novelhome Chapter 442 - 213: Celestial Realm, Uninvited Guest
Chapter 442 - 213: Celestial Realm, Uninvited Guest
But the fact that Li Chang’an could tear off his arm and pierce his torso proved that the god could be killed in the most physical sense of the word. That was the real source of his overwhelming panic.
For short-lived beings like humans, there was no shortage of courage for a desperate, last-ditch struggle when cornered.
But for long-lived beings, born of heaven and earth, life was long and precious. They possessed no such courage for a fight to the death.
So now, seeing Li Chang’an reveal his unfathomable strength and apparent ability to kill him, the great True God of the Celestial Realm turned and fled like a cowardly lizard. He abandoned all of his subordinates still fighting as part of the Celestial Realm’s expeditionary force.
Li Chang’an hadn’t expected his opponent to go so completely off-script.
After all, in his experience, experts who reached a certain level of power generally had their own dignity and pride.
Without some special quality, it was impossible for anyone to stand out from the countless masses of living beings.
Yet he never imagined that with the battle having just begun, the True God would throw all face to the wind and run. His opponent had been injured in their exchange, but the wounds weren’t fundamental or life-threatening. It was far from a life-or-death moment...
Perhaps this, in a way, was one of the drawbacks of cultivating the Incense and Candle Divine Dao.
As long as a being received the recognition of heaven and earth and had a sufficient supply of Incense, even a dog could become a mighty figure over the long years. It was understandable, then, that their combat prowess and fighting spirit would be wildly inconsistent.
With their leader, a True God, fleeing, the outcome of the battle was a foregone conclusion. The other True Gods saw how the tide had turned and scattered in all directions.
Li Chang’an ignored this rabble and focused on hunting down the True God who had fled.
The Celestial Realm and the Mortal Realm were not directly connected. He had even heard that the passages between them weren’t fixed; they were not only hidden but could only be maintained for very short periods.
If he wanted to find the entrance connecting the Celestial Realm and the Mortal Realm, Li Chang’an had to either capture that True God or follow him directly into the Immortal Realm.
Finding the passage any other way would be difficult; even those Incense Fire True Gods were not qualified to know its location.
That’s right. Li Chang’an planned to take the fight directly to the Immortal Realm.
After all, various phenomena he had observed over the years suggested that the Immortal Realm was currently at an extremely vulnerable juncture.
He wasn’t sure of the reason, but Li Chang’an knew this was a golden opportunity to strike at the enemy’s very heart.
If he could take complete control of the Mortal Realm, then all the Guardian Gods who cultivated the Incense and Candle Divine Dao would lose their very foundation of existence. The Celestial Realm would soon wither and die.
Only then would those robbers and thieves from the Celestial Realm, who had plundered this world in their flying ships, reveal their true, monstrous nature.
...
The True God fled quickly, but Li Chang’an’s pursuit was faster still. In the process, Li Chang’an caught up to him several times, tearing off maimed limbs of various sizes from the god’s body.
Unfortunately, his opponent was completely unwilling to engage. He would rather sever one of his own limbs and regenerate it with the Power of Incense than stop for a true, head-on battle with Li Chang’an.
He couldn’t entirely be blamed for his cowardice. Through their repeated, brief clashes, the True God had actually developed a rather accurate assessment of Li Chang’an’s power.
’If I flee, I’ll lose some face and some Power of Incense at worst. But if I stay to fight, I’m fairly certain I’d be leaving my life behind. There would be no other outcome.’
One fled while the other pursued, their figures streaking across more than half the Central Plains. Their passage left the various great tribes they passed utterly flabbergasted.
After all, when this True God first descended upon the Mortal Realm, he had been incredibly ostentatious. He led a great army across mountains and rivers, acting high and mighty, as if terrified the world wouldn’t know of the horrifying power he wielded.
And now? It had only been a few days, and he was already this pathetic.
