Dragon Canon

After the karmic thread snapped, Wei Yuan’s primordial spirit returned to its normal state, and he could no longer perceive the distinction between the real and the illusory in the world around him.

In the Great Realm, the Red Lotus Bodhi had ceased its swaying and appeared somewhat wilted. It would seem that dispelling this type of hostile karma had taken a toll on it as well.

Silence temporarily fell upon the three of them, though the atmosphere remained heavy and foreboding. It seemed that the monster’s assault had been temporarily thwarted, but it still refused to give up and was lying in wait nearby.

During this time, Wei Yuan felt another two unusual sensations. It felt like the shadow monster was attempting to lock onto him, but failed both times for some inexplicable reason.

Seizing this opening, Wei Yuan commanded through his fortune, “All units, battle formations! Breach the walls and enter the palace!”

Inside the side hall, Ji Liuli’s Devil Suppressing Nine Level Pagoda flickered in and out of view, never letting its guard down for a moment. The monster seemed to be existing in a special state. Though clearly within the pagoda’s range, it was currently unaffected by it. Ji Liuli was unable to detect it through her Dao Foundation either. However, it could not launch an attack without emerging from its stealth state, and the moment it did, the Devil Suppressing Nine Level Pagoda would instantly reduce its speed by at least thirty or forty percent.

Sword qi swirled around Zhang Sheng as he gripped his sword with one hand and took a pill with the other. Ji Liuli silently handed him a pill before taking away the one he had been about to swallow.

The healing pill Ji Liuli handed to Zhang Sheng was roughly a hundred times more expensive than the one he had intended to take.

While Zhang Sheng and Ji Liuli remained on high alert, Wei Yuan wasn’t idle either. He produced square cauldrons that could serve as building materials and began constructing a low wall around the three of them. The monster was extremely fast, and these low walls would effectively restrict its movements.

Another bloodcurdling scream rang out from beyond the palace walls. Clearly, another straggling cultivator had fallen. At that moment, the sound of crunching and munching echoed from the side wall. The slime dripping from the ceiling now contained streaks of crimson, and a thick, pungent stench of blood began to permeate the air. At the same time, the monster’s aura was slowly growing stronger.

Anger flared within Wei Yuan’s chest. Nearly half of these Dao Foundation-stage cultivators had ascended within the realm of Qingming, and almost every one of them had contributed a blue fortune. Their recognition of and loyalty to the realm went without saying. If they were to die on the battlefield against the Shamans, it would have been a death well-deserved. But to be devoured by a monster here—Wei Yuan found that truly unbearable.

By now, the cultivators outside the palace had gathered in one place and formed a military formation. In an instant, army aura surged skyward, and a chilling aura of slaughter radiated through the air!

A military formation was a Dao of uniting the masses. It was also the singular option for the weak to band together and stand against the strong. Whether a formation could take shape depended on one, the commanding general at its helm, and two, whether an army aura could take shape. The commanding general served as the linchpin of the offensive, while the army aura was akin to the pure qi of the human realm, the yellow qi of the Liao realm, the green qi of the Shaman realm, and so on—capable of altering the surrounding environment.

The cultivators Wei Yuan had brought into the grotto-heaven were by no means weak—there were over a hundred Dao Foundation-stage cultivators. At the moment, Trueman Chu He was commanding the military formation, and the ranks included formidable immortal foundations such as Yu Zhizhuo, Sun Yu, and Feng Tingyu. Once an army aura had taken shape, it might not cause all ghosts and gods within a hundred zhang to flee, but it was certainly strong enough to cause even a powerful Avatar like Trueman Fen Hai to give it a wide berth.

Since entering the grotto-heaven, Trueman Chu He had faced nothing but misfortune. Naturally, he had long been seething with frustration. Now, spurred on by the army aura, he was pointing an immortal sword at the palace and roaring with bloodlust, “Advance! Annihilate that foul beast!”

The crowd roared in response and marched forward. The towering palace walls were still over ten zhang away from the front-row soldiers, but the moment the army aura struck them, they instantly crumbled to dust.

Inside the side hall, Wei Yuan sensed the army aura surging skyward and immediately breathed a sigh of relief. With a formation this strong, as long as the monster wasn’t a fool, it shouldn’t dare to confront them head-on.

The only flaw with a military formation was its lack of flexibility. There was zero chance it was ever catching up to an Avatar Trueman, but it was remarkably effective for both holding defensive positions and close-quarters combat. Back then, the Shamans had also used army aura to clear a path even through a domain constructed by an immortal stone such as Qingming. Until the army aura was exhausted, they basically weren’t weakened in any way.

