Tianyi pulled out a talisman from his spatial ring. It seemed ordinary and bland, but it contained a terrifying technique that his mother, the Sword Empress, had sealed within. Without waiting for the elders to react, Tianyi inserted his qi into the talisman, and a bright light erupted from it. With the hand Tianyi held the talisman as the origin, the light spread out and enveloped all of Dragon Palace.
Heartless Sword Art - Sword World
Using sword light as the foundation, the talisman constructed a sword formation. In essence, the formation emulated the domain ability that only immortals could create. Domains were special. They allowed the user to have near-complete control of everything within, much like how a realmlord could know and control almost everything within the realm they ruled over.
Right now, Tianyi could sense everything with the Dragon Palace. All the defense of the palace was a joke to the current him. Under his control, he disabled all the defense and messaging systems of the palace and exterminated every demon inside.
The demons didn't even have a chance to process anything as they all fell down onto the ground, their bodies intact, but their souls extinguished. There was no way Tianyi was going to comply with their demands, nor would he foolishly fight them and allow Leviathan Ancestor to return.
Tianyi had no plans to confront the Leviathan Ancestor at all. Although the talisman gave Tianyi an ability akin to a true immortal, against the real deal like a true demon, it was just a trick that emulated their natural ability to create domains. Against mortals, even unity venerables, it made Tianyi invincible.
Discounting anomalies like the Dragon Emperor. I still can't believe that he wasted two talismans against the bastard.
With the minor annoyance dealt with, Tianyi turned his attention to the Mountains and Seas Formation. The illusionary second sea had already latched onto the core of the spirit springs and was absorbing it into the formation. With each passing moment, the foundation of Dragon Palace was being destroyed.
Tianyi looked towards Daoyi and Xi Ri. "The process will take a while. When I'm finished, Dragon Palace will be destroyed, so we should quickly ransack as much treasure as possible."
Under Tianyi's suggestion, the three of them went to the treasury in order to steal, ahem, save all the treasures from the crumbling Dragon Palace. Of course, the three didn't forget to store the demon's corpse as well. Tianyi split the three demon elders between the three of them. And it was only at that moment that Tianyi realized he had probably committed a massacre considering how many demons there were. Well, they are enemies. It's either me or them...just ignore the fact that I was the one who invaded their home.
When Tianyi entered Dragon Palace's treasury, he was disappointed because of how poor it was. Sure, there were mountains of materials rich with spiritual qi, but for a true demon, it was laughably destitute. He had several times more wealth in his spatial ring than the treasury room.
Why was a true demon so damn poor? Logically speaking, as the only three active true demons, they should have been able to accumulate far more wealth than this. Or did Leviathan Ancestor keep the most precious treasures with him? Although I haven't seen any sort of spatial ring or bags, that doesn't mean the demons don't have any.
"You two can split. I lost all interest." Tianyi said, the excitement from raiding a treasury all but gone.
"Are you sure?" Xi Ri asked, hesitant. He had never seen so much wealth in his life. He wasn't even sure his master had this much wealth.
"Don't be too bothered," Daoyi said as she began to place as much of the treasury as she could into her spatial ring. "Tianyi probably has at least ten times more stuff in his spatial ring compared to the treasury."
"What!?" Xi Ri gasped in surprise. He turned to look at Tianyi in shock.
Tianyi avoided his eyes, feeling guilty for some reason. It wasn't like he was trying to flaunt his wealth, okay?
After that small episode, the three of them returned to the incubation room. The room had turned unrecognizable, with the walls having been torn down, the floor cracked, and the tile shards falling into the giant hole that formed. Within the newly formed hole, the three could visibly see the blue sphere that was rising up. The sphere was the core and the origin of the spirit spring. The more it rose, the faster it became until the sphere rose above the Tianyi and neared the shattered ceiling.
The core of the spirit spring then began to dissolve and spread apart, merging with the illusionary second sea of Tianyi's mountain and seas formation. The moment the process began, the Dragon Palace seemed to have lost all luster. The light it had exuded faded away, and even the coral reef it was situated atop seemed to have dulled into a gray color.
Tianyi felt the spirit spring completely merge with the Mountains and Seas Formation through his connection with the formation. "It's done. Let's leave."
