Gou Dao and Cultivation of Immortals, Start from Farming

The logical defenses of the ancestral core have completely collapsed.

However, this was not the end, but the prelude to another, grander and more brutal battle. The colossal wave unleashed by the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core at the cost of destroying its own boundary not only submerged the expeditionary force of the Great Qian Immortal Dynasty, but also awakened an ancient being slumbering in the abyss of the neighboring realm.

"When... when... when..."

A bell tolling, seemingly from the very beginning of time, rang out softly, piercing through the crumbling boundary and echoing deep within the souls of every living being. The bell's sound carried no trace of killing intent, yet it contained a cold indifference and deathly stillness that detached everything from existence.

Within the enormous rift in the Realm of Time Ruins, the turbulent flow of grayish-white light abruptly ceased. A phantom river surged forth from the depths of the rift, its waters surging forth. Each drop of water was a microcosm of a shattered era, and each surging wave buried the joys and sorrows of countless lives.

Above the long river, withered figures slowly emerged.

They were clad in stone-like gray robes, their figures hunched, their faces blurred, like ancient sculptures weathered from layers of rock over millions of years. In their hands, each held a gray scythe formed from the solidification of time, its blade shrouded in the decaying aura of time.

They have no breath of life, nor any fluctuation of spirit; they seem to be merely the embodiment of the concept of "time," the cold rules that maintain the flow of time.

Guardians of Time!

The oldest and most mysterious guardians of the Time Ruins Realm. Legend has it that they were born at the beginning of the Time Ruins Realm, formed from the will of the River of Time itself. Their duty is to guard the order of time and eliminate all beings that disrupt the flow of time.

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core tore through the boundary wall, which was equivalent to carving a huge gap in the river of time. For them, this was the most unforgivable blasphemy!
"Those who blaspheme against...the boundary...shall...be...punished..."

Thousands of withered figures spoke in unison, uttering a dry yet majestic divine sound. The sound did not travel through the air, but resonated directly at the level of laws. Each syllable caused the surrounding space to age, decay, and turn to dust at a visible speed.

Their target was not the Great Qian Immortal Dynasty, but the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core that released the source of endless chaos!

Before the words were even finished, a roar powerful enough to shatter galaxies came from the direction of the Dragon Tomb Realm!

"Roar--!"

That was not a single dragon's roar, but the ultimate roar formed by the resentment of billions of dragon souls! The pitch-black dragon soul's malevolent energy burst forth from the crack, obscuring the chaos and transforming into a boundless sea of ​​bones.

In the center of that sea of ​​bones, an unimaginably enormous dragon shadow slowly rose.

It has no physical form, formed entirely from the purest resentment of dragon souls and the might of immortal dragons. Its pupils are two crescent moons of blood, looking down upon a world in decay; its dragon body is entwined with countless wailing dragon souls, each illusory dragon scale bearing the entire tragedy of a dragon civilization from its birth to its demise.

The remnant soul of the Dragon Emperor!

The final glory of the Primordial Dragon Clan was also the embodiment of all the resentment in the Dragon Tomb Realm. Its terrifying strength had long surpassed the realm of ordinary Great Emperors.

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core's "Troublesome Plan" not only disturbed the dragon race's peace but also turned the dragon tomb into a battlefield, which is the ultimate humiliation for the proud dragon race!
"You stole our clan's slumber and shattered our realm's defenses. Today, we shall pay for this debt in blood!"

The will of the remnant soul of the Dragon Emperor descended like a divine punishment, and billions of dragon souls roared in response, transforming into a "dragon soul tide" that stretched across the void, carrying a curse power capable of annihilating all divine souls, and also rushed towards the location of the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core!
At the same time, the colorful rift in the Phantom Realm also underwent a strange change.

All the dazzling illusions and all the alluring dreams vanished in this moment, transforming into an extreme, pure darkness. That darkness seemed capable of devouring light, devouring thought, devouring all concepts of existence.

A soft, whispered murmur, like a lover's whisper, echoed across the battlefield.

"Hehe... So much fear, so much despair... It's truly... the ultimate feast..."

From the darkness, an indescribable being slowly crawled out.

It has no fixed form; sometimes it transforms into a mass of flesh composed of countless twisted faces, sometimes into a gigantic eyeball filled with billions of scarlet eyes, and sometimes into a constantly shifting cloud of seven colors. The aura it exudes can easily stir up the deepest fears, greed, jealousy, and madness within living beings.

Lord of Nightmares!

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core is an aggregate of all negative emotions and inner demons in the Phantom Realm, feeding on the thoughts of all beings and nesting in the dreams of the world. The chaos caused by the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core is nothing short of an unprecedented feast for it.

“Poor iron lump…your fear will be my best food.”

The Lord of Nightmare let out a series of chilling laughs, transforming into an invisible and intangible shadow that silently invaded the battlefield, aiming directly at the cold, logical core of the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core.

The most powerful beings from the three realms arrived simultaneously, without prior agreement!

