"Whoosh," the sound ripped through the air as Han Kui's strike, aimed through Hua Miao's body, slammed into the chest of the Feathered One. A magnificent flame, faintly tinged with gold, as if blending the characteristics of the True Solar Fire and the Zombie God Corpse Fire, erupted from within the Feathered One, instantly incinerating his body to ash.

Gu Xiechen breathed a sudden, immense sigh of relief. Han Kui's power was growing ever stronger; this Feathered One had seemed utterly defenseless.

As this thought still echoed in his mind, a faint, cyan-purple light suddenly shot out from the wisp of ash that remained of the Feathered One. A seed, the size of a thumb, rapidly surged forth from the light. It was like a seed of evolution emerging from the primordial chaos of creation. In an instant, surging vitality swept across the four directions. The intense life aura stimulated the distant flora, causing the flowers, grasses, and trees to grow wildly. Gu Xiechen watched in astonishment as dozens of trees, nearly a hundred meters tall, shot up to over three hundred meters in the blink of an eye.

The seed split, recombined, and expanded rapidly. About fifteen seconds later, the Feathered One reappeared before everyone.

With a slight smile, the Feathered One inclined his head in a salute toward Ran Xiechen: "This is my Great Dao!"

Gu Xiechen’s muscles tensed. He roared in fury, suddenly striking the sword case behind him. A beam of black and white light erupted from the case, flashed momentarily in everyone’s eyes, and vanished instantly. Almost simultaneously with the vanishing sword light, dozens of transparent holes flickered across the Feathered One’s body. A thick, faint gold mixed with wisps of cyan-purple blood sprayed out from within him. Wounds appeared one after another, and the blood leaking from the Feathered One increased. In just three to five seconds, the Feathered One’s body was cleaved into fragments by the invisible sword light.

"Such fast swordwork!" was the only sound the Feathered One managed to utter before his body disintegrated into countless fragments drifting toward the ground.

With a sharp flick of his wrist, the Five-Water Dragon Whisker Fan unleashed its five-colored true waters with a tremendous roar, whipping up a five-colored vortex that enveloped the Feathered One’s remnants. Continuous bursts of Cai Water Yin Thunder erupted, hitting every piece of flesh dozens of times simultaneously. In the blink of an eye, the Feathered One was blasted into the finest powder.

The Five Black True Waters retracted, and a stream of fine powder was scattered by the fierce wind.

Just as this powder was about to merge into the heavens and earth, it was as if a tender sprout of the Fusang tree suddenly sprang from the boundless wasteland. The cyan-purple light erupted from the powder like unstoppable solar brilliance. A thumb-sized seed shot out from the powder, much like the gradually unfolding Fusang tree, carrying an unstoppable surge of vigorous life force. After a few breaths, the smiling Feathered One stood before them once more.

"Excellently done. This is my Great Dao," the Feathered One said, nodding toward Gu Xiechen. "How many times can you kill me?"

Gu Xiechen froze, just like the wide-eyed Peng Hua. They stared blankly at the Feathered One, feeling as if trapped in a nightmare, a sense of debilitating numbness slowly creeping over their bodies. Both Han Kui's Zombie God Corpse Fire and Gu Xiechen's Taiyin divine ability were top-tier energy manifestations in the cultivation world, yet they couldn't eradicate the Feathered One? He had been burned to ash, shattered into the finest particles. How could he still survive?

A piercing sound of tearing wind rushed in from afar. Siren, gripping a longsword wreathed in Black Flame, stabbed it fiercely into the back of the Feathered One’s heart. Six wings of black fire piercing the heavens erupted from his back, and a pillar of black fire surged out from within the Feathered One. The black flames, laden with the heavy scent of death, seemed intent on burning this world away, and the intensely corrosive Black Flame instantly permeated every cell of the Feathered One’s body, like a bucket of concentrated sulfuric acid poured into a human being, rapidly destroying him.

"Whoosh." A strong wind blew in from the distant sky, and the Feathered One’s body dispersed into fine black ash drifting away.

Siren gasped heavily, large beads of sweat dripping from his forehead. He managed a strained smile toward Gu Xiechen and coughed dryly, "I have inherited the most negative, dark power in this universe—the power that destroys all. I refuse to believe he can survive such a destructive force! Is he truly immortal?"

Gu Xiechen fanned himself and chuckled dryly, "Immortality isn't impossible, is it? The power you inherited from Lord Mnemós, he was immortal!"

