The void here was choked with the wreckage of warships, the corpses of warriors, fractured divine weapons and armor, and the remnants of exploded meteoric volcanoes.

Glittering orbs of light—soul altars of various hues, some chillingly cold, others like molten fire seas, or exquisitely crystalline, or gleaming with golden light—spun everywhere. Rare divine weapons soared like roaming dragons, and warships blazed with blinding light. Many of these formations resembled truly real domains, causing the void here to overlap and manifest countless true illusions…

This place had transformed into the bloodiest meat grinder in the starry expanse, littered with countless bones and scattered, severed limbs, altars shattered like collapsing mountains.

The battles raged on: Soul Clan, Devourer Clan, Black Demon Clan, Ancient Demon Clan against the Profound Heaven Clan, White Bone Clan, those under Purple Radiance, and the Heaven Craft Clan. Deep within the nothingness, Yuan Zu’s main body and Purple Radiance’s true form dueled in the surging black waters, seemingly tearing the Void Domain Sea apart. The residual energy shockwaves rippled outward, powerful enough to shatter stars billions of miles away.

If even one such energy surge happened to strike a Domain Gate, the natural domain behind that gate would be struck by a catastrophe, bringing undeserved disaster upon the races inhabiting those life-bearing stars, leading to the extinction of smaller species.

Seven of the Ten Great Ancestors—You Yu, Han Tian, Rupert, Beverly, Ega, Mantis, and Shiro—were present. If Yuan Zu were included, eight would be assembled!

They had not gathered to discuss the specifics of entering the Gate of Primeval Chaos; rather, they were locked in mutual slaughter, fighting for an unknown purpose, unleashing their strongest powers.

This war darkened the heavens and eclipsed the sun, ripping the stellar rivers apart and causing the universe to collapse!

Billions of years ago, the end of the Primeval Era was also brought about by a great war, one that swept across all Primeval Beings.

Today, the battle involving the seven clans had gathered the most outstanding experts in the starry sea. Their conflict was so immense that the Void Domain Sea itself seemed unable to bear the strain. The Sea of Volcanic Clouds… was gone now, reduced to apocalyptic ruins. Many volcanoes had been ripped from the ground, becoming lethal weapons in the hands of the Heaven Craft Clan members.

The volcano housing a teleportation array had become a weapon wielded by Tam, burning with fierce flames, operated by his mastery of the Profound Mystery of Fire, as he charged toward the nearest Soul Clan members.

In the thick of the fight, Tam’s brow suddenly twitched. He fiercely turned his gaze toward the colossal volcano he had conjured.

A ripple of spatial energy pulsed from the heart of that volcano. He instantly knew that the core array within had been activated once more.

“Sssshhh, sssshhh, sssshhh!”

Amidst the splashing firelight, a magnificent figure appeared at the crater's rim, grinning widely. The man casually slashed his hands through the air, and the space before him immediately shattered.

Along with the space, hundreds of Soul Clan members’ divine bodies and souls were disintegrated. With no room to counterattack, those Soul Clan experts at the Primeval God realm were reduced to shredded flesh; the altars formed crystalline matter, which the suddenly appearing youth absorbed into a black speck between his eyebrows with a single point of his finger.

Tam didn't recognize the youth, but he felt a terrifying aura emanating from him, like that of an ancient, savage beast—an aura that made his temples throb.

This was instinctual fear of the soul!

“Who—who are you?” Amidst the brutal fighting, no one noticed Tam’s shriek. He rapidly retreated, even willingly severing his control over the volcano.

“Relax, I’m one of yours.” Shi Yan chuckled, surprised, before narrowing his eyes to observe the situation here.

Han Tian, Judy, Mantis, Shiro, and Dracula were all experts at the second layer of the Domain Ancestor realm. They were respectively resisting You Yu, Ega, Beverly, and Rupert—all also at the second layer of the Domain Ancestor realm, though their strengths varied.

Among them, Han Tian versus You Yu, and Shiro versus Rupert, were relatively evenly matched. However, Judy and Dracula had to join forces to contend with Ega, as Judy was not one of the figures among the Ten Great Ancestors, and while Dracula was an elder expert, his strength hadn't fully recovered due to the short time since his awakening.

Finally, there was the confrontation between Mantis and Beverly, where Mantis was clearly at a disadvantage.

Having depleted too much divine power and nearly suffering dissipation of her cultivation, Mantis had rejoined the fight after only a brief recovery. Despite being a Domain Ancestor of the second layer like Beverly, her injuries prevented her from seizing the initiative; merely holding on this long was already quite desperate.

This was the most formidable set of duels, second only to Purple Radiance versus Yuan Zu.

Following that came the mutual struggles among the subordinates of their respective clans. Though Naphtun, Oliver, Rabbit, and others had died successively, the Four Great Clans remained formidable, still possessing several members who had reached the first layer of the Domain Ancestor realm.

Those warriors Shi Yan was unfamiliar with were locked in combat with Guy, Xiao Lie, Jia Ni, and Tian Xie.

Among them, the Lizard Ancestor was exceptionally conspicuous. Although he had only recently entered the first layer of the Domain Ancestor realm, his combat prowess was astonishing due to his Primeval Bloodline!

He had beaten a peer expert of the Ancient Demon Clan until he bled profusely. That expert fought in his Ancient Demon Clan's demonic body, the massive form of a Golden Great Lion, but he was still far inferior to the Lizard Ancestor when the latter transformed into his true form. The lion’s body was nearly being ripped apart by the Lizard Ancestor.