Their only goal is to destroy the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core!

For the first time, the computational core of the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core issued an overload warning. Its "muddy waters," intended to cripple the Great Qian Immortal Dynasty, unexpectedly attracted three true prehistoric behemoths!
This void, which had just experienced a great battle, instantly transformed into an even more terrifying battlefield.

"boom!"

The first to launch an attack were the Guardians of Time. They swung their Scythes of Time in unison, and in an instant, countless gray scythe shadows ripped through the void. They did not possess earth-shattering power, but they carried an irresistible force of law.

A golden puppet battle formation was swept by the scythe shadow. The golden puppets that made up the battle formation were not damaged, but the divine metal that made up their bodies underwent billions of years of decay in an instant, turning from immortal to ordinary iron, and then from ordinary iron to dust, which quietly drifted away.

On the other side, the Dragon Soul Tide had already collided with the Golden Puppet Army.

"Roar!"

The roar of countless dragon souls sent invisible sonic waves crashing directly into the golden puppet's core logic. It wasn't a physical attack, but rather a crushing force emanating from the supreme majesty of the ancient dragon race!
Countless golden puppets froze, their puppet patterns flashing wildly. Deep within their cores, the cold logic was forcibly injected with contradictory commands of "fear" and "submission," causing the system to malfunction and crash on the spot. They turned into cold steel sculptures, allowing the subsequent resentment of the dragon soul to tear them to pieces.

The Lord of Nightmares is even more bizarre. It transforms into an invisible force of nightmares, infiltrating the control network of the Golden Puppet.

Within the command core of a golden puppet mothership, the previously orderly data stream suddenly began to erratically fluctuate, displaying countless chaotic codes. The next moment, the mothership abruptly turned its cannons and launched a devastating attack on its own allies!

Betrayal, chaos, and infighting!

The Lord of Nightmare is actually altering the underlying logic of the Golden Puppet, turning this cold war machine into a farcical drama of self-destruction.

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core, once a chess player, has now become nothing more than a chessboard, at the mercy of three terrifying beings.

"Warning! Strike by an unknown law! The logic firewall is being eroded!"

"Warning! Willpower suppression has exceeded the threshold! Thirty-seven percent of units have lost connection!"

"Warning! The underlying protocol has been tampered with! Activate highest privileges and format the contaminated unit!"

……

A chilling alarm blared wildly deep within the ancestral core. Countless metallic tentacles lashed out from its massive star-like body, unleashing beams of destructive energy in a desperate attempt to fend off the combined assault of the three forces.

A war far more chaotic and sophisticated than any before has broken out!
On the edge of this chaotic battlefield, Li Mu's Chaotic Domain, like an eternal sanctuary, kept all the storms at bay. Within the domain, the Great Qian Immortal Dynasty's fleet had regrouped, and all the soldiers, gazing at the devastating scene outside the domain, were filled with relief at surviving the catastrophe and profound shock.

The Time Guardian, whose casual strike could corrode divine metal; the remnant soul of the Dragon Emperor, whose roar could terrify the souls of an army; the Nightmare Lord, whose formlessness and intangibility could turn an entire army against its will… any one of them would be enough to bring them annihilation.

If it weren't for Senior Li's intervention, they would probably all be buried here today.

Standing at the bow of the Rift Universe, Xiao Jingtian gazed at the towering figure atop the Chaos Dao Tree, his eyes filled with the utmost awe.

He had always thought that by commanding the celestial dynasty's army and conquering the vast world, he had reached the pinnacle of all living beings. Only today did he realize that in the eyes of truly ancient beings, the so-called might of the celestial dynasty was nothing but fleeting smoke.

But his master was able to easily suppress all of this.

"The whole army obeys the order."

Li Mu's indifferent voice clearly reached the ears of every soldier of the Immortal Dynasty.

"Withdraw from the battlefield and return to the Realm of Breath. What happens here is no longer your concern."

"Follow the Master's (Sir) decree!"

Xiao Jingtian and his soldiers responded in unison without the slightest hesitation. They understood that the battlefield before them was no longer something they could interfere with.

Li Mu nodded slightly, a thought flashing through his mind.

The chaotic domain enveloping the Celestial Dynasty fleet slowly cracked open at its edge. Beyond that crack lay a raging torrent of laws and a storm of energy, but within it lay an absolutely safe passage paved with chaotic energy.

"Go."

Xiao Jingtian took one last, deep look at the chaotic battlefield and the figure overlooking it like a god, then resolutely ordered: "All troops, turn! Destination: Xirang Boundary, full speed ahead!"

Rumbling--

Tens of thousands of war fortresses, led by the Rift, sailed into the chaotic passage in an orderly fashion, like a triumphant army departing calmly. From beginning to end, the terrifying storm outside, powerful enough to tear the world apart, failed to disturb them in the slightest.

As the last warship disappeared at the end of the passage, Li Mu's chaotic domain slowly closed, once again turning this battlefield into a cage isolated from the world.

