Chapter 828: A Direct Route

Before him was a quiet, idyllic thicket, within which were many caves and log cabins.

𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

Bearmen originally didn't live in packs, but ever since a king of the realm emerged among the bearmen, things had been different. The new king had assembled all his people to form a settlement of bearmen.

Those who had wealth and luxury could afford log cabins for themselves; those that didn't dug holes beneath large, shady trees.

At the center of the settlement was a gigantic tree, one that had been around for centuries, with thick bark and dark green leaves. Its crown was so massive that it covered up a third of the settlement by itself.

Suddenly, a roar came from underneath the hollow in the massive tree. The entire forest seemed to quake, and frightening gusts of wind radiated out from that hollow in all directions, bending the trees and sending leaves rustling through the air. The nearby log cabins creaked and began to fall apart.

Zhang Lie stood at the epicenter of the wind, his robes fluttering but his body perfectly still.

A pair of pale blue eyes lit up within the tree hollow, rousing fear in anyone whom it saw. Fear bubbled up from the bearmen's hearts, an instinctive fear that seemed to arise with no rhyme or reason.

A wild beast's aura emerged from the hollow. Sharp claws extended out from within, and a golden figure emerged from its depths. This was a golden-yellow bearman, over a hundred meters tall. Its fur was perfectly golden, with so many scars over its body it looked like a carved totem. As the bearman walked out of the hollow, the entire bearman settlement was abuzz.

"Why has the deity climbed out of the hollow? What's going on?"

"Has something startled our deity?"

"It's been hundreds of years since the deity last walked the earth—but he's been awakened thrice now in a matter of days!"

The bearman deity could hibernate for decades or even centuries on end, but it had woken up three times in recent memory.

The first time was when the king of the realm was killed and the will of the world mourned his passing. The second time was when the nine worlds merged together. Only a few days later, the bearman deity awakened for the third time, causing a panic to descend on the bearmen.

After losing their king, the only reason the bearmen had been able to preserve their authority in the world was because of the bearman deity. If something were to go wrong with him, they would all lose their place in the world's hierarchy.

The bearman deity walked out of the hollow and stared straight at Zhang Lie. It had awakened upon sensing Zhang Lie's arrival.

Zhang Lie's eyes glimmered with rainbow light, freezing the bearman deity in place. Zhang Lie didn't waste his time. Clenching his fists tightly, he gathered blue genetic energy around him. Ripples of genetic energy emanated from his arms. He flicked his wrists, causing a frightening aura to descend on the world. The skies began to darken, and a fish the size of a whale materialized in the air.

It was so sudden and so ominous that all the bearmen were in shock. An immense pressure weighed down on their bodies, as though they were trapped under a mountain.

"[Fists of the Silent Sea: Soar]!" Ripples of energy spread out from Zhang Lie, warping the space around him. and launching shockwaves toward the bearmen. The shockwaves sounded like peals of thunder, like stampeding hooves. They resonated until they reached a crescendo.

Before the bearmen could figure out just what was happening, a huge wave soared into the air. As Zhang Lie punched forward, the fish slammed its huge tail on the ground and sent a torrent of water surging into the settlement.

The shockwaves and water-attuned genetic energy exploded, releasing a huge burst of energy that swallowed up the dazed bears like a rampaging beast.

Struck directly by Zhang Lie's attack, the bearman deity was slammed against the bark of the gigantic tree, leaving a deep impression in its trunk as its leaves fluttered madly.

The next moment, the shockwaves and water-attuned genetic energy exploded, releasing a huge burst of energy that swallowed up the nearby lifeforms like a rampaging beast.

The log cabins were sent flying in an instant, along with trees and branches that had been uprooted or knocked off their base.

The bearmen settlement looked as though it had been struck by a Category 5 hurricane. Everything in the vicinity had been reduced to rubble; one punch from Zhang Lie was sufficient to clear a battlefield.

"Oh, you survived," Zhang Lie remarked with some surprise.

The bearman deity hadn't been annihilated in one blow. Diamond-like wounds appeared beneath its golden fur.

The bearman deity's eyes flashed. After being struck by Zhang Lie's attack, the incident pain allowed him to regain some semblance of rationality. He stuck a claw into the bark, sending chips of wood flying as he pulled out a humongous axe from within the tree, over fifty meters tall and engraved with ancient runes, perhaps designed specifically for the deity himself.

Zhang Lie sneered. "A disaster-grade lifeform that uses weapons? Interesting."

As he suppressed Zhang Lie's control with his incredible willpower, the bearman deity's body flared with golden light, dyeing the entire forest golden. The leaves gave off a lustrous gleam, and the grass on the ground shivered and stood at attention. Even the fur on the bearman deity's body pricked like golden needles.

The environment itself became a weapon against the unwelcome intruder Zhang Lie. The most pronounced change was in the axe that the bearman deity held, which gave off a sharpness that felt as though it could penetrate anything.

"A domain of penetration..."

The bearman deity swung his axe in a wide arc.

Zhang Lie was shocked by the attack. The bearman deity had transferred the potency of his domain entirely to his attack, to the swing of his golden axe that had captured, condensed, and concentrated all that sharpness into a single lethal blow.

Zhang Lie felt as though a wave of sword energy was about to overwhelm him—a piercing sensation composed of all the matter, all the vital life, in the environment around him. Zhang Lie faced not the swing of an axe, but a sharpness with the weight of the entire forest behind it.

The bearman deity's attack was nothing less than masterful, and it was clear he was a grandmaster of the blade. In exercising his aura, the bearman deity far exceeded any opponent Zhang Lie had ever faced.

"Very interesting—but unfortunately, I'm your opponent!"

Zhang Lie stretched out two fingers. Water-attuned genetic energy exploded around him, swamping the forest with tidal waves that filled the sky. The energy gathered around Zhang Lie like a whirlpool and condensed around his fingertips.

"[The Boundless Blade: Yawning Wave]!" As Zhang Lie thrust forward, he launched a beam of sword energy at the bearman deity, dull and colorless, far less resplendent than the bearman deity's attack. It looked wholly unthreatening, but the bearman deity felt lethal pressure from the attack...