The Mountains and Seas Formation shrunk and returned to within Tianyi's pendant. Not wasting a moment even to inspect the changes, he brought Daoyi and Xi Ri onto the immortal boat and immediately left Dragon Palace. Strangely, even though Dragon Palace had lost its energy source, the spirit spring, there still seemed to be a translucent silver bubble that covered the palace.
Tianyi activated all the stealth mechanisms of the immortal boat to the maximum. Thankfully, it seemed that they had escaped in time as they didn't see a hair nor hide of Leviathan Ancestor. Only after a few hours passed did Tianyi feel it was safe enough to inspect the changes in the Mountains and Seas Formation.
Inputting spiritual sense into the pendant, Tianyi began to inspect the Mountain and Seas Formation. The second sea was no longer illusionary and was made up of crystal clear water that could be mistaken for air had Tianyi not known any better. It wasn't just the appearance that changed, but the function.
The spirit spring seemed to be producing spirit water, although the rate seemed slow to Tianyi's eyes. Studying even further, Tianyi discovered that he could use the second sea to power the Mountain and Seas Formation instead of using his own qi.
When Tianyi was still in the Foundation Establishment Realm, he had used the Mountain and Seas Formation to kill a nascent soul grandmaster. At the time, he did not have enough spiritual qi to power the formation and instead relied on using immortal stones to do so. As Tianyi increased his realms, he no longer had such a problem. So the function of the second sea was practically useless to the current him.
Despite this, Tianyi felt relieved because the spirit spring was still intact. Actually, it should be called spirit sea now. When he had time, he should be able to research a method to condense his qi into a stable liquid state.
Suddenly, the immortal boat began to rock as if it was facing turbulent waves atop the sea even though it was underwater. Tianyi turned his head towards the source of the disturbance that was causing the disastrous currents underwater.
"What's wrong!?" Xi Ri shouted as he grabbed onto a fixture to prevent himself from being flung around.
"Tianyi, did the demon catch up to us?" Daoyi asked as she too stabilized herself.
Tianyi shook his head, a ghost of a smile on his lips. Just because he wasn't willing to stay to confront the founder of the Leviathan Clan didn't mean that he didn't leave a small present. "Leviathan Ancestor must be blinded in rage at this point. We better leave as far as possible," Tianyi said, the smile still upon his lips.
Leviathan Ancestor left the Abyssal Depths, an endless trench in the giant lake of his territory. In the Abyssal Depths, the qi was incredibly sparse and the pressure so immense that even Unity Realm experts would be crushed to depth. Still, it was in such a place Leviathan Ancestor could temper his body, continually strengthing himself.
It was the location that the sea serpent had spent most of his time in since he found it, but for the first time in hundreds of years, Leviathan Ancestor left the Abyssal Depths.
As his serpentine body swam through the water, vibrations rolled off its body, causing the lake floor to form turbulent currents. It was as if the water was entering an enraged state, reflecting Levithan Ancestor's mood. The farther Leviathan Ancestor swam, the stronger the currents became until whirlpools formed above and under the water, causing the originally treacherous waters to become even more dangerous.
In a short amount of time, the founder of the Leviathan Clan arrived at Dragon Palace, but in that short amount of time, the lake's environment had been irrevocably changed. Old underwater currents vanished as new ones took their place, and new submarine canyons had been formed.
Leviathan Ancestor's piercing blue eyes seemed to smolder with rage as he gazed at the foreign qi encircling his Dragon Palace. He had sensed something happening to the dragon egg he was creating, so he immediately rushed over. Along the way, he noticed his connection with the Dragon Palace disappeared, making him even more anxious.
Now that he had arrived, Leviathan Ancestor sensed the power from a being equal to him in realm. Were we wrong? Did the true immortals descend from outside the realm and not just mortals?
Leviathan Ancestor placed those unnecessary thoughts outside of his mind and focused on cracking the domain. Qi began to gather in front of his body. A moment later, a blue beam shot out towards the silver-colored bubble encasing palace.
To the shock of the founder of the Leviathan Clan, the domain formed from sword-light popped easily, allowing the beam to penetrate the disheveled palace, destroying it even more. Furthermore, the popped silver bubble coalesced into a sword formed of immortal qi and sword-light.
The sword shot towards the sea serpent, causing an underwater explosion that enveloped the surrounding kilometer. When the water calmed down once more, the Leviathan Ancestor was fuming with so much rage that it seemed that the ice-cold water of the deep would boil.