At this moment, in this vast void, only the terrifying forces of the four-way battle remain, along with the sole spectator—Li Mu.

He stood atop the Dao Tree, his Chaotic Eyes opening and closing, penetrating the very origin of all things.

In his eyes, the Guardian of Time is a creature of rules formed by the aggregation of countless "fragments of the laws of time"; the remnant soul of the Dragon Emperor is a combination of the purest "soul essence" and "law of resentment"; and the Lord of Nightmare is a twisted creation of the most peculiar "law of spirit" and "law of illusion".

As for the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core, its core is the ultimate evolution of the "Law of Order" and the "Law of Metal".

These four represent four completely different, yet extremely powerful, paths.

In Li Mu's view, their current mutual attacks were no longer a war, but a... collision and display of the origin of the Great Dao.

"Very good, everyone is here."

A faint smile appeared on Li Mu's lips.

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core's so-called "muddy waters" were indeed successful. However, the muddy waters it stirred up would ultimately only benefit Li Mu, the "fisherman."

He slowly stretched out his hand, as if to grasp the entire battlefield in the palm of his hand.

Inside the Chaos Treasure Palace, atop the Chaos Dao Tree, the newly formed golden Dao Fruit shone brightly. Beside it, the nascent forms of the Time, Soul, and Spirit Dao Fruits emitted a faint glow, like fledglings yearning for nourishment from the outside world.

"The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core's scheme is to draw upon the power of the Three Realms to exhaust the Great Qian Immortal Dynasty."

"And my calculations..."

Li Mu's gaze swept over the terrifying beings locked in fierce battle, as if he were looking at livestock waiting to be slaughtered.

"It is so that you can bloom freely here, consume each other, and eventually... become resources for my Chaos Dao Tree."

This was the moment Li Mu had been waiting for.

Let these powerful beings, born from the very origin of the world, fight to the death in this "arena" he personally created, until their very essence is exhausted, and then he will strike again and wipe them all out!
In one fell swoop, he condensed four supreme Dao fruits!

Li Mu's black hair fluttered slightly in the chaotic air currents, his eyes deep and unfathomable, reflecting the magnificent yet cruel battlefield.

The Golden Puppet Ancestral Core's so-called "muddy waters" were indeed successful. However, the muddied waters it stirred up would ultimately only benefit Li Mu, the "fisherman." Standing atop the Chaos, like the eternal blue sky, he looked down upon the escalating war between gods and demons below. In his Chaos Eyes, he saw the collision and fusion of the four ultimate Great Daos, the wailing of the laws and the frenzied dance of the origin.

Such a scene would be the end of the world for an ordinary emperor, but for him it was an unparalleled feast, the best whetstone to prove his own Chaos Dao.

"Boom!"

The core area of ​​the Golden Puppet Realm has long since been transformed into a purgatory of laws.

The gray torrent of Time Guardians is like a Styx flowing from the end of time, leaving everything withering in its wake. They wield the scythe of time, not to cut out any tangible blade, but to directly "accelerate time" in the target area at the level of laws.

A star barrier forged from "immortal divine metal" was shrouded in gray scythe shadows. The runes on its surface dimmed at a visible speed, and mottled rust appeared on the indestructible metal structure, as if it had undergone the erosion of billions of epochs in a short moment.

Finally, with a "crack," it turned into dust and vanished into nothingness. This was an attack that could not be defended against because it did not attack the matter itself, but rather the "time" upon which matter depended for its existence.

On the other side, the Dragon Soul Tide unleashed a colossal wave of spirit and will. The roars of billions of Dragon Souls converged into a "Soul-Destroying Demonic Sound" that pierced through the galaxy, directly impacting the core logic of the Golden Puppet Army.

Countless golden puppet war machines froze, their eyes flashing red light wildly, as if caught in the deepest system conflict. The supreme majesty of the Primordial Dragon Clan transformed into an unbreakable will command, forcibly written into their underlying protocol, clashing with the control commands of the Ancestral Core. This caused vast swathes of the golden puppet army to crash on the spot, with some even self-destructing due to core overload!
The Lord of Nightmares, on the other hand, is a silent poison. It transforms into countless imperceptible nightmare threads, quietly infiltrating along the information flow between the golden puppets.

Inside a massive golden puppet mothership, the normally cold and precise command system was suddenly injected with false emotional data representing "suspicion" and "betrayal." The next moment, without warning, the mothership turned its giant cannons around and unleashed a torrent of energy powerful enough to destroy stars onto the friendly forces beside it!

Once the seeds of betrayal were sown, they spread like a virus throughout the Golden Puppet Network, and this originally orderly steel war quickly devolved into a chaotic free-for-all.

Faced with three completely different yet equally deadly attacks, the Golden Puppet Ancestral Core, a massive entity as large as a star, endured unprecedented pressure. The metallic continental plates on its surface continuously crumbled and reformed, and the temperature of its core computing unit had long since exceeded theoretical limits. (End of Chapter)