Douluo Unrivaled: The Beginning Materializes the Black Abyss and White Flowers

Chapter 329 Beast Tide Eruption (Two-in-One Chapter)

Wherever Ishtar's gaze fell, the black eye patch on Jingliu's face fluttered off in the wind, revealing his scarlet eyes filled with murderous intent.

The longsword in her hand, formed from the condensation of extreme ice crystals, seemed to sense its master's fighting spirit, emitting a clear and cold hum. The chill flowing over the blade grew even more intense, as if it had longed to taste the blood of a god.

On the other side of the battlefield, Artoria once again raised the holy sword that shone with glorious light. The immense energy resonated with her will, transforming into a dazzling golden stream of light. Her clear voice echoed throughout the battlefield: "Excalibur!"

A torrent of blazing light burst forth like a raging celestial river bursting its banks, carrying terrifying light and heat capable of instantly vaporizing steel and destroying cities and armies.

Wherever the light cannon passed, the scorched earth was instantly melted and cut into deep ravines, with rocks at the edges turning into flowing, molten lava.

However, this astonishing blow, powerful enough to flatten mountains, was steadily blocked by a seemingly thin yet incredibly tough pale blue divine power shield.

The dazzling stream of light was forced to split in two the moment it touched the shield. Like a river encountering a reef, it grazed Xiao Wu's sides before finally crashing into the distant ruins of buildings, causing a series of violent explosions and flames shooting into the sky.

Artoria's handsome brows furrowed tightly. How many times had she revealed the true name of her Noble Phantasm already?

Even she herself couldn't quite remember.

Even so, she still couldn't truly tear apart or break through Xiao Wu's seemingly fragile but actually deeply rooted divine power defense.

In this Mingdu that has been transformed into a purgatory, the negative energy generated by the pervasive death, fear, and despair is exceptionally abundant, almost inexhaustible. As a servant, she no longer needs to worry about insufficient energy.

While I can't yet use Noble Phantasms as casually as normal attacks, I can still unleash them several times in a row without any problem.

Even so, the continuous bombardment of this city-level treasure failed to completely kill the opponent.

The only piece of good news was that the divine aura emanating from Xiao Wu was visibly weakening, and the surging divine power was becoming increasingly unstable and weaker.

"The gods of this world... their vitality and defense are truly unreasonable, they're just too difficult to kill..."

Cú Chulainn, leaning on his magic spear, shook his head with a wry smile and sighed.

His figure had become somewhat blurry and transparent, clearly on the verge of collapse, exhausted and reaching the limit of what he could endure.

He had just managed to stay alive by relying on the "Combat Continuation" skill, but even this skill has its limits.

The only reason I can still stand here is because of the indomitable will of a warrior.

Having been in this world for some time, he had secretly learned a lot about the power system of this world while at Shrek Academy.

Cú Chulainn knew very well that while the top human powerhouses or 100,000-year-old soul beasts in this world were powerful, very few could truly stand up to a top-tier Servant head-on.

An absurd opponent like Xiao Wu, who can withstand both the Noble Phantasm of Causality and the Excalibur, must be a deity from the legendary realm of gods in this world.

After all, only true gods could possess such extraordinary vitality and defensive capabilities.

Although Xiao Wu did not display the overwhelming, world-destroying power of a god as rumored, her indestructible defense and tenacious vitality alone undoubtedly place her at the level of a true god.

Therefore, Xiao Wu's identity was already very clear in his mind; she could only be a legendary deity in this world.

Both the vast and powerful spiritual force and the divine energy, which is far superior and purer than soul power, illustrate this point.

Not only were Cú Chulainn and Artoria finding it difficult, but Mai was also secretly groaning at this moment.

Artoria's "Intuition" skill was so abnormal and sharp that several times her planned fatal attacks were predicted and dodged by her opponents.

Moreover, the opponent's Noble Phantasm was extremely powerful, and she had to use her primordial divine power to barely defend against it each time.

However, this caused the old, serious injury caused by Ma Hongjun's Phoenix Divine Power to flare up and backfire, as the power was no longer suppressing her. This resulted in a continuous decline in her combat performance, and her divine power recovery speed could not keep up with her consumption.

In the midst of this intense exchange of attack and defense, Xiao Wu suddenly sensed a very familiar, warm, and majestic fluctuation of divine consciousness coming from not far away.