Hunted like a dog by a Guardian God who cultivated the Martial Dao.
At first, the True God tried to shake Li Chang’an so he could use a hidden passage back to the Immortal Realm. But Li Chang’an’s pursuit was relentless, giving him no opportunity to get away.
Soon, he began to flee in a blind panic.
After Li Chang’an tore off yet another of his arms, the True God finally broke down completely. Ignoring the fact that Li Chang’an was hot on his heels, he found a passage and dove straight through it, back to the Immortal Realm.
’After all, even if the Immortal Realm is in a weakened state, there are at least one or two Emperors standing guard. That is infinitely better than facing Li Chang’an alone.’
This was the very moment Li Chang’an had been waiting for throughout the long chase. He followed right behind the god, entering the passage at nearly the same instant.
A sensation of time and space twisting washed over him.
Soon, Li Chang’an found himself on a high mountain shrouded in clouds and mist. Pavilions dotted the landscape, and vast, magnificent palace halls stretched out as far as the eye could see, their corners peeking through the haze. It truly looked like the dwelling place of Immortals.
But Li Chang’an knew this was no dwelling of Immortals. It was a small, pocket dimension sealed by an Array.
In his previous worlds, Li Chang’an had learned about Arrays from various sources, to the point where he had even created his own "Martial Scripture: Array Chapter."
But because Arrays required various Spiritual Objects and an immense amount of effort to create, Li Chang’an rarely used them. That didn’t mean, however, that his understanding of them was lacking.
In fact, the moment he entered this space, he knew it was a pocket world, isolated by an Array.
To maintain this Array, the Celestial Realm had siphoned a massive amount of Spiritual Qi and Energy from the world below.
The instant he stepped into the Celestial Realm, dozens of Guardian Gods clad in armor and wielding Long Spears surrounded him. They were all between the Molting and Divinity Transformation Realms. Their auras were imposing as one shouted, "Who are you? Do you have a pass?"
Li Chang’an waved a hand, casually incinerating the group of domesticated Guardian Gods. At the same time, the once peaceful and serene Celestial Realm turned deathly cold in an instant.
Clearly, in the time Li Chang’an had been delayed at the entrance, the True God had already fled deep into the Immortal Realm and activated the entire plane’s massive Array.
Li Chang’an sneered, his gaze sweeping across the entire Array.
He had to admit, creating such a vast Array was an impressive feat. However, its primary function was to maintain a stable pocket world, not for offense or killing enemies.
To Li Chang’an, the gaps within the Array were riddled with fissures he could pass through. The idea that they could trap him with this was nothing but a pipe dream.
As he moved through the fissures in the Array, Li Chang’an was already considering how to sabotage, or even completely destroy it. He wanted to make the so-called Celestial Realm either plummet into the Mortal Realm or be devoured by the Void right where it stood.
Of course, that wouldn’t be easy. He would have to find the Array’s core, and the gods of the Celestial Realm were no fools. The core was certain to be protected by a powerful force.
’But no matter what, I have to try,’ he thought. ’I’ve already broken my original, predetermined fate. This reincarnation is already a net profit, no matter how you look at it. Even if I really die here in the Immortal Realm, the worst that can happen is an early return to the Main World.’
As Li Chang’an pushed deeper, the Immortal Realm, once shrouded in a sea of clouds, seemed to spring to life. More and more Celestial Soldiers began to assemble. A barrage of arrows, hidden weapons, and even incredibly destructive Spiritual Artifacts rained down on him, their detonations echoing without end.
Li Chang’an dodged the attacks he could and simply endured those he couldn’t. While they were a nuisance, it was clear they couldn’t truly harm him.
Then again, his opponents obviously didn’t expect to stop him with such trifles.
Li Chang’an may have been the strongest person to invade the Immortal Realm in many years, but he was hardly the first. The Immortal Realm already had a well-established protocol for dealing with uninvited guests like him.
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