Chapter 1139: Improvement of All Hands (IV)

The world changed after ten minutes. The cosmic expanse disappeared and Silver City remained Silver City. However, the situation was vastly different from before. People’s strength and hearts had changed.

The moment everyone settled back down, the Demon Hunters erupted with cheers that were echoed by the rest of the army. “Mighty is the commander!”

“Mighty is the commander!”

The earth trembled and sky shook as waves of sound built, extending from Silver City!

Someone turned on the sky canopy system, making screens light up around the world. The cheers resounded through all of Skystar Dynasty! Countless soldiers raised their fists to the air and shouted with joy.

Huang Yu was visibly shaken when he took to the air and roared, “Dominators are able to hover in the sky. Anyone who has reached Dominator or greater, take to the air!”

His shout cascaded through the sky and one thousand people rose in response. It grew to three thousand, five thousand, ten thousand...

More and more soldiers took to the air. The sight astonished the world as there were more than one hundred thousand Dominators!

While one hundred thousand was only a couple percent of the overall army, all of these soldiers were Dominators! More than one hundred thousand of them! There were more than likely quite a few Mountain and Sea among them.

The scene spread throughout the world as it was broadcast on all of the sky canopies. Jaws dropped and eyes widened—local overlords and provincial executives of the four continents trembled like leaves!

Dominators!

Mountain and Sea were the equivalent of Arcanus and Dominators the equivalent of Solars and Novas. To have so many Solars and Novas appear in the blink of an eye was absolutely mind-boggling, and this was just the army! The rest of the people on the ground didn’t seem that weak either!

How was this possible?

It didn’t make sense to many people. Was Dominator a cultivation level so easy to reach? Why had more than one hundred thousand been born overnight?

“Dominators can choose to remain in the army or leave!” Li Hao’s voice rang out of the sky canopy. “With Sunderers as the threshold, all those below are to return to where they came from—barring special exceptions. But you are not to become a plague upon your hometown after you return! You can join the local Inspectorate, Night Watchers, enroll at the martial academy, or work as a guard or security!

“In addition, Watercloud Dynasty swears fealty to Skystar Dynasty as of today. They will join us as our one hundredth province, the Watercloud province. They will be temporarily located on the shores of the four seas! The Watercloud Army will construct the navies of the four seas with the Watercloud empress dowager as the Admiral of the Four Seas!

“Great Li pledges ties of friendship with Skystar Dynasty and will recall its troops starting today!

“Divine Nation of the west was guilty of unpardonable insubordination. Last night, the Skystar Commander Office executed dozens of its divine spirits, obliterated its army of one million, and razed its divine city. The Moon God queen of the east and eleven fake gods are on the run. Arrest warrants are hereby issued for these fugitives! Any Skystar citizen may kill them!

“Barren Dynasty is trapped within the desert and cannot make any headway. However, any who set foot outside of their territory will be shown no mercy!”

“......” The world quieted for a moment when Li Hao announced the latest news. Everyone was in shock.

What??

Skystar Dynasty had been very nervous about the encirclement of the four nations because the dynasty hadn’t triumphed decisively in the initial skirmishes against Great Li or Divine Nation. While there hadn’t been battles against the other two nations, the people of Skystar Dynasty felt the pressure all the same.

But now, Li Hao was saying that Great Li had retreated, Watercloud surrendered, Divine Nation toppled, and Barren Dynasty trapped within its own borders...

The people were stupefied and couldn’t find their tongues.

W-what...?

They didn’t understand what they had heard! It’d only been a few days, what’d happened since then?

Seeing as sky canopies could be found in all directions, incredulous whoops, hollers, and cheers exploded over Silver Moon province the next moment. The world had just changed around them! How was any of this possible?!

......

Barren Dynasty.

A sky canopy hovered in the air. All color had drained from the Barren king’s face.

Impossible.

They had just discussed holding a meeting of the five sides today. Indeed, the slated date was today. The sky was still dark—daybreak was when the parley would happen.

But now he learned that Great Li had run off, Watercloud surrendered, and Divine Nation was no more!

That was impossible!

Despite witnessing a bloody rain yesterday, despite all omens foretelling an unsuccessful meeting, never did he think that the entire world would change over the course of a day. The immensely powerful Divine Nation had been toppled!

While Li Hao said that eleven divine spirits were on the run, and the Moon God made it twelve, if the Barren king’s memory served correctly, there should be at least sixty divine spirits in that nation!

“How can this be?” murmured the Barren king. Indeed, how could it be? And why had Skystar suddenly gained so many Dominator soldiers?

That was the Dominator level, the original Solar and Nova supernatural level! Pulling out one hundred thousand in one go, and this was just

one

of Skystar’s provinces. Even if most of them were gathered here, what did that mean for the rest of the dynasty?

Fear was starting to overtake the Barren king. Everything was happening too quickly!