The fluctuation made her instinctively feel incredibly warm and joyful, as if it were the scent of the most important and cherished person in her life.

But her mind was shrouded in a thick fog, and she couldn't remember who the other person was. This sense of contradiction left her feeling dazed.

At the same time, almost simultaneously, she also clearly sensed another equally familiar, yet more rugged and heavy aura, which vanished completely and forever.

The feeling caused her heart to clench violently, and an indescribable, immense sorrow surged into her heart like an icy tide, as if she had lost a dear relative who was indispensable to her life.

"Why...why is this...my heart aches so much..."

Xiao Wu subconsciously raised her hand to touch the corner of her eye, only to find that cold tears had already unknowingly slid down her cheeks.

She didn't understand why she suddenly burst into tears, but the overwhelming sorrow from the depths of her soul completely engulfed her like a tidal wave, making her forget to continue her attack and stand there in a daze.

"What's wrong with her all of a sudden?"

Cú Chulainn and Artoria quickly exchanged a glance, looking at each other with suspicion and wariness in their eyes.

Although they could all clearly sense the intense, storm-like energy fluctuations coming from afar, it was obvious that top experts were engaged in a life-or-death battle there.

But at this moment, they were already exhausted and in poor condition, and they really didn't have the extra energy to pay too much attention to the battle in the distance.

Just dealing with the seemingly invincible Xiao Wu was already overwhelming and pushing them to their limits.

"Black Tower, immediately reconnect me to emergency communications with Ningguang and Ganyu."

Lu Jingming quickly activated the advanced communication soul tool on his wrist.

The energy network within the Mingdu area had long been in chaos due to the internecine warfare among various forces, with powerful energy interference everywhere. Without the Black Tower's technological support that was ahead of its time, he would have had no way of contacting Ningguang and Ganyu, who were thousands of miles away in Shrek City.

"Hehe, little guy, you're only realizing it now? It's a bit too late, isn't it?"

Black Tower's voice, tinged with a hint of mockery and a desire to stir up trouble, resounded directly in his mind. At the same time, countless pale blue data streams, as if possessing a life of their own, rapidly converged and flowed in the void before him, eventually condensing into an extremely clear optical screen projection, displaying the scene of Shrek City in the distance in real time.

"This is... a beast tide?! And on such a massive scale?!"

On the screen, the image quickly focused and zoomed in on the southern region of Shrek City.

That place was originally a strategic location guarding the entrance to the Starry Sky Forest, where countless defensive fortifications were built, and it was also the strongest first line of defense for mankind against the beast tide.

At this moment, dust billowed into the sky from the edge of the Starry Sky Forest, as if a sandstorm had descended.

Countless soul beasts of various shapes and crimson eyes surged forth like a destructive flood bursting its banks, densely packed and stretching as far as the eye could see.

The thunderous roar of its four legs pounding the ground coalesced into a terrifying sonic boom, shaking the earth violently.

The sky was a dark, oppressive mass, with countless flying soul beasts blotting out the sun and turning the entire horizon into an ominous inky black, completely swallowing up the sunlight, as if the end of the world had suddenly arrived.

"Impossible, this is absolutely impossible!"

Gu Yue's figure flashed to Lu Jingming's side in an instant. Her eyes were fixed on the breathtaking scene on the screen, her exquisite face filled with disbelief and shock.

“Di Tian would never launch such a large-scale beast tide without a reason, much less without my permission, and he didn’t send me any message at all.”

Before she could finish speaking, several enormous figures flashed across the screen, causing her purple pupils to contract sharply.

Those were the three-headed Crimson Demon Hound Crimson King, whose body was as large as a small mountain and whose three heads roared ferociously, and the Dark Gold Terror Claw Bear Lord, whose body was covered with dark gold light and whose claws tore the earth apart.

These are all senior ferocious beasts with extremely high status and terrifying strength in the core circle of the Star Dou Great Forest.

The fact that even they appeared among the beast tide army is enough to prove that this beast tide is by no means an ordinary small-scale disturbance, but an unprecedented all-out war in which the Star Dou Great Forest has mobilized its entire force.

"Di Tian certainly wouldn't act without your permission, but what if... the one orchestrating all of this isn't Di Tian himself at all?"

Lu Jingming's voice was low and solemn; he had already realized the worst-case scenario.

