“Little Heavenly Ghost brat, I have told you before. I have lived for five or six thousand years, and I have reigned on the Imperial Throne for four thousand. On my person, I always possess one or two things you could never imagine. For example, this.” The Nether Ghost Emperor sneered dismissively at his words, raising a hand into the void. A fruit, as black as ink and exuding wisps of black mist, appeared, terrifying and distorted beyond measure. Without hesitation, he swallowed it whole. Almost simultaneously, the Nether Ghost Emperor’s withered spiritual aura exploded, descending from the heavens and nearly forcing the Heavenly Ghost Emperor’s legs to buckle.

“Devil Fruit?” The Heavenly Ghost Emperor cried out in utter horror, his voice trembling with shock. “Impossible! There is no way a Devil Fruit can still exist within the Three Realms and Six Domains.”

This item was one of the most renowned Heaven and Earth Treasures from the ancient era. Inherently venomous, consuming it meant setting one’s soul ablaze, temporarily restoring the consumer’s strength to its peak. The side effect, however, was annihilation if the soul burned out completely. But due to excessive use, the reserves of Devil Fruits in heaven and earth dwindled increasingly. Following a long and brutal catastrophe that ended the Ancient Age, the last remaining Devil Fruits vanished entirely amidst that chaos.

Even in the Ancient Age, this fruit appeared only occasionally, but in modern times, it was something many had never even heard of; only a select few erudite, high-level cultivators would recognize the name Devil Fruit.

“Little Heavenly Ghost brat, you have always hidden your identity, believing yourself to be a true Ghost King. Your insight is truly shallow.” The Nether Ghost Emperor’s silver hair rose high, his countenance restored to a sinister yet undeniably noble appearance. However, his once profound and boundless eyes were now tinged with madness due to the Devil Fruit’s aftereffects.

Even the Nether Ghost Emperor, after consuming such a famously suicidal ancient elixir, struggled to maintain complete control, growing volatile and belligerent. It felt as though a fierce flame was raging within his chest, scorching and unbearable. He even harbored a faint illusion that he was now more formidable than in his prime.

“I say, the space will collapse.” As the Nether Ghost Emperor unleashed the enigmatic Divine Nether Tongue Art, a technique touching upon the profound laws of the cosmos.

Just a few miles from the Heavenly Ghost Emperor, the void began to collapse inward at an incredible rate. From a distance, that section of space looked as if a piece had been torn away—only a mass of true blackness remained, collapsing inward, resembling a slightly swirling black hole.

“Old ghost, die.” The Heavenly Ghost Emperor proved worthy of being a peerless expert of his generation; even under such a potent Divine Nether Tongue Art, he retained the power to resist. His colossal surrounding power constantly swelled outward, forcibly holding back the crushing force of the collapsing space. Aiming his twin fists at the Nether Ghost Emperor in the void, he unleashed a barrage of strikes.

This barrage of fist energy was, in fact, a powerful Nether-elemental spell. Each dark punch resembled a fierce, menacing ghost baring its fangs. Moreover, each contained a strand of spatial law, subtly locking onto the target’s position. Should he move, or attempt to instantly teleport away, that punch would pursue him like a relentless parasite.

The Nether Ghost Emperor, seeing the Heavenly Ghost Emperor’s ferocity, and spurred by the influence of the Devil Fruit, became fiercely combative, advancing rather than retreating. He adopted a stance, meeting the incoming fists head-on with an equally matched fist and kick to repel the barrage.

“Bang~” Having expended immense vital energy, the Heavenly Ghost Emperor finally wrenched himself free from the collapsing space and charged toward the Nether Ghost Emperor with unrestrained vigor. A few fierce spells forced the Nether Ghost Emperor to retreat, prompting him to roar with laughter: “Nether Ghost old dog, I said you are getting old.”

“Hmph, I say, the space will explode.”

Boom!

Following the Nether Ghost Emperor’s words, the space around the Heavenly Ghost Emperor indeed exploded in a most bizarre manner. Spatial fragments, like the sharpest blades in existence, sliced through the Heavenly Ghost Emperor’s body without obstruction. Even for an expert who had cultivated to the level of Ghost Emperor, the soul form was already an incredibly solid, condensed entity.

Yet, under the cutting of the spatial shards, it proved vulnerable. However, the Heavenly Ghost Emperor was not easily dismissed. He immediately shifted his strategy to pure defense. The Nether Ghost Emperor was already severely depleted, relying entirely on the soul-burning power of the Devil Fruit; the longer the battle dragged on, the more favorable the situation became for him.

By this time, Lei Dong had already retreated a hundred miles away with his family members and Dongfang Fu. The direct confrontation between the two Ghost Emperors was far beyond the scope of them, who were merely Golden Core cultivators, to interfere with. Every move they made contained the power of laws; even brushing against the periphery could instantly shatter one's soul, ensuring eternal damnation.

However, Lei Dong did not seize this opportunity to flee. Regardless of which Ghost Emperor won, he, Lei Dong, had no means of escaping the Nine Netherworld and reaching Kangzhou. Furthermore, the moment he spread his wings to escape the battlefield, he received simultaneous warnings from both Ghost Emperors, forbidding him to leave.

