Overdraw the future and become a peerless martial god

Chapter 162 Kill Qiyao

The world seemed to stand still at that moment, as if even time itself had been frozen.

The River of Blood surged to its limit but then ceased to overflow. The Seven Luminaries Offering God Array crumbled inch by inch amidst the scorching lightning. The floating Soul Locks, like spider silk severed by divine lightning, quietly fell and dissipated into the wind and snow.

Chu Ning stood amidst the lingering echoes of the collapsing thunder and fire, his body covered in scorch marks, as if a thunder beast lurked beneath every inch of his skin.

He slowly raised his head, his breath trembling slightly, but his aura became increasingly steady. The thunderous energy around him seemed to be a rhythm awakening from the deepest part of heaven and earth, profound and sharp.

In the distance, the figure of the Seven Luminaries Priest stood above the River of Blood, without uttering a word.

They were shocked.

For the first time, they felt an oppressive aura, like the awakening of Thor, emanating from this white-haired man with a homosexual relationship.

Tianxuan Xuange's furious flames solidified, and the blood-flame lotus platform beneath his feet trembled slightly. Even the usually arrogant Tianxuan Xuange's eyebrows twitched for a moment.

Tian Shu·Dong Ming's eyes flickered, and the illusory world in her pupils kept overlapping and distorting, as if even her eyes that could see into the future could not understand this situation.

"He has been promoted to the sixth rank." Dongming's voice was low, with a slight tremor of reluctance to admit it.

"He endured self-punishment with the Five Thunders and survived; he ascended to a higher level by refining the Thunder to its extreme." Lian Zhen spoke slowly, his voice hoarse, like wind squeezed from frost-covered bones.

"This wasn't part of the plan." Wu Qu murmured, his eyes narrowing slightly, the cursed blade vibrating in his hand, as if he had sensed a true opponent.

Wenqu remained expressionless. Blood was still seeping from the shattered Xuanming Seal, and his soul was collapsing, but his gaze remained unusually calm.

"Don't panic."

His voice seemed to emanate from a coffin, deep and cold, "Though he has reached the sixth rank, he is still a nobody."

"And we, the Seven Luminaries, still exist."

He stepped forward slowly, his tattered bone robe fluttering slightly, and remnant souls surging beneath his feet, as if the river of blood still believed in the Lord of Sacrifice.

"Formation."

"Use the Big Dipper constellation to appease his thunder spirit."

The snow began to fall again, but each snowflake was quietly dispersed by the thunderous breath before it hit the ground.

Chu Ning remained silent, standing there like a monument forged from divine thunder.

He sensed the changes in the Seven Luminaries.

They were in shock.

But after the initial shock came murderous intent.

He knew this, just as he knew he still didn't have the strength to directly confront the Seven Luminaries Array.

Although the Thunder Extreme was formed and his body was new, the Five Thunder Tribulation Fire within his body had not yet dissipated, and the power of the Thunder Soul was still mutually absorbing each other.

He could not gamble on the Five Thunder Punishments again.

He only has one chance to strike.

But this time, the very source of the sacrificial ritual must be severed.

Chu Ning slowly lowered his head, looking at the lightning that appeared in his palm.

That thunder was no longer a technique, no longer a law, no longer a weapon.

That's him.

He is Lei.

The Blood River suddenly trembled, and Wenqu stepped forward. Gray light burst forth from the Xuanming Remnant Seal, and the Star Chart Array slowly unfolded.

"The Seven Luminaries return to the formation, and the Soul Bridge is re-established." His tone was chilling.

"Let him know that divine authority cannot be challenged by mortals."

On the snowy path of the Fox Ancestor's fiefdom, Dong'er, holding the Shuoyue Ice Soul, still stood guard at the end of the Soul Bridge. She looked at Chu Ning's back, her tears still wet, but she no longer called for him to come back.

She knew—the storm had only just begun.

In the midst of wind and snow, the first thing to stir is—anger.

Tianxuan Xuange slowly took a step forward, and the snow exploded into flowers beneath his feet.

Amidst raging flames, the lotus-shaped Blood Flame Soul Platform unfurled from the void, resembling a burning chariot, thundering across the heavens and earth.

He resembled a demon, his muscles bulging and knotted, soul fire runes etched into his flesh, his entire back bare and shrouded in flames, like a battle spirit emerging from the Asura's purgatory. Between his brows, four words were clearly written:
—Only war, only fury.

He may not be the strongest of the Seven Luminaries, but he is certainly the least afraid of death.

His rage surged, staining the snowy night crimson.

He looked at Chu Ning, his opponent who possessed the Thunderous Body, and a mocking sneer appeared on his lips.

“Thunderous Body…” Xuan Ge’s voice was low and hoarse, like magma churning in his throat, “You think that a mere Thunderous Body can shake my Heavenly Pivot Authority?”

He didn't give them a chance to answer.

A furious roar, like a mountain splitting and a wind collapsing, suddenly erupted.

"—Asura's Burning Curse!"

The overwhelming pressure of a seventh-grade martial artist exploded outwards, and with him at the center, the heavens and earth seemed to be torn apart, and all things were burned.

The blood curse suddenly split open from his spine, and a scorching lotus-shaped soul imprint bloomed from his bones. Petals peeled off his flesh and blood, burning, swirling, and forming an array.

At that moment, it was as if his back had been ripped open by a god, and what gushed out was not blood, but the soul of rage—rage that had burned away all reason.

Flames melted his bones, and cursed lotuses bloomed. Xuan Ge's entire being seemed to transform from a mortal into the embodiment of "rage."

"Raging Lotus Steps Through the Air!"

