This Celestial General was truly formidable. With a casual palm strike, the momentum unleashed was as devastating as a tidal wave smashing against a mountain.

"Boom!"

A gaping void was ripped through the Ghost Tide, a sheer emptiness carved out by his force. Hundreds of specters were pulverized into dust by the sheer power. More specters outside the immediate radius of the strike were violently tossed about, swirling through the air like debris caught in a gale.

Yet, after unleashing such a commanding blow, Meng Chao stood frozen, utterly bewildered. In his long years of campaigning, he had certainly encountered cannon fodder like Vicious Ghosts. He had fully expected this single palm strike to annihilate thousands of specters. To his shock, however, only those at the very center of the palm's impact were ground into nothingness; the rest, after tumbling for a moment, remained startlingly vigorous and whole. Not only was Meng Chao stunned, but even the Nascent Soul cultivators observing the battle were shocked. Were those meticulously refined Head-level Vicious Ghosts? How could they be so resilient? But if they were Head-level ghosts, why were there so many? Even a powerful Heavenly Demon Soul could not command such a multitude.

Lei Dong, meanwhile, sneered inwardly. Now you see the might of the Netherflame Specters, he thought. The Netherflame Specter Banner, which had cost him immeasurable energy, fortune, and near-death experiences to acquire, possessed terrifying power. A single Netherflame Specter was not much—easily crushed. But when they gathered, their collective power became truly terrifying.

This situation involved tactics related to mass-attack spells. Perhaps someone might ask: A master at the Nascent Soul stage can unleash a sweeping mass attack that instantly eradicates weaker beings within a range of several dozen zhang. The problem is, whether one is a Qi Refining cultivator or a Nascent Soul powerhouse, their strength, while varying, is ultimately finite.

Theoretically, a Nascent Soul cultivator could create and execute an indiscriminate attack covering an area spanning tens of zhang, or even several li. In practical application, doing so is pure suicidal behavior. How much energy would a spell covering such a vast area consume? Half? Or all of it? In short, even a high-tier Nascent Soul cultivator could not sustain many such bursts. Furthermore, while this approach might appear overwhelmingly mighty, its actual lethality is extremely weak. As every cultivator knows, concentrated power yields astonishing might; conversely, dispersed power is weak. A spell that seems to shake heaven and earth, if cast like this, wouldn't scratch a fellow cultivator of the same rank standing still to receive it. Thus, such seemingly powerful spells are fundamentally useless against peers.

Turning to weaker entities that rely on sheer numbers, one might think this spell has some utility. However, this is the world of immortal cultivation. The speed of both humans and demonic beasts is extraordinary. Even a beast tide will not crowd together neatly for slaughter. If prepared, their formation will be sparse. In a radius of several dozen zhang, perhaps a hundred zhang in diameter, you might fit a few hundred units at most.

For a Nascent Soul cultivator, expending so much power to kill a few hundred low-level units at once is an utterly mad and foolish act. Because while killing those few in the center, more than ninety percent of the energy is wasted in the empty spaces between them.

Moreover, when weak entities gather in numbers, they usually number in the thousands, tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands. Killing a few hundred, or even a few thousand, is meaningless. Consider one hundred thousand Vicious Ghosts: once arrayed and slightly spread out, they would blanket the sky and earth, covering an area spanning dozens of li. To scour an area covering dozens of li with raw, overwhelming force—perhaps a Soul Transformation cultivator could manage it, but a Nascent Soul stage cultivator certainly could not. Only one possessing inexhaustible power—a god, not a man—could manage that. In reality, even gods have limits to their power.

It is precisely for this reason that large-scale swarms of numerous, moderately powerful low-level units—especially those unafraid of death—are a major headache for those lofty existences. Killing them one by one would take eons. Launching a wide-area attack drains the caster quickly. Worse yet, head-on confrontation: once submerged in the tide, even the mightiest elephant can be consumed by an endless swarm of minuscule ants. When numbers reach a critical mass, they form a tide—be it a beast tide, insect tide, or ghost tide—all of which trouble high-level cultivators. In the wilderness, encountering them usually prompts a hasty retreat. But if one is unfortunately cornered and surrounded, there is nothing left to do but mourn one's fate.

Consequently, not only did Fan Quqing's face change, but the Celestial General Meng Chao's expression also turned grim. Though this was merely a projection of his true body, it contained a sliver of his soul and power. Its destruction would cause significant harm to his main form.

The two sides were extremely close, and in the brief moment of stunned realization, the Ghost Tide crashed against Meng Chao once more.

Meng Chao did not retreat; in a battle fought over such a wide area, there was nowhere to run. He could only summon a radiance around his body, forming a defensive barrier, and let the ferocious Ghost Tide engulf him. A Celestial General possessing high-tier Nascent Soul strength was no ordinary foe. His defensive barrier successfully held the tide back. However, he immediately discovered, to his horror, that these fodder ghosts were terrifyingly powerful; each claw strike carried a faint trace of ghostly blue flame.