He knew very well that although Gu Yue's main body was still sleeping in the core of the Star Dou Great Forest due to old injuries, this clone, which possessed most of her consciousness, always maintained a close connection with the Star Dou Great Forest. Given Di Tian's absolute loyalty and cautious nature towards the Silver Dragon King, even if he did not want to disturb Gu Yue's main body's recuperation, he would definitely try to consult or at least inform Gu Yue's clone before launching a super beast tide of such scale that could change the continent's landscape.

But now, Gu Yue is completely unaware of this matter, yet the beast tide has already fully erupted.

There's almost always only one answer: Di Tian, ​​something's happened.

On this Douluo Continent, there are very few beings capable of threatening a ferocious beast king like Di Tian, ​​whose cultivation is close to nine hundred thousand years and whose strength is comparable to a demigod.

And the only person who could act in the deepest part of the Star Dou Great Forest, in Di Tian's lair, without alerting Gu Yuena's true form and other ferocious beasts, was none other than the extremely hidden and most skilled manipulator of spirit and soul, the Great Lord of Annihilation, Huan Long. He really couldn't think of a second person.

“Controlling Di Tian and commanding all the soul beasts in the Star Dou Great Forest to serve her... this fits Huanlong’s wicked aesthetic of destruction.”

Lu Jingming's eyes turned cold.

"She never liked to carry out brutal destruction herself; she was more adept at using others to do her dirty work, using the hands of living beings themselves and internal conflicts to achieve her goal of destroying civilization."

With the strength of the Great Lord of Illusion and Annihilation, even if she is just a memory body, coupled with the fact that Shrek Academy's defenses are currently extremely weak, and Xuanzi and several Sea God Pavilion Super Douluo elders are trapped in Mingdu and unable to escape, the academy only has a few dean-level combatants such as Yan Shaozhe and Cai Meier, who cannot pose any real threat to her.

However, instead of directly crushing Shrek City, she went to great lengths to control Di Tian and launch this terrifying beast tide that could sweep across the continent. Her sinister intentions are self-evident.

Brutal and direct destruction is never Huanlong's style; that's the kind of method that Fenfeng would prefer.

She preferred to sow discord, to plant seeds of suspicion and hatred, and to watch as civilization gradually self-destructed amidst internal strife and despair.

Once Shrek City is breached by this unprecedented beast tide, the human world will inevitably unleash endless fury and hatred upon the entire soul beast race.

This has nothing to do with any personal grudges; it is purely a direct confrontation between race and stance.

The three great empires of Tianhun, Xingluo, and Douling, along with all human forces, will never sit idly by while soul beasts run rampant. At that time, the contradictions that have accumulated between humans and soul beasts for countless years will be completely ignited, leading to a full-scale war.

This scene of bloodshed and regression of civilization is precisely the masterpiece that Huanlong most wants to see.

Even more insidiously, she could take advantage of the full-scale attack of the beast tide and the fact that everyone's attention was drawn to the front line to sneak into the depths of Shrek Academy unnoticed.

They may have already succeeded... seizing the golden tree that relates to the origin of the world, achieving their fundamental goal of breaking free from the Holy Grail's constraints and reshaping their true divine body.

Killing two birds with one stone, he manipulated the powerful figures and forces of the entire continent at will.

"Damn it, utterly despicable and shameless."

Gu Yue gritted her teeth, her eyes blazing with anger.

Huanlong dared to take advantage of her slumber to plunder and manipulate the Star Dou Great Forest, the last pure land and foundation of the soul beast race. This was simply provoking her and offending her.

Deep within the Star Dou Great Forest, beneath the clear yet unfathomable surface of the Lake of Life, lies a separate, alternate dimension created by the power of the Silver Dragon King.

At this moment, in this originally peaceful and serene space, the silver dragon that had fallen into a deep sleep suddenly opened her dragon eyes, which were like huge amethyst crystals.

A palpable rage surged within those majestic vertical pupils, and the enormous dragon body, hundreds of meters long, suddenly stretched out, its hard, silver scales clanging together with a metallic sound.

The moment the dragon wings spread, an extremely terrifying pure-blooded dragon might swept through the entire alternate dimension like a tsunami, even causing the sturdy spatial barrier to hum under the strain.

"Illusion—!"

A clear, melodious female voice, yet filled with boundless anger and authority, resounded like thunder throughout the space.