With his second step, flames exploded like a spiral vortex, and he instantly soared into the air. More than ten fiery lotuses swirled and condensed behind him, transforming into a huge raging flame war wheel that stretched across the void.

The war wheel spun, the air hissed as it was pulled by the high temperature, and space began to deform and distort.

He raised his right arm, clenched his fist, and poured all his soul fire into his arm bone. In an instant, his fist seemed to become a volcano, with curse flames surging wildly.

"Drink-"

He roared and threw a punch straight at Chu Ning's forehead.

This punch wasn't just meant to kill one person.

That would destroy the entire world.

But Chu Ning remained unmoved.

He closed his eyes briefly and lightly tapped his left foot.

"Qiang!"

A thunderous roar erupted, and a bolt of lightning tore through the wind and snow. His figure vanished in an instant, like lightning breaking through the clouds.

Lightning suddenly exploded behind Xuan Ge, like a golden bolt of lightning sweeping across the sky.

"Golden Crow Thunder".

"—Broken Tide Peak".

Chu Ning appeared beside Xuan Ge, the Broken Snow Blade already unsheathed, a blazing white light pouring out from the blade, like the dawn light, cleaving down from the void.

This strike, like a sea of ​​stars, cleaved through the endless night.

"Boom."

Xuan Ge's body trembled violently, his Soul Fire Shield shattered on the spot, and he was struck as if by a thunder hammer, flying backwards for thirty feet, crossing the snow and plunging into the Blood River.

Flame fragments fell like a rain of stars, scorching the battlefield and stirring the Soul Bridge.

"……good."

He knelt on one knee, staggering out of the flames, his crimson eyes burning like torches, a scorch mark on his chest still slowly burning.

He licked his lips and whispered:
"This strike... is qualified to hurt me."

Blood dripped down his shoulder, reflecting the rage in his eyes, yet he showed no sign of backing down; instead, the fire burned even more fiercely.

He did not fall.

On the contrary, the cursed fire burned even brighter, and the killing intent grew even more ferocious.

His fighting spirit was like a furnace being filled with strong liquor; the deeper the wound, the stronger the fire, and the more overwhelming his will became.

"Come on." Xuan Ge slowly straightened his body, and the cursed flames surged within his body. The remnants of the cursed lotus petals condensed and reconstructed behind him, like a lotus battle banner reborn from the ashes.

"The stronger the opponent, the more excited I get."

"Ha ha ha ha--"

He laughed angrily, standing against the wind, like a war god treading on a thousand-foot raging wave, startling the heavens and earth.

He was no ordinary, brute.

He was the kind of demon who fused anger into his very bones and treated every wound as a badge of honor on the battlefield.

This was the first time Chu Ning truly faced this adversary squarely.

He raised the broken snow with his left hand, five-colored lightning rings coiling around his body, the thunder roaring like the low growl of an ancient divine dragon:

"Second move - Bone-Splitting Arc!"

The Thunder Slash is like a spiraling conch, with the blade as its core, stirring up the wind and thunder of heaven and earth, falling from the sky and slashing across all obstacles.

Xuan Ge roared angrily, and ten cursed lotuses transformed into a giant shield in front of him, protecting him with flames, his fierce intent like a mountain collapsing and shattering.

"boom--"

Thunder and fire clashed, eclipsing the world's color, as if a chasm of thunder and fire had been torn open across the entire ice plain.

The cursed shield shattered, Xuan Ge knelt on one knee, his aura disordered, and the cursed fire trembled incessantly.

He was panting, cold sweat beading on his forehead, as if he were on the verge of his limit—but his angry eyes remained defiant.

"You...can't kill me."

"My anger has not subsided, and my fighting spirit remains undiminished!"

He roared as he stood up, biting his tongue hard, and blood dripped into the magic seal beneath his feet.

"Cursed Blood Ignites the Body - Wrathful Lotus Heavenly Lock!"

The cursed fire erupted once more.

The ten cursed lotuses were reforged into a ring of lotus formations, which descended from the sky and transformed into a flaming lotus lock, enveloping the entire battlefield.

Each petal of the cursed lotus is a condensation of soul fire, burning fiercely and bursting forth with a ferocious power that ignites its own life soul.

"Chu Ning!" Xuan Ge roared to the sky, his body enveloped in cursed flames, his rage surging wildly. "Show me your skills and let me be defeated!"

At this moment, he was not delaying.

He compressed his last fighting spirit into a fleeting moment of extreme intensity.

"kill!"

He transformed into a beam of cursed light, the lotus lock exploded, and the cursed flames turned into ten thousand fire whips, which, along with his soul power, swept towards Chu Ning.

Chu Ning's expression was solemn. He held the lightning shield in front of him, but he still took three steps back.

The five-colored lightning trembled, and for a moment it was difficult to stabilize.

"...That's ruthless."

He frowned for the first time.

Xuan Ge's attack was almost a self-destruction of his soul, but he skillfully controlled it below the critical point.

A single wrong thought can lead to annihilation.

"What a pity." Chu Ning raised her eyes and moved her fingers slightly.

The lightning rings no longer swirl around, but instead recede inwards.

The raging thunder transformed into utter stillness; the thunder's intent pressed down like ice and snow, leaving the world utterly silent, as if dead.

"The third move."

He uttered three words in a low voice, as if it were a divine judgment:
"—The world is extinguished."

The lightning bolts returned to the blade, and the broken snow pointed to the sky.

As stars fell and lightning struck, a beam of cold light pierced the Xuan Ge Soul Platform, silencing all sound and flames.

"Click——"

Like a mirror cracking, the Frozen Blade pierced through the core of the raging flames in an instant.

The golden crow struck with lightning, and the soul fire dissipated.

