Chapter 1268 - Immortal Slaying Domain

Liu Wuxie swept his gaze across the horizon. Aside from the faceless clan, none of the other races surprised him. For many disciples around him, this was their first time seeing so many foreign faces gathered in one place.

Why haven't I seen the divine race?

He wondered. Nearly every race in the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain had arrived, yet no one could find the divine race, even after the Ancestral Tree warned him they were on Indigo Bamboo Star.

"There's no sign of the spirit clan either. Could they be absent from the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain?" he murmured, his brows knitting. He had hoped to use the Myriad Race Ceremony to return the Earth-Binding Chains to the spirit clan and settle his debt to the Feathered Emperor.

Newer races that emerged within the last tens of thousands of years mingled among the crowds, many unfamiliar even to him. Their talent couldn't compare to the ancient lineages.

In the region of the abyssal race, a colossal abyssal mountain drifted forward; the abyssal race had forged an entire peak into an abyssal artifact. Abyssal devils swarmed along its ridges, their strengths varied and menacing. The sight pulled his thoughts to Tian Wucang. After practicing the Curse Dao Art with his bloodline, Tian Wucang must have risen to prominence by now.

"The Myriad Race Ceremony is about to begin. I will now explain the rules. The first event is Blacksmithing, and those registered for it will be teleported to a designated zone. The Immortal Slaying Domain must recognize your artifacts," Zhuge Ming announced, his gaze sweeping over nearly two thousand registered disciples.

The Immortal Slaying Domain was a mysterious treasure that protected the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain. Place a finished artifact within it, and it would grade the work; the higher the grade, the higher the ranking.

Everyone already knew the broad strokes. The array would teleport participants to a specific area to search for blacksmithing materials, forge their artifacts, and submit them to the Immortal Slaying Domain for appraisal. Every astral domain possessed a counterpart to the Immortal Slaying Domain—a dense, nebula-like shield encircling its world. The universe had a lifespan, and so did planets; one day, the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain would reach its limit and decline.

"The Blacksmithing event will decide the ownership of Gos Star. Whoever takes first place wins sovereignty for their sect's faction for the next thousand years," Elder Long added. The great forces had already negotiated the stakes. Gos Star's title would hinge on this ceremony. If Liu Wuxie claimed first, the Heavenly Dragon Sect would rule the planet for a millennium.

"Elder Long, what does the sect gain if a disciple makes the top ten?" a disciple called out. First place obviously brought the grand prize, but what of ranks two through ten?

"Top-ten finishers will earn the sect several mines and expanded territory," Elder Long said, keeping the details light. Even a tenth-place finish carried enormous benefits.

"What about the rewards?" another disciple asked, the question that mattered to most.

"The champion receives a seventh-grade spiritual pill, one choice from the ten supreme arts, one hundred thousand Pure Yang Pills, and five million astral stones..." Elder Long declared.

Gasps rippled through the crowd. Even Liu Wuxie felt a flicker of greed at the mention of a seventh-grade spiritual pill. It could elevate him by a whole level unconditionally and expand his desolate world.

"These are only the base rewards," Elder Long continued. "If you truly win first, the sect will add more benefits for your family and kin as well."

Liu Wuxie held few ties in the astral domain, but if he took first, he would convert those rewards into constructing an interstellar teleportation array to the True Martial Continent.

Elder Long's gaze found him in the crowd and dipped in a subtle nod. This was Liu Wuxie's chance. If he seized first, he could leverage it to secure the teleportation array from the sect.

No wonder he had registered for every event; he wanted the sect to witness his value. The base rewards alone drove people mad, not to mention the extras.

Fighting spirits surged across the fleets. This was an opportunity to establish a name and elevate cultivation. A seventh-grade spiritual pill corresponded to the Void Realm; even Primal Origin Realm cultivators could leap a whole level unconditionally.

More races continued to arrive until the skies over White Moon Valley seemed to brim with them. There weren't literally ten thousand races, but there were thousands, and humanity still outnumbered them.

Suddenly, the Ancestral Tree stirred within him. He followed its warning southwest and spotted a strange warship sliding into view.

"The divine race has finally come," he murmured.

The vessel drew every gaze. The divine race stood oldest among those present, older than the abyssal race, the demon clan, or the human race. It was a pity the witcher clan remained absent, as if someone had erased them from existence.

