A Pawn's Passage

The Longevous on the outer perimeter quickly discovered that the shadows had broken free of the water’s constraints and were coiling around them.

The moment they were ensnared, their minds grew heavy and muddled, every dark and negative emotion surged up at once and multiplied wildly.

The Godly Immortal lineage was most adept at manipulating the wishes of the human heart, harnessing the six desires and turning them against oneself. The Shadow Tide now pushed this aspect to its absolute limit. When Chak Chel had employed it, the goal had been to seize divine power, so it had not been unleashed with such variety. Now that Utu intended to kill enemies, the scene was naturally quite different.

Soon, every one of them had vanished soundlessly into the shadows.

The shadows receded, and the sea turned calm once again.

The sea at night was dark and mysterious, like a bottomless abyss swallowing all light. Its deep-blue, almost black hue instilled fear of the unknown. Beneath the surface, shadows layered upon each other.

A faint streak of red light gradually emerged along the line where the sea met the sky, heralding the imminent rise of the sun.

In that moment, all was hushed. Even the sound of the waves were barely audible, as if the entire world had held its breath, quietly awaiting the sun.

Then a dark and howling gale swept in without warning, carrying the saltiness and dampness of the sea, shattering the stillness in an instant. Driven by the tempest, the waves grew increasingly rough, crashing against the coastal reef with a deafening roar.

Some believed the power of shadow would be suppressed in daylight. But this was not so. Light and shadow always traveled together; only where there is light can there be shadow. The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow it casts.

Certainly, absolute light could annihilate shadow and render it utterly absent. But such absolute light existed only in theory, like perfect justice.

Having eliminated the Longevous on the outer perimeter, the shadows began to spread toward those with greater cultivation.

A shadow quietly attached itself to one of the Longevous.

Before the Longevous could react, a chilling force seeped into his body, as if a cold hand had gripped his heart. His eyes flew open in shock. Though he struggled to shake off the influence, the force allowed no resistance. In the end, he could only sink painfully to the bottom of the sea.

At the same time, his body began to transform. The dragon-scaled skin gradually darkened and dulled, as if soaked in ink. His features blurred, leaving only a dim, formless mass. In the end, even his silhouette grew indistinct, like a writhing, shifting shadow.

Scenes of this kind repeated. Those Longevous seized by the shadows became shadows themselves, turning to attack their fellow tribesmen.

Since the Longevous were not trained Spirit Guards, they were momentarily unable to respond when ambushed. All it took was a moment’s hesitation for the shadows to pass through them, repeating the same process.

These Longevous had dwelled on the sea for many years. They were impoverished, yet comparatively peaceful. They were nothing like the Daoist Order, which had been in a constant state of external warfare—against the Confucian School, the Buddhist Sect, the Western Region, the Golden Horde, Fenglin, the Holy Court and so on. To this day, fresh conflicts still broke out.

As such, the Daoist Order’s combat force was still well-maintained. However, during peaceful times, there had been an increase of flowerbed Daoists, who were full of moral theory but ignorant of actual hardships.

The Longevous was much the same in this regard. Having been isolated for so long without many external enemies, they were not prepared for such a coordinated attack.

But there was no time for them to gain experience, because many of the Longevous did not survive this initial assault, toppling one after another into the sea.

By right, the Longevous were considered descendants of the Daoist Order, so they should not have been slaughtered indiscriminately.

But once they had become servants of the dragon, those with a lighter degree of dragonification could still be managed. Those more deeply dragonified were essentially beyond saving and had to be eliminated. That was because they were bound to the old flood dragon. Even if they were left alive, once the old dragon died, they would become raving madmen when they no longer had a master.

There was simply no room to be softhearted. Releasing a group of powerful madmen to wander at will would cause future troubles, so it was better to give them release sooner.

This made the old flood dragon all the more deserving of death. Enslaving the human race and Daoists was a crime that merited execution.

Though many flowerbed Daoists in Jade Capital clamored loudly for the protection of flood dragons, Qi Xuansu was not among them.

So there was a clear line to Utu’s actions. The earliest individuals had merely vanished, drawn into Utu’s divine domain. The Dragon-Blooded who arrived after received no such mercy.