Xuan Ge's pupils contracted sharply, and the cursed flames within his body burned violently, struggled, backfired, and collapsed.

He staggered, his body cracked, but he did not fall.

He looked up at Chu Ning, his chest heaving, yet a final smile appeared on his face.

"This strike... is worthy of my defeat."

"If there is an afterlife, I will still fight you."

He fell, not turning into smoke, but becoming a blood lotus afterimage, lying quietly in the snow, as if waiting for the next battle.

Flames scattered, and soul light turned into rain.

His fighting spirit, however, lingered long amidst the swirling flames.

Chu Ning stood atop the snow-covered peak, lightning returning to its sheath, and snowflakes falling.

He murmured in a low voice:
“An enemy with blood and bones is worthy of respect.”

"He may be executed."

The moment Xuan Ge fell, the Blood River seemed to freeze for a moment, even the churning blood flow solidified into a cold, icy painting.

But immediately afterward, a chilling killing intent exploded from the core of the Blood River, as if the sky had suddenly torn apart, crushing the entire Fox Ancestor's fiefdom.

Wenqu raised his right palm, and the Xuanming Seal rose into the air. Seven blazing star rays suddenly burst forth from the broken star patterns, piercing the sky and igniting the setting sun.

His lips showed neither sorrow nor anger, his voice was calm as still water, yet it resonated like the booming of an ancient bell, shaking the entire soul array:

"—Seven Luminaries, return to your positions."

In an instant, Wuqu, Pojun, Dongming, Lucun, Lianzhen, and Xuange rose into the air, each occupying their respective star positions.

Starlight emerged from above their heads, echoing the sparse stars in the sky and reconstructing the celestial phenomena.

The shattered Xuanming Seal slowly sank, transforming into the core of the Seven Luminaries Star Chart.

Wenqu stands at the center of the horoscope, the rune between his eyebrows shining, and with a gentle touch of his fingertip, he adds the final stroke.

"Big Dipper Illusion Array, activate."

"boom!"

The sky suddenly darkened, and snow fell.

As the world turned upside down, the once empty ice plain was swallowed up by the vast starlight and transformed into a divine realm of stars.

The seven luminaries are in the sky, their star trails like chains, illuminating the land of blood and snow.

The ice beneath Chu Ning's feet quietly shattered, and star-like runes appeared between heaven and earth, causing the space to collapse inch by inch.

His brow twitched slightly, and his heart sank.

"If you can't beat them one-on-one, then come at me all at once."

He exhaled slowly, the lightning in his eyes receding, leaving only a faint glimmer.

"Nightmare Tiger Thunder, appear."

With a whisper, a dark purple lightning bolt burst forth from his palm. Unlike heavenly thunder that pierced the sky, it spread through the void like mist, seeping into the cracks between heaven and earth and the gaps in the soul, like a ghostly shadow lurking.

This is not pure thunder, but the soul of thunder.

—Yin Lei·Yan Hu.

Creating illusions, devouring the mind and spirit, invading consciousness and soul, making it impossible for the enemy to distinguish between reality and delusion, is one of the forbidden techniques in Soul Wars.

Chu Ning knew that facing the complete Seven Luminaries Array, a direct confrontation would only lead to certain death.

To break the deadlock, the only way is to disrupt their minds and disturb their core.

The first to launch an attack was Tian Shu·Dong Ming.

She stood quietly at the western corner of the astrolabe, her eyes like stars, their gray light swirling.

A "Destiny Star Seal" appears between the eyebrows, like the eye of destiny analysis.

"Observe the celestial radiance of destiny."

She closed her eyes and focused her mind, expanding her spiritual awareness to quickly visualize all the paths Chu Ning might take within the next twelve breaths.

Hundreds of tracks, like star trails, intertwined and flowed before her eyes, as if the future was being dissected before her very eyes.

"His next step... tilts three inches to the left front."

She opened her eyes, her tone as sharp as ice:

"—Break!"

"Preemptive strike!"

Starlight surged from her sleeves, transforming into gray-white chains that sealed off all movable areas within three steps of Chu Ning with lightning speed.

Almost simultaneously, Kaiyang Wuqu roared, his soul fire surging and transforming into the battle spirits of thousands of troops.

"Military Soul Slashes the Wheel!"

He swung his cursed blade, and the power of ten thousand troops transformed into hundreds of blade shadows. Each blade contained the spirit and fighting intent of an army, like a thousand troops launching a surprise attack, one after another, cutting off all chance of survival.

Chu Ning twisted his body and severed the two paths, but the third and fourth paths followed in quick succession.

The phantom blades seemed endless, trapping him firmly in layers of battle formations and deadly traps.

"Po Jun," Wen Qu called out calmly in a low voice.

Above the Yao Guang star position, Po Jun raised his right palm, his lips moving silently.

"Cause and effect, severed."

A black and white chain of light slowly descended from her fingertips, like a lock of life.

"Break the life lock".

These chains do not bind the body, nor do they bind the law, but they bind life—blocking a future that "may happen".

Chu Ning's chest tightened, and the power of the Five Thunderbolts seemed to suddenly lose its guidance, and the thought of "the next strike" was abruptly suppressed.

"Not good." His pupils contracted.

For the first time, he felt a disconnect between his mind and his strength during battle.

"Too powerful." His thoughts trembled slightly.

The next moment, the Wenqu Seal Technique changed again, the star chart heated up, and the celestial light converged.

Tianquan·Lucun quietly activated the soul runes:

"The Abyss of Devouring".

"The Gluttonous Soul-Splitting Beast!"

Below the star map, a crack suddenly appeared on the ground, and billions of soul shadows surged out like a jellyfish tide, their tentacles rushing straight at Chu Ning's soul platform.

That was no longer an attack, but a devouring of the source.