Almost all the Leviathan Ancestor's scales, each large enough for a grown cow to fit on, were cracked or had fallen off its body. Blood leaked and diffused into the lake water, coloring the surrounding in a deep purple fog.
The Leviathan Ancestor's body trembled, and it roared in unconcealed rage. He had been tricked!
Now that the sword domain had disappeared, using all its energy in that attack, Leviathan Ancestor could sense the deathly silence within Dragon Palace. He could not sense any of his descendants, but more importantly, the dragon egg was gone, and the perpetrator had disappeared.
There was even worse news.
Leviathan Ancestor shrunk his body until it was that of a humanoid, but his head was that of his true form, only far smaller. He charged into the palace only to found the state even worse than his wildest imaginations. All of the demons inside were dead, their blood coating the floor in a viscous substance.
What enraged Leviathan Ancestor even more was that the bodies of the Nascent Soul and Unity Realm equivalent demons had disappeared. Recalling that the cultivators would use the corpse of demons as materials, Leviathan Ancestor found his rage almost overtaking his sanity. However, there was one more crucial location he had to check.
When he had arrived, his stomach sunk to the bottom. For years, he had kept the secret of the spirit spring and even built a palace atop to hide the information about it. Now, all the years of hard work had been ruined. Worse of all, the dragon egg he had been nurturing in preparation for possessing had disappeared.
"Immortals, this isn't over! Since you took away my future, I'll kill all the mortals in the realm!!!" Leviathan Ancestor's roar sent shockwaves throughout the lake, causing tsunamis to erupt everywhere.
Tianyi felt his body shiver as he felt the power rolling from the direction of the Dragon Palace in waves. Did he like the surprise I left him?
He was glad he had chosen not to confront Leviathan Ancestor. Tianyi had some small thoughts that perhaps he was able to receive a blow from true demons or true immortals, but just feeling the waves of power, he realized he was wrong. The True Demon Realm and Pathfinding Immortal Realm could crush Unity Realm experts like bugs, and Tianyi could only be considered equal to unity venerables.
"Man, he must really pissed, eh?" Tianyi said as he jokingly looked towards Daoyi and Xi Ri but soon frowned.
Daoyi was trembling like crazy while sweat dripped down her face, and Xi Ri had already fainted from the excessive power buffeting them through the immortal boat's defense. The immortal boat could completely block the rollings waves of power, but that would need it to lower its stealth functions, creating the risk of being discovered.
Tianyi brought out the mantle-shaped immortal artifact once more, allowing it to cover Daoyi and Xi Ri. It could not completely disperse the heavy pressure the two were feeling, but it could be alleviated somewhat.
"Tianyi, what the hell is that?" Daoyi said through gasping breaths.
"That, I assumed, would be a true demon's rage, causing the surroundings to warp and distort," Tianyi said, confident in his guess.
"Never, ever, take with you to sneak into a true demon or true immortal's lair. The risk of dying once being discovered is too high. I'm still a core formation master, and I can't even withstand a true demon's diluted power from this distance." Daoyi said, a hint of fear coloring her voice.
"Don't worry, I don't think I'll do it either. Or until I enter the Unity Realm. But don't worry, I won't bring you to do anything like this again until I'm also an immortal. If I'm going to bring you to danger, I want to be confident enough to protect you guys. Can't have my fellow reincarnators reincarnated again." Tianyi joked.
"Thanks," Daoyi said, trying to calm down the palpitations within her body and ignoring Tianyi's attempt at lightening the mood.
"Don't be," Tianyi said with a sigh. "I unnecessarily brought the two of you into danger with me without knowing the true power of my opponent. If he had been able to arrive earlier, I don't know if all three of us would have escaped."
The unsaid words were whether Daoyi or Xi Ri had died. Tianyi had seriously underestimated the difference between him and Leviathan Ancestor. His victory over the Earth Burning Venom Serpent must have developed his hubris or something.
"That's enough excitement for me. I plan to group up with Senior Brother Xia until the end of the Demon Slaying Expedition. Our luck was pretty good." Tianyi said. "You and Xi Ri got a lot of the treasures while I got the dragon egg, even though the immortal pill ruined it. And I got a nice surprise as well."
"Yeah, regrouping with the others sounds like a good idea for now." Daoyi agreed. She hadn't felt any fear when they raided Dragon Palace since Tianyi seemed to have everything under control, but it was only when she felt Leviathan Ancestor's power that she realized how much danger they were in.