The only viable plan was to rely on the strategy of profiting from the conflict between the clam and the snipe. Given the fate and hatred between these two Ghost Emperors, there was no possibility of them shaking hands and sitting down for tea together.

As expected, perhaps sensing his power rapidly draining, the Nether Ghost Emperor intensified his assault, and the struggle between the two grew increasingly violent. Lei Dong gradually retreated to three hundred miles from the epicenter of the battle. But at this juncture, a message echoed in his mind from the Nether Ghost Emperor: “Brat, if you wish me to overlook your capture of the Heavenly Spirit Ghost as a subservient spirit, then for the next few breaths, follow my commands completely.” Following this, a string of orders flooded in.

Lei Dong remained outwardly calm, secretly activating the Circulatory Heaven Breath Concealment Art. Once this technique was engaged, he seemed to dissolve entirely into the void, resembling nothing more than an insignificant meteorite. His wings spread slightly, his lips barely moving, he recalled the more than one hundred Yin Sha Heavenly Thunders he had distributed to the womenfolk. Only then did he silently transform into a shadowy specter, cautiously inching toward the center of the battle. The Circulatory Heaven Breath Concealment Art truly lived up to its reputation as a supreme secret technique inherited from the ancient era. Back then, Tantai Bingyun had relied on this very art to deceive a Nascent Soul-level cultivator while possessing only a Foundation Establishment cultivation base.

Under normal circumstances, Lei Dong would have been unable to completely evade the tracking and detection of a Soul Transformation-level expert using the Breath Concealment Art. However, the Heavenly Ghost King was currently preoccupied, perhaps even struggling desperately, to evade the Nether Ghost Emperor’s pursuit, leaving him little residual capacity to monitor Lei Dong’s movements.

“I say, time will solidify.” The Nether Ghost Emperor finally felt he could no longer delay and unleashed the Divine Nether Tongue Art once more. But this time, the moment the words left his mouth, the power surging from his body nearly caused him to perish on the spot.

“This is impossible! You are not qualified to comprehend the Law of Time…” The heavily wounded Heavenly Ghost Emperor’s eyes finally betrayed a profound terror. At the Ghost Emperor level, they could naturally grasp certain profound mysteries of heaven and earth, such as the Law of Space. However, the Law of Time was an immensely profound heavenly law, vastly superior in rank to the Law of Space.

But before the Heavenly Ghost Emperor could finish speaking, he instantly froze. Time, within several dozen feet around him, appeared to have completely solidified. His expression and eyes were locked in utter astonishment.

Lei Dong, who had been positioned several miles away in ambush, instantly teleported to the scene as soon as the Nether Ghost Emperor finished speaking. Almost simultaneously, he hurled the more than one hundred Yin Sha Heavenly Thunders in his hand toward the Heavenly Ghost Emperor. Yet, an incredibly strange phenomenon occurred: when those Yin Sha Heavenly Thunders were still about twenty feet short of the Nether Ghost Emperor, they miraculously halted in mid-air, as if time itself had ceased. Seeing this scene left Lei Dong stunned. He had dabbled a little in the Law of Space, but controlling time was far beyond anything he could contemplate.

In that split second—in reality, only three breaths passed from the moment the Heavenly Ghost Emperor was frozen until he could move again—the Heavenly Ghost Emperor had just managed to utter the last syllable of his sentence: “…then… Huh?”

Mysteriously, he suddenly sensed a swarm of spherical objects appearing around him.

Boom, boom-boom.

The simultaneous detonation of over a hundred Yin Sha Heavenly Thunders unleashed a power so formidable that even a full-force strike from a Soul Transformation expert could not match its might. Raging Yin Sha energy swept across the heavens, and the space itself seemed to suffer severe damage, tearing open a vast, black chasm.

This was the profundity of the Law of Space. To Lei Dong and the others, the Heavenly Ghost Emperor had been frozen for three breaths. However, from the Heavenly Ghost Emperor’s perspective, those three breaths never truly existed. His utterance felt perfectly continuous, with no discernible interruption, only a peculiar sense of why a cluster of black spheres was suddenly rushing toward him.

This tiny flicker of surprise was precisely what prevented the Heavenly Ghost Emperor from instantly breaking through space to escape. Conversely, Lei Dong swiftly teleported backward just as he released the thunder and it became momentarily fixed.

The spatial ripples spread out for several hundred miles. Yet, as the turbulence gradually subsided, the silhouette of the Heavenly Ghost Emperor slowly reappeared before Lei Dong’s eyes. But this time, the Heavenly Ghost Emperor was mutilated to a degree of terrifying horror: his right arm and left leg were completely gone, and his body was riddled with holes blasted open.

He truly lived up to his title as a Soul Form; his vitality was astonishingly tenacious. Lei Dong couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat. This Ghost Emperor was too terrifying; to endure a direct blast from over a hundred Yin Sha Heavenly Thunders at such close range and yet not have his soul utterly destroyed?

“Lei Dong, I want you dead!” The Heavenly Ghost Emperor roared in agony, forcibly regenerating his lost limbs. However, his entire body was now semi-transparent, flickering in and out of existence, barely able to sustain the Soul Form.

… (Finally caught up. Two chapters can be posted consecutively before the day ends.) R.O