In essence, Utu was a Shaman, skilled in spells. As such, when it came to sorting through and eliminating lower-cultivation enemies in bulk, Utu had the advantage over Hun Ahau. After all, a Martial Arts Practitioner throwing punches would take considerably more time.

By now, the elite among the Longevous had sensed something was wrong. A series of prolonged cries rang out in rapid succession, shaking the sea and stirring the clouds, giving full demonstration of their deep cultivation.

These Longevous were of elder rank, closest to the Dragon Palace and deepest within the entire perimeter. That was why they had only now detected the attack. They were mostly at the Wuliang stage, and there was even one at the Zaohua stage. The depth of their foundations was evident. Judged solely by their senior combat power, they were nearly a match for a small Daoist Mansion.

The Longevous elders acted at once, moving to eliminate the shadows. But they did not know the proper method to do so.

Eliminating shadows through physical means was not impossible, but it required the ability to strike the intangible with the tangible. Without such ability, one had to dispel shadows with light. The Holy Court’s holy light or the Daoist Order’s thunder light were both natural counters to these shadows.

The Longevous, having dwelled on the sea for so many years, had evolved toward water techniques. Though they unleashed no small number of Divine Thunder, blasting the shadows into writhing, rippling distortions, they ultimately could not scatter the shadows entirely.

Hun Ahau had not moved at all, leaving Utu to act alone in the beginning. Only when the Longevous’ elite fighters were deployed did Hun Ahau finally step in.

The two had different roles. Utu was a broad, surface offensive, while Hun Ahau was a focused, decisive strike.

Hun Ahau faced seven Longevous elders alone. Without a word, he thrust a single palm out at the nearest elder.

The elder had no choice but to summon his cultivation and meet the blow head-on.

The elder met Hun Ahau’s single palm strike with two of his own. He watched that single hand push steadily toward him, and in an instant, he felt like a fallen leaf in a gale, tumbling backward without end. Blood gushed from eyes, ears, mouth, and nose like a broken dam.

The other elders were all shaken when they saw this. They had not expected Hun Ahau’s strike to be so terrifyingly powerful.

The Chief Elder’s expression did not change. He gave only a slight wave of his hand, and the assembled elders immediately moved to encircle Hun Ahau.

Of the seven, excluding the Chief Elder at the Zaohua stage, five of them were at the Wuliang stage. One female elder was very close to the Zaohua stage. The seven elders combined were not to be underestimated.

Hun Ahau felt a soft, floating palm strike from behind. The blow was gentle yet clearly carried concentrated innate qi within it. Hun Ahau was not arrogant enough to take it with his body alone. He turned and blocked the strike.

When their forces clashed, Hun Ahau did not move at all, while the opponent stepped backward through the air, each step leaving ripples in the void.

From this, it was clear that this elder was far beyond that of an ordinary Longevous elder.

The one who had struck was the Chief Elder, the highest in cultivation among all the elders.

The Chief Elder steadied himself and advanced once more. His left palm struck out, and his right palm followed swiftly, while the left pulled back again and added its force to the right. These three successive palm strikes were like waves, each building upon the last, their combined force three times that of any single blow.

Hun Ahau relied purely on his brute strength to meet the Chief Elder’s strikes directly. In their direct exchange, Hun Ahau triumphed. One of Hun Ahau’s palms broke through all three of the Chief Elder’s linked strikes.

But the Chief Elder was not alone. Seizing the moment, the female elder closed in, launching an attack at Hun Ahau with both hands that had transformed into dragon claws.

Her dragon claws swept through the air like a gale, targeting 36 vital acupoints across Hun Ahau’s body with agility.

Hun Ahau simply let the dragon claws reach his indestructible body.

A Martial Arts Practitioner’s vital acupoints were occupied by body spirits, making them the least susceptible to attack.

The Chief Elder let out a long cry like a dragon’s call. “Get into formation!”

At his words, the seven Longevous elders shifted positions, arranging themselves into the Seven Star Net Formation.

This formation originated from the Taiping Sect. It was fitting because the Northern Heavenly Sect had merged with the Taiping Sect, and Sun Lingxiu was venerated as the founding ancestor of the Taiping Sect.