Then, Tianxuan·Lianzhen quietly dissipated, turning into a pale blue mist that fell from the void.

Silently.

But the lightning beneath Chu Ning's feet was instantly frozen.

"A captivating fragrance."

"The returning soul embraces the moon."

That was the most subtle and insidious method of control, silent yet colder than death itself, even causing his divine soul and thunderous aura to slowly freeze and die.

The entire sacrificial array resembled a closing star core, crushing every inch of Thunder Soul's power.

This is no longer a battle.

This was an execution.

But Chu Ning suddenly closed his eyes.

He no longer "sees".

Because the Nightmare Tiger Thunder does not rely on the five senses, but unfolds directly from the soul.

The lightning around him receded, and like a nightmare creeping in, a lightning shadow quietly spread out.

The shadow of the Nightmare Tiger slowly unfurled its wings from behind him, blurring the lines between reality and illusion, like a nightmare emerging from his sea of ​​consciousness.

"Roar!"

A roar shook the soul, not just audible, but directly impacting the sea of ​​consciousness.

The next moment, three of the Seven Luminaries—Dongming, Pojun, and Wuqu—froze in their tracks.

Their souls simultaneously fell into illusion:

Within Wuqu's soul consciousness, the roar of ten thousand troops suddenly turned into silence, and a black curtain of thunder and rain descended upon the battlefield.

Without a sound, a thousand troops were annihilated.

It was so empty that it seemed as if there had never been an array there before.

He tried to summon the knife, but there was nothing in his palm.

That blade, which belonged to the soul, was "erased by fate" in an instant.

In her Insightful Eyes, the future star trails intertwined and became chaotic, with illusory images of Chu Ning constantly overlapping, merging, and disintegrating until she could no longer determine which one was real.

She saw Chu Ning walking slowly towards her, yet her vision split into a thousand possibilities, each one revealing a different way she "died."

And Po Jun...

His karmic chains were not broken, but instead became entangled with him.

On each lock ring, a single character was clearly displayed:
"error."

"You wrote the wrong destiny." Chu Ning's voice whispered in his mind, "This time, I will write it."

"phantom?"

"No...this is..."

"Thunder Soul Enters Consciousness!"

Chu Ning opened her eyes.

Lightning flashed like a tide, and the Nightmare unfolded in full force.

He raised the broken snow and slashed at a corner of the star chart.

That strike, seemingly aimed at cleaving the formation, was in fact a severing of the soul.

"--break."

"Crack!"

The gray chain shattered, the phantom collapsed, Sanyao's body trembled violently, his soul platform shook, and his consciousness was forcibly pulled back to reality.

In the instant the lightning pillar pierced his soul, Po Jun saw countless images collapse in his mind:

He had set up a thousand life-locking chains and rehearsed countless causes, weaving the world like a net, but in that instant, all the chains broke.

His consciousness was caught in a kind of "paradox of infinite recursion":

"If I am to be killed, I should not know that I am to be killed."

"If I am already dead, then who is pondering 'why I died'?"

He ultimately did not die from Chu Ning's lightning, but from "the self-destruction of cause and effect itself".

The seven luminaries' star chart suddenly dimmed.

The first layer of the Seven Luminaries Formation has been broken.

Chu Ning stood proudly, his thunderous breath surging like a night sea.

Behind him, the phantom of the Nightmare Tiger crouched low, its thunderous breath surging like a tide.

“This is just the beginning.”

That single strike shattered a corner of the star map, the night thunder dissipated like a tide, the three luminaries' divine senses trembled violently, and their figures retreated one after another.

But the world did not return to peace as a result.

On the contrary, a deeper, larger, and more ancient existence seemed to be "awakened" the moment the array was broken.

In the deepest part of the Blood River, where the pitch-black expanse was as silent as a deathly abyss, a very subtle tremor suddenly appeared.

Then, her eyelids slowly opened.

That's not a human eye.

It seems somewhat like Qing Li's vertical pupils from my memory.

It has no pupils, no eyes, no focus, and no emotions; it seems as if the act of "gazing" is generated solely by some spatial rift itself.

However, it is precisely these "non-eyes" that cast an indescribable artistic conception.

It wasn't anger.

It's not resentment.

It was neither a judgment nor mercy.

Rather, it is a gaze that transcends meaning itself.

An absolute will, existing beyond language, emotion, and concept, slowly approached the entire world from the depths of the Blood River through this gaze.

At that moment, Chu Ning stood on the icy plain and felt an unprecedented heaviness—not pressure, but the pain of having the "boundaries of cognition" torn apart.

He seemed to have been stripped of his own skin.

He couldn't help but look into those eyes.

The more you gaze, the more lost you become.

A negation that extends from existence itself is constantly whispering.

"The Blood Eye...has opened?"

Wenqu's voice suddenly froze in mid-air. He abruptly looked up, gazing at the horizon.

Those were “non-eyes,” without pupils or outlines, as if the void itself had been condensed into an abyss. Gazing upon them sent chills down his spine and made his soul twitch slightly.

He should have been happy.

Awakening the Blood Eye and guiding the Divine Ring is their ultimate goal, planned for a century—to use the Seven Luminaries as a guide to complete the ultimate sacred ritual of "transforming the mortal into the ring."

But at this moment, he was trembling.

A deep-seated fear swept over me like a tidal wave.

“No…it shouldn’t have opened its eyes now,” Wenqu murmured, her face pale. “Not now…not in this way…”

Before the words were even finished, the world shook violently.

A dark shockwave, centered on the blood-red pupil, spread throughout the entire space.

Above the Bridge of Souls, an altar that should have been stable emitted a low, resonant sound, like the echo of a dying heartbeat.