Siren was stunned. He shook his head violently. He couldn't believe their luck was so terrible, nor that the Roman people were so lucky. An immortal being? Preposterous!

That patch of black ash drifted loosely. A single, crystal-clear cyan-purple light slowly floated up from the ashes, and intense vitality rapidly enveloped hundreds of miles of space. A small seed burst forth again from the clear light. The Feathered One's gentle voice drifted out; he was reciting a passage from the Huang Ting Jing. After reciting less than a hundred characters, the Feathered One stood before them once more.

"Unborn and undying, self-generating and self-destroying, eternally unquenchable—this is my Great Dao!" The Feathered One smiled at Gu Xiechen. "My body contains Yin and Yang energies; I myself evolve the void. You cannot kill me."

"Let me try!" a deep voice boomed from high in the sky. Ducart, clad in armor etched with flowing clouds and water, radiated an incomparably sharp aura. His body was enveloped in golden flames as he leaped down from the sky. He had plunged directly from the super-mothership floating high above the atmosphere, falling vertically for hundreds of kilometers, his body accelerating to an extreme degree. What rolled over his body was the True Solar Fire derived from the innate sacred blood of the True Solar God, combined with the flames generated by the violent friction between his body and the air. Gradually, his body became indistinct and transparent, transforming into a figure of pure fire.

A fist several times larger than the Feathered One's head slammed down violently onto his head. With a crisp cracking sound, the powerful, unparalleled force of the punch shattered the Feathered One's body. Golden flames surged forward, rapidly burning his remains into a wisp of cyan smoke.

What caused Gu Xiechen and the others' bodies to freeze happened again: a stream of cyan-purple light shot out from the cyan smoke, and a fist-sized seed surged out rapidly. The Feathered One, smiling lightly, nodded toward Gu Xiechen: "Come, come, come. Kill me a few more times. I bet you cannot kill me. Do you believe me?"

Gu Xiechen was furious and utterly astonished. What kind of monster was this Feathered One? Were there truly people in this world who could not be killed?

In a fit of rage, Gu Xiechen struck his sword case, about to unleash another few blasts to destroy the Feathered One. However, just as he was about to summon the True Magnetic Two Energies Splitting Light Sword, the Haotian Pagoda suspended in his Sea of Consciousness suddenly trembled slightly. A stream of clarity, like clear spring water, instantly merged into his soul, shaking the clarity that had been obscured by his rage. Gu Xiechen suddenly awoke, and his Soul Pearl emitted a five-colored strong light, spinning rapidly inside the massive body of the True Solar God.

His spiritual platform was utterly clear, like a flawless, crystalline glazed mirror, reflecting every minute detail of the outside world without distortion.

A chilling coldness shot up from Gu Xiechen’s coccyx to the top of his skull. His divine sense instantly swept over the Feathered One’s body, and he discovered with utter horror that the strange, restrained power within the Feathered One had escalated more than tenfold after being "killed" several times. Almost every time he was "killed," his power doubled.

Cold sweat poured uncontrollably from the back of his neck. This was the first time Gu Xiechen had witnessed something so bizarre and strange. His power increased so rapidly, and through such an odd method. Could it be that the Feathered One was intentionally using Gu Xiechen and the others to help him cultivate? The Soul Pearl shone brilliantly. Gu Xiechen felt his mind was clearer than ever before. In an instant, he conceived hundreds of possibilities and, guided almost by instinct, settled on the one with the highest probability.

The cultivation method the Feathered One practiced was indeed that strange technique of Two Energies Generating Evolution—a heretical path he had comprehended himself. But he must have encountered some kind of bottleneck, which is why he hadn't revealed himself to support any faction during the great changes in the Roman Kingdom.

However, his sudden appearance now likely meant he had sensed the presence of Gu Xiechen and the others.

What Gu Xiechen possessed was the power of Taiyin, the purest, most innate Yin energy from the creation of the cosmos.

Peng Hua had been transformed into a Flying Night Yaksha, cultivating the Corpse Scripture handed down from Han Kui. Furthermore, he had modified his body with the innate sacred blood of the True Solar God, naturally harboring a surge of Pure Yang Qi. The True Solar Fire contained within the innate sacred blood held a congenital Pure Yang Qi. Although its grade was lower than the Taiyin power possessed by Gu Xiechen, it was still extraordinary.