Gu Yuena was about to mobilize the power of space to forcibly tear open a portal to the outside world to settle accounts with that audacious Absolute Lord, but she suddenly discovered that the space around her had already been entangled and imprisoned by countless strange chains formed from ghostly blue starlight.

These chains gleamed with a cold, deep luster, slowly writhing like living venomous snakes, intertwining to form an enormous net that completely sealed off the entire alternate dimension from the outside. Its structure was so solid that it was impossible to break through it instantly by brute force.

Her body shone with a brilliant silver light. In the dazzling light, the enormous dragon body rapidly shrank and transformed, eventually turning into a graceful young woman dressed in a plain white dress.

Her long silver hair cascaded down like a waterfall from the heavens, her purple eyes held an undeniable majesty, and her brows exuded an innate nobility and aloofness, as if she embodied the essence of heaven and earth.

This is her true form, the ruler of all soul beasts, the Silver Dragon King Gu Yuena.

Silver power, imbued with the laws of space, flowed and condensed at her slender fingertips, attempting to cut and tear a tiny channel like the sharpest blade.

But those spark chains were exceptionally stubborn and resilient. Not only were they not severed by the power of space, but they also seemed like an enraged swarm of bees. More of the same chains, like living shadow snakes, burst forth from the void, trying to completely bind and suppress her here.

Gu Yuena's eyes turned cold, and several silver spatial blades, condensed to the extreme and almost materialized, flashed past, precisely severing the dozen or so chains that attacked first.

The broken chains turned into specks of pale blue sparks and dissipated.

But her expression became even more serious as a result.

She had clearly been outmaneuvered by the Great Lord of Annihilation, Huanlong.

This hidden alternate dimension, which she created herself, was originally intended as an absolutely safe haven to avoid the prying eyes of the divine realm; it was her final core lair.

Now, without her even realizing it, it has become the perfect prison that confines her.

To escape, the only option right now is to forcefully break the spell and shatter the seal that connects this space with the outside.

But the other party was clearly well-prepared.

This strange Starfire Seal is not without roots; its energy core seems to be faintly connected to the vast life force of the Lake of Life below. It is by no means easy to disintegrate quickly; it will take at least a considerable amount of time to wear it down.

"Ditian..."

Gu Yuena's face darkened completely, as if covered with a layer of frost.

The only person who knew the exact coordinates of this alternate dimension was her most trusted right-hand man, the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King Di Tian.

Given Di Tian's absolute loyalty to her, etched into his very soul, there was absolutely no possibility of him betraying her willingly.

So the answer is only one fact: Huanlong not only controlled Ditian through some strange means, but also had the ability to extract the most core secrets about the place where his original body was sleeping from his soul memories.

Otherwise, the other party could never have found this place so accurately, nor would they have set up such a powerful seal specifically targeting spatial abilities in advance, with the purpose of preventing her from going out and disrupting their entire plan.

Gu Yuena couldn't help but feel a sense of helplessness and self-mockery, as if she had created an absurd situation by trapping herself in a cocoon.

She took a deep breath and forced herself to calm down.

With the partial power she had recovered, it wasn't entirely impossible for her to forcefully destroy this alternate dimension along with the seal. However, the destructive energy turbulence generated the moment the spatial structure completely collapsed would be enough to worsen her old injuries, which were not yet fully healed, and might even damage her foundation. It would be a losing proposition.

"Thankfully... Ah Ming is here."

Thinking of that figure who always brought unexpected surprises, Gu Yuena's turbulent emotions calmed down a little.

Lu Jingming was clearly on her side. With his power and resources, he would never stand idly by and watch as humans and soul beasts were easily instigated by Huanlong and plunged into endless bloody battles and internal strife.

As long as Lu Jingming mediates and controls the overall situation, even if Shrek City unfortunately falls, there may still be room for recovery and mitigation.

As for the survival of Shrek Academy itself... a barely perceptible indifference flashed in Gu Yuena's eyes; she didn't really care.

From the perspective of soul beasts, the weakening of humanity's top powers may not be entirely a bad thing.

With someone she could completely rely on to act outside, she no longer rushed things.

Instead, he suppressed his anxiety and began to patiently mobilize the vast divine power within his body, like the most exquisite craftsman, slowly wearing down and disintegrating the energy nodes of the external seal.

It would be best to get out as soon as possible; she was eager to find Huanlong and settle this score.

How dare they exploit and trample on the soul beast race like this? This debt must be settled in blood.

(End of this chapter)