The structure of the entire world seemed to loosen, shift, and recombine as these eyes were opened.

At the top of that chaotic star field, above the Seven Luminaries, seven blurry halos quietly appeared.

They are formless and intangible, do not emit light or heat, yet they appear so real in the visual sense, like seven "dead stars" lying across the sky.

They are not light.

They are—the light of negation.

It denies everything, denies rules, denies time and space, and even denies the most fundamental question of "who am I".

The moment Chu Ning looked up, he felt as if his consciousness was being torn into countless versions of "himself".

Each version of oneself is gradually annihilated and erased under these seven halos.

He is not being seen, but being "cancelled".

A chilling realization suddenly exploded in my mind:

That is not a reflection of existence, but a projection of non-existence.

A fundamental force that denies all "existence".

On the Seven Luminaries Star Chart, Wenqu finally dropped all pretense and spoke in a low voice:
“That is… the shadow of the God of Sleep.”

"He has no form, no thought, no name."

"Because its essence is 'negation'."

"You think He sees you... but in reality, it is you who are canceled in His eyes."

"boom--!"

The river of blood seemed to freeze in that instant.

But upon closer inspection, it appears to be "rising".

It wasn't that the River of Blood was moving, but rather—the entire world was being dragged upwards by some force. Golden cracks appeared on the rings on the Soul Bridge; they weren't breaking, but rather the dismantling of order.

That golden light had no warmth, yet it exuded a chilling coldness that penetrated deep into the soul.

Chu Ning gazed at this strange phenomenon, and suddenly it dawned on him:
This is neither magic nor a sacrifice.

This is—an echo from before creation.

Before heaven and earth were born, there was a negated "He".

"Chun Ning!"

An anxious voice interrupted his thoughts.

He turned his head suddenly and his pupils suddenly contracted.

In Dong'er's arms, the once tranquil and dormant Azure Soul Flame was now trembling violently.

That wasn't awakening, but... a struggle.

"She's resisting the soul-summoning!" Dong'er's face was pale, and her voice was trembling with tears. "She doesn't want to come back!"

“I don’t want to…” Chu Ning murmured, then his expression changed drastically, “No, it’s—I can’t!”

He could clearly sense that an ancient, unfamiliar, and cold will had appeared within Qing Li's soul fire.

It wasn't Qingli's consciousness, but rather—the "shadow" of a slumbering deity that had long been lurking within her consciousness.

That shadow was none other than the vertical pupil that had once appeared on Qing Li's forehead, exactly the same as the blood-red eye in the sky.

"The God of Sleep..." Chu Ning felt a chill run down her spine, "He resides within her?!"

This is the true purpose of the sacrifice.

It's not about resurrecting Qingli, but rather using her as a body to make the Sleeping God "land".

The seven celestial constellations began to repair themselves, the fragmented trajectories returned, the rotation accelerated, and the seven halos intertwined, like gears of fate gradually meshing, causing the entire sky to rumble and vibrate.

Wenqu suddenly raised his head and shouted sternly:
"Locking the Formation—Offering to the Gods!"

At this moment, he no longer concealed anything, nor did he hesitate.

The real ceremony is only just beginning.

He finally understood that this was not a "divine intervention".

Instead, it is to use a remnant soul of a person to occupy the will of a deity, thereby "transforming the mortal into the divine" and becoming a new god!

The Seven Luminaries Formation has never been a killing formation.

It is a formation for creating gods.

He looked at Chu Ning, his voice like a knife:

"You...shouldn't have broken the formation."

"That strike you just made was not a victory."

"Instead—it's a key."

Chu Ning felt as if struck by lightning, her chest heaving violently.

He always thought he was preventing this calamity.

The result, however, was that it spurred His coming.

He opened the door for God himself.

"boom!!"

The soul fire suddenly exploded.

A female phantom slowly rose from above the Ice Soul, nestled in Dong'er's arms.

She opened her eyes.

Those eyes weren't Qingli's gentle ones, but rather the emptiness of bloodshot eyes.

That's not her.

That was the projection of the consciousness of the Sleeping God, forcibly reborn through the shell of Qing Li's remnant soul.

She parted her lips slightly, her voice ethereal and otherworldly, as if it were not a sound, but rather a fluctuation of the very laws of heaven and earth:
"You came."

Chu Ning was jolted, wanting to speak, but no sound came out.

She was looking at him.

But it wasn't "gazing"; it was more like observing dust or scrutinizing weeds.

There was light in her eyes.

But that wasn't human vision.

It is the peace of the gods.

That kind of "calmness" means that "your existence is not important".

In her eyes, he was not an enemy.

It's not even "a species".

The seven luminaries and six stars knelt down in unison.

Wenqu lowered his head, dispelling all his magic, and uttered only his last words:
"—The offering to the gods begins."

The wind howled, the blood river surged backward, and the world seemed to tremble as if the heart of a god had been torn apart.

At the edge of the Big Dipper array, in the last inch of the human realm beyond the sacrificial array, Dong'er still knelt guarding that cyan soul flame.

She remained steadfast, and despite the severe disruption of her own soul energy, she forcefully injected the power of ice into the core of her soul fire.

"Qingli... come back." She knelt down, the star mark between her brows slightly cracked, and her soul was sent out in an extremely painful way to merge with the restless soul fire.

She didn't know if this action would kill her.

All she knew was that if she let go, Qingli would be lost forever.

But Soulfire did not respond.

The soul flame that should have trembled gently upon being summoned now seemed like a suddenly awakened alien life form, struggling and devouring her from within her sea of ​​consciousness.

At the center of the Azure Crystal Soul Flame, the illusory figure opened its eyes.