Trueman Chu He’s murderous voice carried all the way to the side hall. Wei Yuan couldn’t help but feel that the phrase “foul beast” was directed at him, but he had no proof.

The military formation swept through the area like a tornado, flattening several palaces in the process and eventually reaching the courtyard. Then, they charged toward the side hall.

With the roof blocking the light gone, there were no shadows inside the hall. The monster might not be able to hide there anymore.

It was at this moment the entire palace began to tremble. The ground cracked open, and countless sparks of starlight flew out. Several fissures also appeared in the sky, and a fragment fell, revealing the deep void beyond.

Wei Yuan was taken aback. What kind of array was this? It looked immensely powerful; so much so that even a shattered grotto-heaven could not withstand it and began disintegrating in earnest.

Before Wei Yuan could react, the scenery around him shifted, and he suddenly found himself in a canyon.

The canyon was no more than a hundred zhang wide, with sheer cliffs rising straight up from both sides. The sky hung unusually low, as if a giant bowl had been placed upside down overhead.

Seeing this scenery and recalling the various strange phenomena that had occurred when the unknown array was activated, Wei Yuan recalled a famously powerful array called the Profound Heaven Star-Shifting Great Array.

The array created its own self-contained world that could be divided into numerous independent worlds. When activated, anyone within the array whose primordial spirit exceeded a certain threshold would be teleported and placed into one of these separate worlds. Since the teleportation wasn’t a direct attack and posed no immediate threat to one’s life, and the array was exceptionally high rank, even newly ascended True Lords could fall victim to it. Only World Ruler True Lords with the ability to manifest their Imaginary Worlds externally were unaffected by this array.

This array excelled at scattering groups of enemies and defeating them one by one. If meticulously designed, it could even create various extreme environments within the independent worlds, into which specific enemies could be cast so that they could be annihilated efficiently.

For example, Wei Yuan found himself in a zone that was completely devoid of moisture. If a cultivator practicing water-based techniques or a powerful Shaman were thrown in here, their combat effectiveness would be reduced by a whopping thirty percent.

Wei Yuan breathed a sigh of relief after discerning the nature of this array. Generally, arrays such as this would contain much deadlier terrains such as lava, oceans, poisonous swamps and so on. Being cast into a dry canyon was, comparatively speaking, quite lenient.

To break this array, one must kill the guardians stationed in each space, then shatter the spirit object placed at the eye of the array. This way, they would break out of the miniature world and enter another miniature world, where the process would begin anew. This would continue until all miniature worlds were destroyed or the array’s spirit qi reserves were exhausted.

The reason this array was renowned was its exceptional ability to handle large numbers of powerful enemies. If manipulated skillfully, the invaders could outnumber the defenders three or four to one, and they could still be split up within the array and defeated one by one. However, such a massive array required an enormous expenditure of time, energy, and materials to set up. Even distinguished clans could not deploy it at will, and they usually set up only one or two in their most critical strongholds.

Wei Yuan hadn’t expected the Xu Clan to go so far as to set up an array this big within their grotto-heaven. He was even more surprised that the array remained operational even after the grotto-heaven had shattered.

At the moment, countless armored sand wolves emerged from both sides of the canyon and fixed their gazes on Wei Yuan. They were the guardians of this miniature world, and their numbers were staggering. Typically, an armored sand wolf was about as strong as a cultivator in the peak of the blood-tempering stage, but these ones were noticeably larger and boasted a much more robust aura. Each one was as strong as a peak Body-tempering stage cultivator.

Looking at the swarm of sand wolves closing in on him, Wei Yuan immediately grasped the strategy of the array’s defenders: first, they would use these formidable, lightning-fast beasts to wear down the invaders. Even if they couldn’t be killed outright, they would deplete a massive amount of Dao energy. After that, the defenders would concentrate their forces for a decisive strike—a sure path to victory.

Too bad for them, depleting Wei Yuan’s Dao energy reserves would likely be a formidable undertaking.

Wei Yuan remained calm, casually killing the first sand wolf to charge at him with a sword and pondering his next move. Just then, a shadow suddenly appeared above the canyon and sprayed a jet of black liquid at Wei Yuan!

The black liquid penetrated his physical body and traveled all the way into his sea of consciousness, where it transformed into a torrential black rain that fell upon his Dao Foundation. The poison was immensely powerful; so powerful that even an Avatar Trueman might die from it if they took a solid hit. As the poisonous rain fell, the land within a hundred-li radius of Wei Yuan’s Dao Foundation transformed into a patch of scorched earth[1].

1. Oh mah gawd! Another couple hundred sprays like this, and it might just be enough to completely kill the Great Realm! How could Wei Yuan possibly survive this crisis?! ☜