The strong barrier would not suffer obvious damage, but Meng Chao distinctly sensed that every attack from the specters inflicted a subtle, yet undeniable, erosion upon his defense. The specters attacked quickly: four claws flying, coupled with gnashing teeth. In a mere instant, they could strike seven or eight times. While a single specter achieved little, there were easily a hundred of them clinging to him like insects.

In just a few breaths, his defense had visibly weakened slightly. More specters were constantly squeezing in, frantically vying for striking positions.

Meng Chao, who had initially intended to lure in more enemies, now dared not delay another moment. He channeled his full power, and a dazzling light radiated outward from his body, spreading over a hundred zhang. Those specters melted and dissipated as if snow encountering the sun.

After unleashing this technique, Meng Chao realized with a shock that only within a thirty-zhang radius of his body was there emptiness. The specters further out sustained damage, but none were fatally struck. This result dealt a fresh blow to the proud Meng Chao. That single technique had killed perhaps a thousand specters at most, yet his own energy was already noticeably diminished. Even one as powerful as he could not possess infinite strength. The Heavenly Demon, realizing she had underestimated Meng Chao, promptly adjusted her tactics slightly. She commanded the Ghost Tide to maintain a distance of several dozen zhang, orbiting Meng Chao about forty or fifty zhang away. Then, she dispatched a small squad—only two hundred specters—to attack him. Of course, with over four hundred thousand specters under the Netherflame Specter Banner, the Heavenly Demon didn't actually need to micro-manage to overwhelm Meng Chao. She was doing this merely to minimize losses among her Netherflame Specters. Facing a few hundred specters, Meng Chao was in a dilemma: to kill them would waste precious energy; to ignore them meant his defenses would likely be breached within the time it takes an incense stick to burn.

Meanwhile, Fan Quqing, who was still dumbfounded on the sidelines, also received attention from the Heavenly Demon. Ten thousand specters were diverted to engage her directly. One thousand wouldn't kill her, but it would certainly drain her until exhaustion.

Under the Heavenly Demon's strategic maneuver, Meng Chao reluctantly unleashed a scaled-down version of his previous spell, expending a smaller portion of his strength to eliminate those two hundred specters. But immediately afterward, another two hundred specters latched onto him. Meng Chao was forced into a continuous cycle of casting that area-of-effect spell. Against the mere tens of thousands of specters currently arrayed, he calculated he could hold out.

Furthermore, Meng Chao had already formulated a new strategy; he wouldn't remain foolishly stationary while the Heavenly Demon dictated the terms. A decapitation strike was essential; killing the Heavenly Demon would neutralize the threat of the specters. With a thought, his aura surged, incinerating the specters around him, and he transformed into a brilliant streak of light, charging directly toward the Heavenly Demon.

In truth, he had severely underestimated the efficacy of the "sea of ghosts" tactic and the Heavenly Demon herself. The Heavenly Demon chose not to confront him head-on immediately, instead beginning to circle with her two Ghost Kings, constantly directing the specters to slow and obstruct Meng Chao.

Flying through the Ghost Tide felt like struggling through thick sludge. The specters used their sharp claws and teeth to ensnare him. One ghost was insignificant, but in large numbers, they prevented him from utilizing his speed effectively. He was forced to repeatedly unleash his golden light to incinerate the specters, yet the ghosts surged toward him as if endless. Beams of light continuously erupted around his body, dazzling like fireworks.

Simultaneously, the Heavenly Demon and the two Ghost Kings were far from passive. They began to strike Meng Chao from behind the cover of the specters with ranged spells. Under normal circumstances, with Meng Chao's speed and power, evading or defending against such simple attacks would be effortless. But trapped within the Ghost Tide, dodging those basic spells became incredibly difficult. Miserably, he was battered by continuous, though not overwhelming, magical assaults. All three possessed Nascent Soul-level combat power, meaning even their simplest spells carried significant force. Meng Chao's protective barrier rippled under the assault, and cracks began to spiderweb across its surface.

In a mere few hundred breaths, Meng Chao's protective barrier shattered. The specters swarmed forward, clawing and tearing at him. Meng Chao desperately lashed out to force them back, then hurriedly cast a new shield around himself. But just in this short period, he had expended nearly thirty percent of his strength, and his appearance was utterly ragged. Yet, up to this point, he had killed fewer than ten thousand specters. The combined might of the Heavenly Demon's three Nascent Soul combatants and the Ghost Tide could not be calculated by simple arithmetic like one plus one.

The Nascent Soul cultivators observing from outside stared, utterly dumbfounded by what they witnessed. It was simply too exaggerated, too shocking. That was, after all, a high-tier Nascent Soul entity.