Chapter 1141: The "Human" From Billions of Years Ago (II)

Meanwhile, far away in the depths of space beyond the Heavenly Pool Forbidden Zone, a three-hundred-thousand-meter-long Starry Sky Dragon turned its head. "Arthas, that’s a Chaos-level treasure."

Seated cross-legged on the dragon’s head, Ximen Jianfeng frowned. "Don’t call me Arthas. My name is Ximen Jianfeng now."

The Starry Dragon growled. "Fine, Jianfeng. Then aren’t we heading back?"

"No. The owner of that treasure has already been decided."

Another Starry Dragon approached, its eyes glowing like twin blue stars. "You mean... that human who defeated you?"

"That’s right." Ximen Jianfeng nodded.

Ximen Jianfeng had once studied humans closely and understood that their strength came in three stages. The first was their normal form, which held about sixty percent of their strength. The second was their principle-condensed true form, condensed from principles, which unleashed their full strength. The last was the ultimate state, driven by secret arts that exploded with force beyond their limits.

Even in his normal form, that human, the Divine Might City Lord, had shown power equal to a primordial star. With a single strike, he had crushed Ximen Jianfeng, a prodigy of the Divine Star-Ring Race. Naturally, his principle-condensed true form would be even more terrifying.

Ximen Jianfeng had never fought the guardians of the other three peak civilizations, but instinct told it that none of them could match that human. Of course, nothing was certain. If those guardians joined forces, the Divine Might City Lord, who was only at the middle-stage of the true spirit level, might not be able to withstand them and could even be forced to retreat.

Whatever the outcome, however, weaker beings like them were not even qualified to interfere. Once the battle for the treasure began, anyone outside the four peak civilizations would be the first to be swept aside.

The Starry Dragon carrying Ximen Jianfeng rumbled with a low growl. "Jianfeng, why are you so fascinated by humans? You even reshaped your origin form into a human shape."

"Indeed. We have never understood this either," the other Starry Dragon said, its gaze full of confusion.

The origin form was the core for a member of the Divine Star-Ring Race. True forms could be altered at will, but the origin form typically remained fixed from birth. It also determined the innate power one carried through life.

The twos’ own origin form was that of Starry Sky Dragons. Because of that, they not only wielded the power and form of dragons, but also inherited the racial ability known as "starlight." This made them stronger than dragons who were also at the true spirit level, even if those dragons bore primordial bloodlines.

Apart from having the origin form of dragons, other Star-Rings could be born in the form of a sun or a neutron star. Their true forms were massive in size, and from birth they inherited the raw power of the stars themselves. Ximen Jianfeng’s original origin form had been a neutron star. In fact, it was a cosmic life born from within a star, and from the moment of its birth it carried ancient-titan-level strength, enough to tear apart and destroy stars.

However, a thousand years ago, Ximen Jianfeng had done the unthinkable. It severed from its neutron star form, and reshaped its origin into that of a human–a form that looked weak and utterly ordinary.

The choice had stunned the entire Star-Ring Race, and even drew the attention of the supreme Black Hole Monarch. Apart from the monarch, no one ever learned why Ximen Jianfeng had done it, or why it had taken on a human name–not even the two brothers born alongside it understood.

Ximen Jianfeng shook its head. "Some things cannot be spoken... or rather, I am unable to put them into words."

The two Starry Dragons looked at each other in shock. There was a huge difference between unwilling to speak and unable to speak. What kind of power could silence a true-spirit-level being like Ximen Jianfeng? Could the human race be hiding an even greater secret?

As the two Starry Dragons tried to contain their shock, a hazy image rose in Ximen Jianfeng’s mind. In that vision, the starry sky was dim and heavy, the universe still in the earliest stage of its expansion. Matter and energy gathered together, forming the first nebulae and galaxies of that primordial era. Inside one vast nebula shrouded in endless dust, a half-formed mass of energy glowed with purple-white light. Its immense gravity pulled all things toward it as it rotated slowly in the dark.

Suddenly, the universe trembled, and a towering figure appeared. At its feet, a multicolored river of fate roared, stretching across the endless abyss of time. The figure paused briefly before the purple-white mass, then moved on as if searching for something. Even after it left, its presence lingered in this starry sky for billions of years. No one could remove it. Then one day, it vanished without a trace.

This vision wasn’t random; it was a memory buried deep within Ximen Jianfeng, awakened when it first encountered a human on the Ancient Battlefield more than a thousand years ago. It was when it saw a human for the first time that it realized the figure it had once seen in the distant past was also a human.