The other Barren officials within the great hall were frozen in shock and unable to find the appropriate words. Skystar was so formidable, how were they to fight it?

“It’s fake, this must be fake,” muttered a skeptical official. “Li Hao must be trying to scare us! This isn’t possible! Divine Nation is valiant and said to have Saints among their ranks. The Saint level surpasses the Sun and Moon level that Li Hao speaks of. How can they have been destroyed?”

Some of the more powerful desolate beasts within Barren Dynasty were also of the Saint level. If Divine Nation could be toppled, didn’t that mean Barren Dynasty could as well?

Many among the assembled shuddered from the implications!

They’d previously felt that Barren Dynasty was invincible due to the presence of desolate beasts and Saints. No one who stood against them would amount to anything.

However, the news of Divine Nation toppling sent everyone into a panic!

......

At the same time.

The west, in a dark corner somewhere.

The Moon God held a piece of a sky canopy and spat out a mouthful of blood.

“Li Hao...” she forced out through clenched teeth. So it wasn’t only Divine Nation that was no more, even Watercloud and Great Li had surrendered.

The Great Li king might speak of withdrawing, but the truth of his actions were that he’d surrendered!

Only Barren Dynasty was left among the four. The world truly had changed completely in the span of one night.

Next to her, some divine spirits crouched fretfully.

“Your Majesty... let us return to Divine Nation first,” someone offered in a low voice. “We are... unsettled. Someone seems to be chasing us!”

The Moon God nodded with a solemn expression; she knew about those on their tail. It wasn’t necessarily Li Hao’s faction—it was very likely those from Red Moon universe!

Damn it!

“Let’s go! We... will be back, but not right now. We need to gain a deeper understanding of the dao universe or we’ll just be going to our deaths in future engagements.” She didn’t linger as an insistence on revenge wasn’t the most important task at hand.

They had to clarify what the rules of the dao universe were. Otherwise, any engagement would be a repeat of the last—Li Hao would easily kill divine spirits and obliterate their Saints without having to lift a finger. That was a terrifying proposition to divine spirits!

And for some reason, the young man’s army had abruptly swelled in strength. It was all rather despair inducing. If the soldiers were this strong, then what about Li Hao himself?

Perhaps... he was even stronger!

Damn that boy!

......

Silver City.

The world shook. Ripples from the Hao Cosmos faded away.

Li Hao looked around with a faint smile on his face after his announcements. Countless soldiers had grown stronger; his efforts were not in vain.

On the ground.

The Great Li army looked at their opponents with some horror. The Skystar Army had suddenly grown massively stronger, whereas Li Hao had intercepted the power of great dao on their side. Great Li didn’t really benefit from the thunder tribulation—only the Great Li king, Jiang Li, and a few temple guards and priests had gleaned some scant pickings.

Their improvements were limited since they did not cultivate the new martial dao. Meanwhile, the powerhouses on Li Hao’s side showed marked improvement since they did walk the new path.

Not all of the young man’s heavyweights had been present. Only the commanders of the five cardinal directions, Director General Zhao, and a few other officials meant to pacify the army had come to Silver City. The rest had scattered around the dynasty on their respective missions. But even so, quite a number of people had improved.

Most frightening of all was Li Hao himself. The Great Li king could sense that the young man was stronger than before.

Li Hao had cleared 320 acupoints out of thirty-six dao meridians. He had opened twenty-eight out of the circulation of thirty-six. 324 other acupoints formed a simple circulation of sword dao with the thirty-six meridians. He had cleared a total of 644 acupoints, opened nine attributed dao meridians, and the body dao meridian. That meant he’d opened a grand total of thirty-eight meridians.

He was officially among the ranks of peak ninth level Sun and Moon and even half a step into the next realm. However, he’d simply opened a high number of dao meridians. The young man was yet to complete the basic circulation of thirty-six.

Thirty-six dao meridians were peak Sun and Moon. While he’d opened thirty-eight, he hadn’t undergone a major metamorphosis and as such, did not count as having entered the next cultivation level.

The Great Li king at present was also much stronger than before.

He had some gains of his own after defeating the ancient city, but hadn’t had time to digest them. He fully made them his with the aid of great dao power, but the king was at most sixth level Sun and Moon.

The gap between him and Li Hao was growing ever larger, a fact that caused an unpleasant expression to spread across his face.

Great Li was not part of Skystar Dynasty; his previous efforts with Li Hao had just been a partnership. Now that Watercloud had surrendered and Divine Nation all but extinct since the Moon God would be unlikely to mount a comeback with the survivors, what could Great Li do? Barren Dynasty enjoyed the protection of the desolate beasts. Great Li did not.

The king looked at Li Hao out of the corner of his eye.

The young man did not seem like a hotly ambitious person. He would not have necessarily paid attention to Great Li had the nation not attacked Skystar. At the same time, the king knew that that applied to the past!

Li Hao might have been so in the past, but what about now?