And Siren possessed the ultimate destructive power of the acquired dark side. This destructive power stemmed from Mnemós, from the ancestor of the Angel race, from that unknown, terrifying existence. That existence, like the True Solar God, was an innate entity, born and raised naturally. The dark destructive power transformed from the power inherited from him was undoubtedly an energy of extremely high quality as well.

Finally, there was Ducart. The power Ducart possessed was different from Peng Hua and Siren's. Although all three possessed flame power and had modified their bodies with innate sacred blood, Ducart's power essence was closer to the innate sacred blood. The mother-transmitted cultivation technique he practiced was the Nine Yang True Gang; after absorbing the energy from the innate sacred blood, the nature of his True Essence became closer to the purest True Solar Fire. Even more precious was that he spent so much time with Lily that his body naturally harbored a continuous stream of vigorous Green Wood vitality! Moreover, it was an innate Green Wood aura of extremely high grade.

These energies, belonging to the Yin and Yang two energies, perfectly matched the meaning of Two Energies, and could precisely be used to catalyze the Feathered One’s energy!

"Damn fellow!" Gu Xiechen instinctively touched the Green Lotus Ring on his index finger.

The Feathered One still maintained that faint, shallow smile and inclined his head toward Gu Xiechen: "How many more times can you kill me? If you cannot kill me, then release my clansmen and leave this place."

Gu Xiechen took a deep breath. He suddenly bowed deeply to the Feathered One, smiling sweetly, "Senior is jesting. How dare we juniors strike against you?"

"Heh heh," Gu Xiechen chuckled a few times, waving to Peng Hua and the others. "We juniors are leaving now. All our clansmen will be left to you, Senior. Ah, to compensate for our transgression, we will also leave you an intact super-mothership as a mount. How about it? Please don't make things difficult for us juniors, good Sir!"

Peng Hua and the others moved in perfect synchronization, rushing toward Gu Xiechen. In a flash, they reached his rear. Peng Hua’s fleshy wings flapped frantically behind him, and his hands formed a strange mudra, having already condensed a Corpse God Immortal Execution Thunder in his palm. Siren’s eyes spewed Black Flame as he silently chanted an incantation, condensing a black Sword of Destruction in his hand. Ducart, meanwhile, used all his strength to conjure more than ten crystalized alloy shields, several meters high and one meter thick, around them.

When everyone was ready, Gu Xiechen cheerfully waved at the dumbfounded Feathered One: "Come, come, come. We are releasing your clansmen now. Please be ready to receive them!"

A powerful light flashed across the sky. The fire control radars of the three super-motherships, over a hundred Roman-made super-battleships, and their accompanying large transport vessels simultaneously locked onto the Feathered One’s body. Hundreds of thousands of intense energy beams struck the Feathered One’s body at once. Explosive white light dominated the heavens and earth. Gu Xiechen and the others felt a heatwave mixed with endless, intense light rush toward them. Although they had closed their eyes, they still felt as if their eyeballs were about to melt.

The heatwave rushed in wildly. Peng Hua’s body instantly burst into flames. Siren and Ducart grunted, sweat and sparse oil spurting from their pores, but they were quickly vaporized in the blazing light. All the shields Ducart had conjured stood firmly before them, yet nothing emerged. These shields only lasted for less than a thousandth of a second under the intense light before instantly vaporizing. The overloaded, full-power bombardment led by the three super-motherships was simply not something Ducart could withstand.

Gu Xiechen spread his arms. The Taiyin Robe sprayed forth endless white water ripples. The ultimate Yin and cold Taiyin Qi enveloped Peng Hua and the other two, extinguishing the raging fires on their bodies and protecting their bodies that were on the verge of melting. The endless light and heat in front collided violently with the Taiyin Robe, causing large ripples to spray off the garment, yet it was utterly powerless against the boundless white water patterns erupting from the robe.

Dozens of Taiyin divine runes suddenly lit up within the robe. All of Gu Xiechen's Taiyin Profound Armor surged out, and the power of the Taiyin Robe was stimulated to its absolute limit. The Taiyin True Scripture was the supreme Grandmist-level cultivation method, and the Taiyin Robe was the most prized innate artifact designed by the Great Fool Sage, perfectly tailored for the Taiyin Qi. Coupled with Gu Xiechen's Void Realm cultivation, the three elements combined allowed Gu Xiechen, at the initial stage of the Void Realm, to exhibit defensive power equivalent to the peak of the Void Realm.

With the defensive strength of the peak Void Realm, Gu Xiechen and the others were pushed back tens of kilometers by the heatwave and intense light, but apart from initial minor burns, they suffered no further harm.