Ximen Jianfeng couldn’t recall the figure’s exact face, but it knew the being’s power was beyond measure. When the figure passed by their universe, Ximen Jianfeng’s own mind had not yet awakened, yet the impression the figure left was burned into its core. Later, it tried asking the other Star-Rings about this figure. Each time, its questions vanished from their memories, erased by an unseen power. They couldn’t even recall those questions.

Even now, if Ximen Jianfeng told the Starry Dragons that it had reshaped its origin form because of that human figure, that memory would still be stripped away by the same force. The thought of such power made it tremble. This power had likely surpassed the primordial level and reached the eternal.

These humans, who were so weak that billions could be wiped away with a single breath, actually carried the potential to reach the eternal level, one that outshone even that of the Star-Ring Race.

The strongest Star-Ring, the Black Hole Monarch, had lived for over three million years. Yet for the past hundred thousand years, it remained stuck as a primordial monarch, unable to advance.

The Black Hole Monarch was the first to enter the Ancient Battlefield more than one hundred thousand years ago. By drawing on the systems of countless civilizations, it created the path of cultivation that the Star-Ring Race followed today. Before that, they were wanderers of the cosmic void. They had no concept of cultivation, only the instinct to absorb and flicker with the universe’s energy, growing ever so slowly.

Without the Black Hole Monarch, they would still be growing at that slow rate. So if a being as powerful as the Black Hole Monarch was unable to advance, how could the rest of them?

Ximen Jianfeng's mind then drifted toward the human knowledge in its mind, obtained through a trade with a human. In its view, the most important part of any civilization was its writing and knowledge, for within them lay the essence of its inheritance. So back then, it traded a principle-level divine object in exchange for all of the knowledge contained in the human's storage ring. Whether it was cultivation techniques or other written works, it wanted them all. Yet as it read through them, many of the texts left it confused.

Titles like "The Basics of Poetry," "The Three Hundred Essentials of the God of Poetry," "Chaotic Ancient Rhymes: New Edition," "The Three Thousand Poems of the Immortal Poet Li Xiu, " and "The Most Beautiful Anthology of Ancient Poems and Lyrics..."

Could these really be the reason why humanity’s potential was limitless?

***

Within the raging chaotic shockwaves, an obsidian giant over ten thousand meters tall drew the chopping saber from its back. Instantly, a will sharper than anything imaginable erupted.

Swish! Swish!

The god-piercing will of the saber sliced apart the chaotic shockwaves within a ten-million-kilometer radius. Even the wild currents of spacetime fell silent under its edge.

"This bell is mine," Nuliel growled. Black flames blazed across its chopping saber. Its aura was so cold and sinister that chaos itself shuddered.

Boom!

Before Chen Chu’s eyes, chaos split apart. Enormous black rifts, hundreds of thousands to millions of kilometers long, tore open. Within them, countless clones of Nuliel swung their sabers down together.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Thirty-six saber lights, each unmatched in sharpness, cleaved through spacetime. Their edges shattered spacetime, destroyed chaos, and swept through hundreds of millions of kilometers across the barrier of a world. In the blink of an eye, they had crossed an infinite distance and engulfed Chen Chu. The power behind this attack was more than ten times stronger than their earlier clash; clearly, Nuliel had been holding back its true strength until now.

Just as it struck, at the same time, lightning erupted from the dark purple divine palace where time had been frozen. Golden-white and purple-gray bolts filled the void, crushing spacetime. Within that boundless lightning storm, a three-hundred-thousand-tall demon god appeared. It had three faces and ten arms, with a divine wheel spinning behind its back, and radiated power equal to a primordial star.

Wearing an imperial crown, Chen Chu’s gaze was cold and unyielding. Eight arms spread wide behind him, while his two front arms pressed together. Between his hands, a black stone stele appeared and rose to millions of meters tall.

Boom!

The moment the stele appeared, it released a force that compressed the chaotic shockwaves within three hundred million kilometers, solidifying them into an unbreakable domain of suppression. However, fused with god-piercing saber will, Nuliel's saber was unstoppable. Its saber lights carved through everything, tearing open thirty-six rifts tens of millions of kilometers long inside the stele’s suppressive domain.

Suddenly, Chen Chu suddenly swung the Heaven-Piercing Stele.

Boom!

The suppressive domain around the stele shattered, releasing black shockwaves that surged like tsunamis. The force was so strong that it shattered every strand of black saber light and distorted spacetime. The power broke through all resistance and clashed with Nuliel’s saber, which had silently cut forth from the depths of the chaotic void.