"The Myriad Race Ceremony is about to start. All competitors, proceed to the teleportation gate!" Elder Long roared as a portal flowered in midair, a doorway into the depths of White Moon Valley.

Those registered for the first event stepped forward and climbed luminous stairs of law toward the gate. Each race's unique laws manifested its own pathway. Those not competing would remain aboard their vessels and wait for the next event. The ceremony would last half a year; there was no need to rush.

Time, however, pressed on Liu Wuxie. If he failed to amass enough value within half a month, he would lose his window to act. Han Feizi had less than a year to live. His only path was forward—claim results, prove his worth, pry open opportunities.

The portal towered over a thousand feet high, like a gate to the Celestial Realm. Light and laws surged around it, laced with faint immortal energy; hundreds of thousands of elites filed through and disappeared.

No one knew where the teleportation sent them. The instant they entered, weight vanished, gravity dissolved, and the world beyond sealed away. Fifteen minutes later, everyone had crossed.

Decks across the armadas thinned. Everyone fixed their eyes on the portal. When the last cultivator of the faceless clan slipped through, the gate rippled and unfurled into a vast screen packed with moving figures, the participants now within White Moon Valley. The image swelled until it carpeted the sky.

The Earth Immortals did not act surprised. This was a space-time teleportation array capable of transmitting images from billions of miles away, a method only Heaven Gaze Realm experts could command.

Not even Quasi–Heaven Gaze Realm experts could achieve it. As for true immortals, their methods surpassed imagination; they could blanket the entire Indigo Bamboo Star with their senses.

Everyone watched the sky, watched the entrants like ants on the screen, yet a brush of divine sense could zoom to any figure, any moment. Mountains unspooled across the image, along with lakes, swamps, and poisonous marshes.

"That's the Immortal Slaying Domain!" someone cried, pointing to a massive nebula that the array projected across half the valley.

When gravity returned, Liu Wuxie's boots met stone, and a crushing pressure followed. Space here was several times tougher than outside; even Primal Origin cultivators would struggle to fly.

After reaching the Primal Origin Realm, short-term flight became possible, but the White Moon Valley's spatial laws were different. It was as tight as a sealed jar.

The valley suppressed divine sense by a factor of ten. Even Liu Wuxie's Ghost Eye shrank to a scant hundred-meter radius.

Outside, his Ghost Eye could sweep a thousand miles. Here, suppression fell heaviest on soul energy rather than true essence or laws. Blacksmithing and alchemy demanded powerful soul force. by suppressing it, the valley prevented cheating. Even swallowing a Soul Refining Pill would be useless.

He scanned his surroundings and saw nothing but rock.

This mountain range brims with metal attributes, perfect for blacksmithing materials,

he thought. He needed to move quickly. Only materials found here would count; the Immortal Slaying Domain would reject anything brought from outside and could even trigger divine punishment.

He opened the Ghost Eye and started the hunt. In this event, bloodshed was rare unless a truly exceptional material appeared.

He kept to the ridgelines and did everything he could to avoid the faceless clan. He felt no fear of the other races, but the faceless troubled him. No reliable accounts described them in the Celestial Realm; they mainly existed in old books.

Rumor held that the faceless possessed bizarre mythical arts that could seize another's soul and bend it to their will. That power was terrifying. If they were dominant in the universe, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Blacksmithing demanded meteor iron and fine steel as primary materials; auxiliary reagents were far easier to gather. He hadn't yet decided what to forge. With a whole month allotted to the event, he could proceed step by step. Forging would take only a few days, but polishing required time.

𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

The range sprawled on and on. An hour passed, and he never saw another soul. The participants had clearly scattered across this zone.

He lifted his gaze to the nebula hovering overhead. The Immortal Slaying Domain looked like a clot of will taking form—chaotic but not yet fully awake. It resembled a primal astral domain, also known as the Astral Domain Heart or Astral Domain Spirit.

Once awakened, it would instantly become the astral domain's master.

He remembered one Astral Domain Spirit that had awakened. It was a newborn will, ignorant as a child, yet immense and larger than ordinary planets. He remembered seeing it devour countless astral stones every day, and its awakening began the countdown to that astral domain's death.