Next were the massive battles among the Immortals, Primeval Gods, Void Gods, and Origin Gods of each clan. Fights at this level were much more chaotic, spreading the battlefield so widely that even Shi Yan’s vision couldn't encompass it all. He estimated the continuous battle zones spanned the width of an entire domain.

These lower-tier battles were the most brutal, resulting in the highest casualties among the warriors on both sides. Everywhere one looked were corpses, shattered warship wreckage, exploded armor, and pulverized weapons.

After briefly assessing the overall situation, he chuckled lowly. As he laughed, Devouring Black Holes emerged from between his eyebrows. These Devouring Black Holes were strangely concealed by spatial illusion techniques; upon appearing, they first rapidly expanded and dispersed, then bizarrely vanished and hid themselves.

Tam, having heard Shi Yan claim to be an ally, had been watching him closely. When he saw the strange Devouring Black Holes appearing, his spirit was immediately jolted, and he began to guess Shi Yan’s identity and origin.

Watching several Devouring Black Holes become hidden, Tam’s eyes lit up, and he subconsciously scanned his surroundings.

He already knew Shi Yan was taking advantage of the chaos to absorb the power from the ongoing battles using the Profound Mystery of Devouring. As the surrounding experts perished, these invisible Devouring Black Holes would ingest an unimaginable amount of energy, and he couldn't even fathom the tremendous transformation this would bring to Shi Yan.

“Mantis, you are skilled in the Profound Mystery of Time. Have you seen the future of your Phantom Race? The future where you are exterminated!” Beverly, the Ancient Demon Clan expert with the appearance of a human-faced serpent, fixed her gaze, cold and sharp as a sword, onto Mantis’s face.

Over nine hundred transparent water droplets, each the size of a fist, floated between her and Mantis, looking like small spheres of water. If one peered closely into the interior of these colorless spheres, a distinct aquatic world could be seen, complete with spectacular undersea vistas and even peculiar clansmen resembling Beverly with human-faced serpent bodies.

Each of the more than nine hundred transparent droplets contained an independent water world, connected to Beverly’s domain.

Her soul energy ignored spatial restrictions, injecting into the center of those water spheres, making the individual water worlds magnificent and vibrant. Gradually, these water worlds began to influence the real world, as if the natural reality was slowly disappearing, becoming part of her water world.

Mantis suddenly felt an inexplicable terror.

She felt as if she were inside one of those water worlds, a weak creature born there, living within Beverly’s domain, subject to Beverly’s control over her life and death, marked by a soul signature that could be casually erased by her.

This was the invasion of her soul altar by a domain!

As this realization struck her, the moisture within her body seemed to be permeated by water energy. Her body gradually became transparent, as if she were about to turn into a drop of water, ready to merge into the nearest water world, truly becoming a being that Beverly could kill at will.

Beverly, situated within the water droplets, transmitted soul energy through her domain, manipulating the Profound Mystery of Water—a divine technique capable of fusing all things—intending to merge Mantis into it, turning her into a slave of her domain, perpetually imprisoned by her.

She sneered repeatedly, watching the trace of confusion in Mantis’s eyes deepen. She thought to herself: Soon, very soon. Before long, you will lose your self, be controlled by my soul, and be tortured alive until the very last spark of your soul thought is extinguished!

“Water Fusing Heaven and Earth?” Suddenly, Shi Yan’s cold laughter echoed.

Beverly’s body shook violently. She spun around and saw Shi Yan materialize silently behind her, like a phantom.

“If Mantis hadn't suffered such a massive depletion, could you gain the upper hand?” Shi Yan reached out, pointing to the area blanketed by water droplets. A stream of starlight surged from his fingertip. As the starlight entered the center of the water world, it transformed into the River of Falling Stars, a brilliant, starry expanse where every star shone like a diamond, releasing a peaceful, soul-calming starlight.

The water worlds within the droplets were illuminated by the light of the Primeval Artifact, the River of Falling Stars, causing the complete worlds inside to collapse bizarrely.

The confusion in Mantis’s eyes rapidly receded. As soon as she realized the true situation, she immediately bit her tongue, using the fresh blood to cleanse the water energy within her body, employing a slight, short-term reversal of time to pull herself back to the moment before she was confused.

She cleared her mind swiftly.

“Shi Yan…” she whispered softly, clearly letting out a sigh of relief. “You arrived not too late.”

“Can you still activate that simultaneous Time and Space Grand Sealing Restriction?” Shi Yan smiled faintly.

Mantis’s eyes slowly regained their luster. “You mean that sealing forbidden technique involving both Time and Space simultaneously?”

Shi Yan nodded.

“I should still have enough reserve power to execute it,” Mantis confirmed.

“Then let’s try it together.” Shi Yan looked toward Beverly. Ripples spread across his divine body, slowly birthing countless strange spaces. These spaces seemed to condense from within him, vast and boundless. As soon as they appeared, they caused the real world to twist continuously, as if it were about to be replaced by his spaces.

Beverly watched the spaces expand, feeling the real world become constrained, and her expression shifted slightly.

At this moment, Mantis ceased speaking. After activating her profound mystery, countless streams of light reversed their flow, and time seemed to be manipulated by her, poised to freeze completely.

Fear finally gripped Beverly’s heart.

… (To be continued)