Boom!

The entire Heavenly Pool Forbidden Zone shook violently. The nearby human powerhouses and the Shadow War God elites across the ruined chaotic world lost their hearing.

At the center of destruction, Chen Chu’s towering form carried the black stone stele. His arms bulged with power as he braced against the descending black saber, a strike fierce enough to split heaven and earth. The black flames of the saber clashed again and again with the stele's lightning. Each collision erupted in deafening roars that made the universe tremble.

Half of Nuliel’s massive body emerged from a spatial rift. Five hundred thousand meters tall, it loomed like a dark giant, its cold gaze locked on the demon god below. Even with the full power of its Shadow God-Slaying Saber unleashed, the battle remained evenly matched. Furthermore, the weapon in Chen Chu's hands was no world-creation-level weapon. It was only a world-level weapon, with power elevated to the psuedo-world-creation level by the blessing of two supreme principles.

This realization made Nuliel furious. It couldn't believe that even facing its full might, this human still held back.

Before either side could strike again, the bronze bell at the center of chaos suddenly trembled. The surrounding void blurred, turning illusory in an instant. Out of the darkness that transformed into a dimension, black smoke seeped forth. It winded like a giant serpent, coiling toward the chaotic treasure.

"Courting death!" Nuliel roared. On the back of its head, a pair of narrow white eyes snapped open, unleashing a wave of killing intent that tore through the void.

At the same time, a second pair of arms burst out from its armpits. They reached into the darkness and drew out another saber that was also pitch-black and wreathed in flames. The saber radiated the aura of a world-creation-level weapon.

It was another Shadow God-Slaying Saber. Or rather, the Shadow God-Slaying Saber actually came in a pair.

Boom!

Saber light burst forth like a flood, drowning spacetime. Its edge cut straight through the dark dimension that had trapped the bronze bell, erasing it in an instant. The black serpent formed from smoke was destroyed along with it. From the depths of the collapsing void came a muffled cry of pain. A vague figure, cloaked in a tattered gray robe, flickered into sight.

It was a member of the Estrela Race, a top-level civilization. While Chen Chu and Nuliel clashed, this Estrela had hidden in the shadows, waiting to steal the bronze bell.

As the saber light tore through the Estrela’s "power," the light suddenly shifted. It became an invisible, supple hand that reached straight for the bronze bell.

"Have you... forgotten me?" Chen Chu’s deep, indifferent voice shook the chaos. Behind him, the lightning spear in one hand blazed with dark purple light, stretching into a beam millions of kilometers long that pierced across spacetime.

Bang!

The black saber light shattered in the lightning’s bright radiance. At the same time, the World-Ending Sun, the Death Millstone, and the Soul Chains also lit up behind Chen Chu.

Boom!

The World-Ending Sun streaked across the void and crashed down. It erupted into a blazing supernova that consumed the true form of a Purple Big Dipper Lightning fighter, instantly obliterating it.

The Death Millstone stretched across the void, turning slowly as its gray power of death smothered heaven and earth. A powerhouse, covered in bronze scales with a single horn on its head and a body like a hell devil, rose up to resist it. With a true form over a hundred thousand meters tall, it roared as blood-red light radiated from it. With both arms, it tried to hold up the sky against the Millstone’s crushing weight.

However, the power of death stripped away all life. The Blood-Red Horned powerhouse’s form, once condensed by principle, decayed like that of a mortal on the verge of death. Its skin turned gray, and its life force gradually weakened.

Meanwhile, the black Soul Chains vanished into the depths of spacetime and pierced through a red-armored ape, ten thousand meters tall. This being, at the beginning stage of the true spirit level, was struck down instantly.

Seeing Chen Chu kill three true-spirit-level powerhouses in an instant, Nuliel became even more furious. "Fuck off!"

Boom!

Once again, a black saber light cleaved across chaos. Its edge sliced through two dimensions and split a being who looked like an old man wielding a wooden staff in two. This strike not only severed its true form, but also its soul, will, and origin power.

𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Whoosh!

From within the dark dimension, a pair of withered hands reached out, seizing the Estrela powerhouse and dragging it back into the darkness. At the same time, a strange, raspy voice rang out. "Our race will remember this attack. We will seek revenge."

"What you'll find is death!"

Boom!

Nuliel erupted with power and pushed back Chen Chu's stele that was as heavy as a Great Thousand World. "Let us pause for now," it said, looking at Chen Chu. "We can continue after getting rid of these inconveniences."

Chen Chu looked at Nuliel with a cold gaze. "Agreed."