The ambient temperature suddenly dropped to the point where all flow of consciousness would freeze.

Dong'er stood in front of her, suddenly speechless—not because she couldn't speak, but because the human ability of "language" was blocked for a moment.

She felt her name being forgotten, her sense of existence beginning to crumble, and even the concept of "being a person" on the verge of collapse.

That fear doesn't come from being harmed, but from being "erased".

It's not that it doesn't want to come back. It's that it's no longer the original "Qingli".

Dong'er's vision was suddenly stripped away, and she "saw" another scene—a desolate starry sky.

There were no stars, no light, only a single "soul fire" standing alone in the void, as if the whole world was collapsing around it.

At the center of that soul fire sat a woman.

It wasn't Qing Li, but it had her face.

She held a sword in one hand and a ring in the other, with a phantom image behind her like an ancient god sitting in the heavenly palace.

She slowly opened her eyes, her gaze piercing through the entire illusory world and landing in Dong'er's sea of ​​consciousness.

“You shouldn’t have come,” she said.

There was no emotion in his voice.

Like a stone tablet sealed beneath the ice of a star core for millennia, speaking for itself.

"Who are you?" Dong'er asked, her voice trembling as she struggled to maintain her senses.

The divine figure did not answer, but the ring in its palm suddenly rose up—a divine ring.

Dong'er immediately vomited blood, and her soul threads were forcibly shaken back.

She opened her eyes and found herself bounced back from that illusion.

The Bridge of Souls has cracked.

The Azure Soul Flame was burning in mid-air, with rings of golden and white soul patterns swirling around it.

This is not a sign of the soul returning home.

This is the self-revival of divinity.

“She…she didn’t come back on her own,” Dong’er murmured. “It was another ‘she,’ who descended in her name, riding on her soul.”

Chu Ning rushed over and saw the Azure Glass Soul Flame bursting forth in mid-air, realizing something was wrong.

"Dismantle the formation!" he roared into the distance.

Wenqu remained unmoved, instead closing his eyes and slowly lowering the Xuanming Seal, pressing it into the Blood River.

“Too late,” he whispered. “God has already made his move.”

"Offering to the gods is never the same as making offerings."

"Instead... a container."

"We only did one thing."

"Give form to divine authority."

The form of Qing Li.

Chu Ning's mind suddenly went blank.

He finally realized that they were not sacrificing to any "god".

Rather, it is "the power of God" itself.

Qingli's soul is the perfect vessel.

The stillness Qingli possessed in life was not indifference, but rather ethereal tranquility.

She was neither greedy, nor jealous, nor did she cry for help, nor did she harbor any obsessions.

Her soul, like a reflection in water, remained undisturbed.

That is why the divine right chose her.

God does not attach himself to the strongest, but to the "purest white" empty shell.

All of this... was predetermined from the very beginning when the Seven Luminaries set up the formation.

The Soul Bridge is not a path for guiding souls, but rather a narrow passage that passively connects humans with "divine authority."

It was never designed for "returning souls".

Rather, when a mortal soul loses its master, if the remaining empty shell is pure, silent, and controllable, it will be chosen by divinity and "borrowed" from its shell.

The true purpose of the Soul Bridge is to "offer one's body".

Qingli is the shell that was "chosen".

At that moment, the Azure Soul Flame exploded in the sky, and the Divine Ring fully unfolded.

Gold, white, and jet-black divine runes surrounded his body, and a phantom slowly took shape in the center of the soul fire.

That wasn't Qingli's outline, but a template of a "constructed god".

She opened her eyes.

At that moment, the wind and snow froze.

Chu Ning felt a sense of unease—not fear, but a cognitive dissonance.

Her eyes held no hatred, no emotion, and not even logic.

That was a gaze beyond language, as if there were some unencoded value beyond "1" and "0" that was gazing upon him.

She spoke, her voice not echoing in the air, but appearing directly in Chu Ning's consciousness:
"You are not a variable that I allow to exist."

For a moment, Chu Ning almost thought he was being "deleted".

He understood—she was not a god.

She is "the authority itself".

She doesn't try to control people.

She came to correct the world's mistakes.

She raised her hand.

The heaven and earth shook violently.

The divine hand slowly descended from the heavens towards Chu Ning.

It is like a mountain but not a mountain, like the sky but not the sky.

The palm shadow seemed to come from a higher dimension. Its descent was not only a suppression of the physical body, but also a judgment of the "rules"—wiping an anomaly from the river of fate.

Chu Ning stood in the shadow of the divine halo, with thunder and flames surging, and the Five Thunders Resonance was trembling slightly, as if it was about to collapse.

He did not waver, but his eyes grew even more solemn, as deep as mountains and seas.

He knew that if he allowed this divine power to pour down completely, he would not only be unable to break the formation, but would also become a wisp of ashes in the "divine host experiment".

He can't retreat.

They won't refund it.

He had already seen through the core essence of this sacrificial ritual—it was not the awakening of an ancient god, but a sacrifice "artificially constructed divine authority."

The "Big Dipper Seven Luminaries Array" is the coordinate projection of divine authority descending.

If he doesn't break the projection, he will never be able to escape from the ritual.

So, the first step...

This means breaking through the central position of the Big Dipper—the position of the Broken Army Star.

Po Jun is the most enigmatic of the Seven Luminaries.

He lacks the strength of Wuqu (a martial arts symbol) and the wisdom of Dongming (another martial arts symbol), but he possesses the power of one word: "cause".

Po Jun controls "cause and effect" and "fate lock".

As long as he is alive, every attack Chu Ning makes, every time he unleashes his lightning intent, even if it strikes the enemy, will be secretly swallowed up by that "life lock," forever locking away any chance of victory.

This was a match destined to fail.

