and then began to converge inward. It was the same with the sea below, which began to rise up to connect with the sky and the air. The entire world was contracted as if to form a powerful sealing mark.

All Xu Qing could sense was that heaven and earth were blurring, and seemingly infinite pressure was building up. And yet, after he got over his shock and looked around, everything looked normal.

The sky was still made of flesh. The earth was still covered by the transparent sea. There were no other dramatic transformations anywhere else.

The only difference was that... the empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird were now surrounded by a sphere-like magenta tumor. It was formed from the sky, the sea, and the air. That was because the event which just occurred had been focused on the empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird!

Xu Qing realized that he would have a hard time describing exactly how it played out. All he knew was that he had a feeling inside him that this entire world was like a fruit. They were currently in the core of that fruit, and just now, Grand Emperor Netherflame had used an unimaginable power to carve a sphere out in the middle of that fruit. The empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird were now sealed within that sphere.

Before Xu Qing’s senses could process it, heaven and earth rumbled, and the same thing happened again. In fact, it happened twenty-three times in a row before it stopped.

Everything was back to normal. However, everything seemed... flimsier than before. Everyone was stunned.

And Netherflame’s voice then echoed out again from within the tumor. “I’ve been planning this for a thousand years. I just needed Devilbird to show up at the right moment. Then I could possess him and use him as a body in which to be reborn. And you are the nutrients I need for that rebirth. Granted, I didn’t expect an Altar God to show up. To be honest, it was... a pleasant surprise.”

Netherflame’s gaze came to rest on the empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird in the tumor. Then he looked at the rest of the surprised cultivators present. “I have thirty-three worlds. I already peeled away twenty-three of them to perform this sealing. That means there are ten left for the rest of you.”

Netherflame lifted his hand and then gently lowered it. It didn’t matter how people struggled, fought back, or tried to evade. Nothing helped. Instantly... heaven and earth filled with rumbling sounds. One world became a mass of flesh that surrounded the young woman in palace attire. Another world became a cage that sealed the fifth Imperial Sovereign. As for the scholar, the teenager, and the old man with the grudge against Xu Qing and Erniu, none of them were able to escape the fate of being surrounded by one of the worlds peeled away by Netherflame. All of them became tumors floating in midair. Another tumor contained Xu Qing and Erniu.

Having accomplished that, Netherflame closed his eyes. Then his chest heaved as he started performing breathing exercises. When he inhaled, the floating balls of flesh quivered and began to contract. When he exhaled, the fleshy tumors shivered again and expanded. Because of his breathing, the people caught in the tumors felt their life force and cultivation bases weakening. A sensation of crisis was starting to grow strong.

However, at that critical moment, the tumor of twenty-three worlds that held the empress and Grand Emperor Devilbird began to tremble. And then the tumor started to act in exactly the opposite way as everything else. When Netherflame inhaled, the interior of the tumor expanded. And when he exhaled, the opposite happened. It was using Netherflame’s strength to create a conflicting force that sent cracks spreading out through the tumor.

Netherflame frowned slightly.

𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

As the cracks proliferated, streams of godlight began to seep out, along with the power of Devilbird’s authority. It took only three breaths of time. At that point, the sealing tumor of twenty-three worlds emitted a loud bang as it exploded.

The empress flew out and shot toward the tumor containing Netherflame. The mere passage of the empress caused heaven and earth to shatter. Grand Emperor Devilbird was next to the empress, his killing intent surging. They were unstoppable.

In the blink of an eye, the two of them smashed into the tumor containing Netherflame, and began to fight. The tumor swelled and became nothing but a chaotic blur. No one could see what was happening inside.

That said, no one was keen on trying to find out. The Imperial Sovereigns were taking advantage of the moment to unleash various trump cards to break free from their own sealing tumors.

Some used secret magics, others used Grand Emperor treasures they had kept in reserve. No one held anything back.

Xu Qing and Erniu were also going all out to break free, using the empress’s medallion and Xu Qing’s carving knife. Unfortunately, the tumors were fantastically gruish. It was as if they took advantage of cracks between fate to create layer after layer. It was never-ending. Erniu opened his mouth and took a bite, but that didn’t do anything.

It was the same everywhere. No matter what anyone did, it was pointless.... Even if they broke through a layer of the sealing, there was always another sealing beyond that. People started wondering if they were seeing things.

Erniu inhaled sharply. “Are these sealing marks really made from only one world each? If we couldn’t break out of them, that would make sense. But look at all the Imperial Sovereigns! They’re using all sorts of trump cards. Even Grand Emperor treasures! And not even that is doing anything.”

His eyes glittered. “Wait a second,” he continued suspiciously. “Why would Netherflame say that to begin with? Maybe... these sealing marks aren’t made from worlds at all! And if that’s the case, why would Netherflame do all of this? What would be the point of tricking us? Wouldn’t it make more sense to put a bunch of sealing marks on the empress and Devilbird? After all, they’re a much bigger threat than us.”

Clearly, Xu Qing and Erniu weren’t the only ones pursuing this train of thought. The Imperial Sovereigns were starting to come to the same conclusion.

And then, just as Erniu gave voice to that concept, something dramatic happened!

Almost all of the tumors started twitching violently and at the same time, contracting and expanding rapidly. And that caused immense pressure to weigh down on the Imperial Sovereigns. In fact, it was a pressure that surpassed what Imperial Sovereigns could sustain.

An instant later, howls of anguish rang out of their mouths. Their bodies then began to collapse and be assimilated. Their life force was being forcefully sucked out. The pressure also caused their cultivation bases to be brutally stripped away. The same thing happened with their souls and authority. Even their magical treasures were unable to escape the effects. The pressure caused them to collapse and be sucked up. It was almost as if they were turning into spirit stones!

This was a consummate level of power, something they couldn’t fight against. They could only writhe in helpless agony and despair.

Of course, that was happening to

almost

all of the tumors. The reason for the word

almost

... was that it wasn’t happening to the tumor that contained Xu Qing and Erniu! Their tumor wasn’t contracting. It was only expanding. And that was because something dramatic was happening inside....

That development caused Erniu to inhale sharply, and it filled Xu Qing with a sense of unbounded danger. A boundless life force swept toward them from all directions, and it... directly entered the tumor that contained them!

Astonishingly, it was the life force that was being stripped away from the Imperial Sovereigns. Unseen hands were manipulating things to send all of it to Xu Qing and Erniu. The previous expansion was clearly intended to make room for it all.

In the blink of an eye, the life force quintessence of all of the Imperial Sovereigns had become a liquid that pooled all the way up to Xu Qing’s ankles. And as it coursed into his flesh and blood, it provided incredible nourishment. And the focus of that nourishment was his fleshly body.

When Erniu saw that, he gasped.

As for Xu Qing, he was shaken to his core as he suddenly recalled something. It was something that happened in the world of the Heavenmakers.

Someone is catalyzing my fleshly body into maturity!

His heart was racing as he thought back to that experience. He suddenly got the sensation that being cleansed by the Heavenmakers' might have seemed like good fortune in and of itself. But the reality was that it was like... cleaning vegetables!

Before you eat something, you need to clean it thoroughly.