Chapter 873: Suppressing in the Mage Trove

How is this happening??

Master Stillwinter could not prevent the stress, fury, confusion, and a host of other negative emotions from exploding within him. He simply couldn’t understand what was going on. He had made a massive sacrifice to use the chains binding an ancient heavenly dao, and that should have resulted in a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering attack.

After all, he wasn’t the first Firemoon Darkheaven to use that method. The sacrificial technique was something that all chosen of his people could do. Because of the immense price that had to be paid, it was usually used as a last resort, which meant that it wasn’t something used frequently. But it had been used.

The chains that were summoned weren’t real, but rather, were illusory projections. But even still, each use of that very special divine ability that was exclusive to the Firemoon Darkheaven people could be considered extremely effective.

Cultivators from other species who could survive it were

as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns

.

Yet despite summoning three of those chains, he had failed to kill Xu Qing. Not only that, but the chains apparently had helped him! Master Stillwinter couldn’t help but feel completely humiliated. That was especially true considering that Xu Qing’s aura was now clearly stronger than it had been before. It was so bizarre that he couldn’t wrap his mind around it. He just couldn’t understand.

He’d gone all out, sacrificed his heavenly daos, life force, and cultivation base, yet it seemed like he’d done nothing but provide a tailor-made blessing to his opponent. The pain in his chest became so intense that he coughed up another massive mouthful of blood.

The words just spoken by Xu Qing caused Master Stillwinter’s eyes to turn crimson, and caused his killing intent to surpass his desire to live. He was aware that this was a situation in which he was likely doomed. Unless an actual god interfered, he had very little chance of surviving.

As one of the top chosen among the Firemoon Darkheavens, he was familiar with gods, and knew that the chances of that happening were slim to none. The Great Hunt was set up to be like raising venomous bugs in a jar. There was no way pleas for help would be answered. The gods existed on high, and were not given to sympathy. In the Great Hunt, life or death was the responsibility of the participant.

“Considering everything...” Master Stillwinter murmured. He laughed bitterly. Giving up on thoughts of fleeing, he glared at Xu Qing, madness rising within him.

Rumbling sounds echoed out from within him, followed by a very dangerous aura. Then terrifying fluctuations rolled out from him. The source of it all was his sea of consciousness!

There were ninety-six god monuments there, all of them trembling. The faces of the dead gods there roared in rage. Their combined cries swirled out to form a massive vortex that spun around Master Stillwinter himself. The sound grew louder, and the force of attraction grew stronger.

All of a sudden, the red sky shifted, turning blurry and dark. The entire world seemed to descend into the netherworld, all while ancient chanting spread through the darkness.

Master Stillwinter’s aura began to grow stronger and stronger. However, only an instant later, cracking sounds rang out within him as he started to crumble. This level of explosive powerup was too much for his fleshly body to take. But he didn’t care.

He had sacrificed his heavenly daos, his life force, and his cultivation base, but he still had his soul. His true soul was actually hidden among the more than ninety god monuments, and now, it glittered brightly. Master Stillwinter howled as it exploded, turning into a burst of force that swept over all the monuments. The true soul was the core of his sea of consciousness, and destroying it would affect everything else.

With that stimulation, the host of god monuments began to tremble violently. Next, they all began to shine with holy golden light that filled Master Stillwinter’s shattered body.

One by one, streams of light shot up into the dome of heaven. From a distance, it was possible to see a total of ninety-five beams of golden light shooting up into the dark sky to form ninety-five enormous god monuments. As they hovered there emanating destructive force, they merged to create a huge face with closed eyes.

The face was extremely ugly, and didn’t have ordinary facial features, but rather, resembled something like a bug or reptile. It was very repulsive.

Meanwhile, Master Stillwinter’s fleshly body had reached the end of the line. As he crumbled into ash, he leered at Xu Qing and said, “I’ll be waiting for you in the netherworld.”

With that, he faded into nothing. The only thing left behind in his stead was the enormous face in the sky. The two eyes fluttered and then opened. An ancient wind blew, full of corrosion and death.

It landed on Xu Qing. Heaven and earth went dim as signs of mutation cropped up in Xu Qing.

But this was not the Xu Qing of the past. He had faced many gods, and had thus developed a measure of resistance to them. What was more, when in his fourth-level god state he was like a god himself.

Therefore, he had his ways of resisting the mutagen and energy of gods. A tremor passed through him as the spots that were starting to mutate burst into flames and then became soul threads.

𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

He looked up at the face in the sky, his eyes shining with a bizarre light. That action seemed like blasphemy to the god above, who was enraged. The face’s mouth opened and then inhaled sharply in Xu Qing’s direction. Heaven and earth crumbled. The air shattered. And a massive gravitational force latched onto Xu Qing. Xu Qing’s body wasn’t under his own control as he flew up toward the face, which clearly sought to devour him.

This was Master Stillwinter's final trump card. He sacrificed his soul to revive the god monuments to a certain degree, and thus... end things in mutual destruction! That was the only thing he could do. No god was going to come save him. And death was death.

What was more, if he could prove his value and show his determination when he died, then it was always possible that a god might resurrect him in the future.

There was no way to tell if a god was pleased or displeased. But one thing was certain: Xu Qing currently looked pleased. All of this was going exactly how he’d hoped it would.

During the fight with Master Stillwinter months ago, he’d become aware of the gruish nature of his sea of consciousness. When using Fishing the Moon in the Well, he saw the more than ninety god monuments of deceased gods. Back then, he wasn’t sure what it meant.

But after gaining enlightenment from Ninedawns’ memory fragments, he saw what happened years ago, and came to realize exactly what those god monuments were.

They were gods that had died during the war between mages and gods. Despite being perished, and not being as dangerous as they were in life, they were still able to form a powerful trump card in Master Stillwinter’s sea of consciousness. That led Xu Qing to the conclusion that they could be very beneficial nutrients for his mage trove.

For that to happen, though, the god monuments needed to be active. Like they were now.

They’re just monuments to dead gods, which means that the monuments... count as being dead!

If he was dealing with ninety-five actual gods, then he wouldn’t have any chance of succeeding. He would be dead after a single glance. But these were monuments that were the remains of dead gods. Therefore, Xu Qing could at least attempt to subdue them.

As he neared the huge face, the violet moon behind him shone with bright light, and the sound of chanting drifted out from it. The soul threads that formed his fourth-level god state wriggled, and as he waved his hand, they spread out. They became a sea of soul threads that was actually larger than the face, and became like a barrier between it and him.

The gravitational force ceased to pull at him. Eyes glittering, he reached out with his right hand and squeezed the sea of soul threads. Millions of soul threads rumbled loudly, sending out boundless fluctuations as they spread out and surrounded the face.

The face’s eyes were listless and dead. But the opened mouth, instead of inhaling, suddenly spat out a golden mist. The mist had a corrosive effect on the soul threads, and for the first time ever, Xu Qing could sense them starting to pop out of existence.

At the same time, the facial features of the face blurred from the effort of trying to free itself from confinement.

Ninety-five beams of golden light shot out, which turned into ninety-five golden spears. The spears exploded in all directions, smashing through the soul threads in their way, which were powerless to stop them.

That said, there was no way Xu Qing was going to let the face do whatever it wanted. And thus, he reached out to the blood sphere that had been thwarted by the arrival of the ancient heavenly dao. Instantly, it erupted into a huge sea of blood. When combined with the soul threads, it created a double perimeter that started shrinking down to crush the face.

Xu Qing then took a deep breath and settled down cross-legged in the air. He placed his hands on his knees, and lowered his head. The mage mark on his forehead then glittered brightly.

Antemage!

His Ninedawns mage armor vibrated as boundless gray fog spread out and filled the surroundings. As the roiling gray fog covered him, a towering figure like a mountain became vaguely visible within.

Long ago, that figure had stood watch outside the God-Rejecting Mage Formation, protecting his species for ten thousand years. Later, he disappeared in the sands of history, remembered by few. Now, he was appearing again. This was the true antemage state of the Darkheaven Archmage people.

Along with it came a truly astonishing and boundless aura. The Mountain and Sea Region trembled, and countless beasts howled. The blood of numerous cultivators was affected, and they felt the urge to drop down in worship. Sadly, the figure was still blurry, giving the sensation that it was only about half complete.

A peerless might appeared around the face that Xu Qing had trapped. Then it crashed down. A boom rattled out as the face collapsed, transforming back into ninety-five god monuments. They attempted to form back together, but there was no time.

Millions of soul threads. A 50,000-kilometer blood sea. Half of an antemage state. Combined, they created something beyond exceptional. More rumbling echoed out as the gray fog seemed to become one with the huge figure.

A moment later, the fog dissipated, and Xu Qing was revealed, hovering cross-legged in midair. The giant face was gone. It was now in Xu Qing’s sea of consciousness, suppressed in the lands of his mage trove. He had succeeded in acquiring incredible nutrients for his antemage state!