Unless, he can break the chain of fate itself.

"Po Jun..."

Chu Ning murmured to himself, his eyes filled with a frozen, icy light.

That's not anger.

That is "recitation".

One of the Five Thunders – The Thought of the Soul Lion.

The thought arises, and thunder roars.

The next instant, Chu Ning's entire body exploded with lightning, transforming into a dazzling bolt of lightning that shot into the sky.

He no longer set foot on the ground, but stood amidst the thunder, atop his own soul.

Within the sea of ​​consciousness, a lion-shaped phantom slowly opened its eyes, appearing almost tangible.

"Soul Lion Thunder".

He gave a low shout.

As the void trembled, a giant lion formed from thunder souls suddenly leaped out, roaring across the heavens and earth.

It is invisible and silent, yet with each step it takes, the space collapses by an inch, and the primordial energy of heaven and earth flows backward.

Lei Shi raised his head and looked at Po Jun.

At that moment, Po Jun in the center of the divine formation slowly opened his eyes.

His face remained pale, devoid of both sorrow and joy.

With a gentle turn of his left hand, a causal totem slowly unfolded in his palm, as if countless life lines were intertwined, outlining a certain "inevitability" of fate.

"The cause has already arisen before the effect arrives."

Po Jun whispered, his voice carrying a certain coldness of absolute rationality.

"Your arrival means you are destined to retreat."

Before he finished speaking, the Life Lock was flung out, flying like a ghostly snake, and instantly wrapped around Lei Shi's neck.

"boom!"

The Thunder Lion exploded, and lightning flashed everywhere.

But in the next instant, the shattered thunder soul did not dissipate, but instead condensed in the air into hundreds of thunder shadows, as if thousands of souls resonated, roaring in unison and fiercely attacking Po Jun's surroundings.

Chu Ning's eyes flashed like torches as he said sternly:

"The Soul Lion is not a single entity."

"The first thought is called: Myriad Thoughts!"

As he roared, the resonance of the Five Thunders was fully released, instantly setting up a thunder array around the Po Jun star position.

This thunder array is different from spell arrays; it is a domain constructed by integrating the five thunders of heaven and earth, with the soul as the pillar and thought as the foundation.

"Smash it!!"

Chu Ning roared, and lightning around him surged like a tsunami, resonating with countless lightning shadows in the formation, all striking Po Jun together.

Po Jun's eyes finally turned serious, and the Life Lock in his palm suddenly spun, activating the "Causeless Turning" technique.

It was a terrifying technique that eliminated the "prerequisite" for all attacks.

As long as your attack is traceable and its cause is verifiable, it can erase the "trajectory itself," making the attack seem as if it never happened.

The Raikage was mostly dispelled in an instant.

But Chu Ning did not back down.

He used himself as the "cause" and the Thunder Soul as the "effect," forcibly injecting the Thunder Slash Will into the causal chain.

"Your rule is cause and effect."

"But my lightning will sever all your karma."

Chu Ning's Thunder Soul surged, and the lion shadow no longer lay prone on all fours, but slowly stood up.

His four hooves transformed into arms, his two horns shattered, and cursed markings appeared on his chest.
It is no longer a "beast".

It transformed into a humanoid lion, its eyes like thunder furnaces, holding a blade of illusory thunder in its hand, and slowly stepped towards the divine shadow.

Chu Ning gazed at it and whispered:

"You are me."

Thunder Soul responded to the call, and as the blade fell, the world turned white.

"--boom!"

A pillar of lightning pierced the heavens and earth, crashing down and shattering Po Jun's soul platform. The lightning soul entered his body, severing his lifeline.

Po Jun's throat trembled, and blood appeared at the corner of his mouth.

Thunder roared from all seven orifices, and his consciousness collapsed.

"How could... cause and effect... be reversed..." he murmured to himself, his voice filled with confusion and shock.

But before he could finish speaking, a roaring lion thunder soul entered his sea of ​​consciousness, completely annihilating his divine sense.

Chu Ning landed slowly.

The Snow-Breaking Blade was returned to its sheath.

As the lightning faded, only the lingering star-patterned shadows beneath their feet continued to tremble.

The star chart vibrated.

The throne of the Broken Army fell, and the Big Dipper Illusion Array lost a corner.

The lingering thunder stretched across the sky, like a "death ultimatum" struck down from the heavens.

The six luminaries were terrified, and the star array was thrown into chaos.

Chu Ning slowly turned around, his gaze sharp and cold, pointing directly at the core of the star map.

—The central control hub of the Big Dipper Formation, the enforcer of the rhythm of the seven luminaries.

Wenqu.

Chu Ning's voice was deep, yet it resounded like thunder in the midst of the battle:

"Now it is your turn."

With the fall of Po Jun, the star chart trembled violently. The positions of the six luminaries shifted like scattered sand, and the array of the seven luminaries began to show disorder and cracks.

But Wenqu remained completely unmoved.

He was like an ancient god, sitting quietly in the Xuanming Seal, his palms raised to the sky, his soul as still as water, his expression neither sad nor happy.

The heavens and earth trembled and order was disrupted, yet he remained like an ancient bell in a tower—silent, still, and unyielding.

"Po Jun is just a point in the formation." His voice was low, as if he were talking to himself, or as if he were responding to an unseen deity. "But divine authority is the thread."

"As long as this line remains, the sacrificial array has not collapsed."

As soon as he finished speaking, the Seven Luminaries Star Chart began to slowly repair itself.

The Soul Lock, shattered by the destruction of Po Jun, reappeared on the Xuanming Seal, as if a wound in the Heavenly Dao was closing, and a lifeline was forcibly extended.

But he didn't realize it.

Chu Ning stood at the edge of the star map, the lightning subsided, his breath stopped, and his soul seemed to be frozen in a line of nothingness.

He didn't draw his sword the first time.

He simply conjured something in his palm.

—A lightning core.

It was as white as jade, as blue as mist, and crackled with lightning like silk, yet there was not a trace of killing intent in it.

That is "Frost Thunder," one of the Five Thoughts.

Bearing the thoughts of the snow fox.

It is not thunder to kill enemies, but "thunder to concentrate intent";
It's not about destroying the structure, but freezing the process;

It's not breaking the formation—it's severing the connection.

Chu Ning looked at Wen Qu, her voice soft, as if she were merely chatting about the wind and snow:

"You think I came here to kill you?"

"Did you think I broke the formation to destroy this star map?"

He smiled slightly:
"wrong."

"I want it to—break on its own."

He flicked his fingertips, and the lightning core slowly rose, hovering above the Xuanming Seal.

At first, there was only a slight chill, like snow falling silently.

Wenqu's brow twitched slightly, a flash of starlight passing through him, but he didn't take it to heart. He simply assumed it was a disturbance of spiritual pressure caused by the disorder of the remaining formation, an aftershock of the collapse of the Po Jun star position.

But the next moment—everything froze.

The Xuanming Seal trembled.

It's not a superficial tremor, but a deep freeze.

Spiritual pressure freezes, soul network freezes, magic circle freezes.

It was as if a spider web had encountered frost, causing blood to stagnate and the mind to rust.

That trace of extremely cold lightning seeped out from the heart, spreading like a tide, locking every soul pattern and every flow of the sacrificial chain into the icy silence.

"What is this!" Wenqu finally noticed the change, roared angrily, and summoned the Soul Lock in his palm, trying to awaken the resonance of the Seven Luminaries Soul Chain and repel the chill in the opposite direction.

But the Soul Chain remained unmoved.

No, it's not that it's not responding, but rather—it's frozen in the moment it couldn't be activated.

Like a corpse about to awaken, sealed in an ice coffin in advance.

“You…” Wenqu’s pupils contracted as he stared intently at Chu Ning. “You knew all along… that the Xuanming Seal was cracked.”

Chu Ning nodded, her expression calm, but her tone revealed a hint of weariness and nostalgia.

"You think I've always been fighting head-on."

"But actually... I'm just buying time."

"The moment the Nightmare Tiger Thunder rose, I separated a wisp of my soul to disturb the consciousness of each of you Seven Luminaries."

"And you are the key."

"If you show even the slightest hesitation at that moment, the old wounds of the Xuanming Seal will burst open again."

"Frost and Thunder, it's just a way to send it off to its end."

Wenqu finally understood.

Chu Ning did not break the formation.

He is—Yin Beng.

That seemingly head-on clash was nothing more than a smokescreen. The real battle had already silently unfolded from the very beginning.

"You...you shouldn't know these things." Wenqu coughed up a mouthful of black blood. The Xuanming Seal Heart was like a shattered mirror, with cracks crisscrossing it, tearing his cursed body along the soul patterns.

He tried to retrieve the seal core, but found that even his soul had been frozen within the array and he could not move.

Chu Ning stepped forward slowly, his gaze as still as snow in the night, his voice low and firm:
“You Seven Luminaries, based on fragments of divine authority, forge sacrificial rituals into arrays, and use the stars as your soul network.”

"But you've forgotten one thing."

“This divine authority was ‘split’.”

"You are using a once-broken artifact to suppress a complete will."

"There is only one outcome."

"boom!"

The Xuanming Seal shattered.

Thunder and ice shattered, and the soul chains vanished. The entire core of the formation collapsed under the combined impact of the frost and ice seal and the old cracks in the seal.

The Wenqu star flew out like a puppet with broken strings, the Soul Lock fell from its back like snowflakes, the spiritual network was severed, and the blood river flowed backward.

He knelt in mid-air, his fingertips touching the ground, and for the first time, an unprecedented look appeared in his eyes—confusion.

“You…you’re not fighting,” he murmured. “You’re calculating.”

Wenqu knelt on the shattered remnant of the Xuanming Seal, coughing up blood without stopping.

He looked up, watching the star map he had once controlled collapse little by little, like watching the sky he had designed crumble.

He wasn't angry.

He was confused.

"The Blood Refining Hall has orchestrated the Seven Luminaries, laying an ambush for thirty years, using divine rings to lay the lines, and causal ritual diagrams to create a powerful force..."

He looked at Chu Ning and asked, "What do you rely on?"

Chu Ninglei's eyes were like frost: "I don't believe it."

Wenqu was stunned.

He understood at that moment.

He lost, not because of the thunder, nor because of the battle formation.

It was defeated by the statement, "You don't believe in God, but I have believed for a long time."

Chu Ning stood amidst the embers of the battle, lightning and flames returning to his sleeves, snow falling silently. He gazed at Wen Qu, his voice deep and slow, like a blade forged from snow:
"When facing an enemy, one must fight with all one's might."

"Those who face God must enter the game."

“Star charts, the seven luminaries, formations, soul locks… you regard everything as ‘martial arts,’ but you have forgotten the most important structure of this formation.”

"I'm not breaking it."

"I'm taking it apart."

The star chart shattered, the seven luminaries collapsed, and the soul pressure dissipated. The entire Big Dipper Array, like a paper lantern having its bones ripped out, finally collapsed with a deafening roar, scattering and vanishing into nothingness.

Chu Ning, however, remained unmoved.

He simply raised his head slowly, his gaze passing over the collapsing Star Abyss and looking towards the outside of the sacrificial array.

The figure suspended in the sky—"Qingli".

(End of this chapter)