Chapter 655: Ten Thousand Miles Round Trip in a Single Breath
The sword rose, the sword fell, and a blizzard raged.
Han Qing's sword was like the scenery on a winter snowfield, entering that expanse of starlight with extreme cold and harshness.
Countless clear cracking sounds rang out as countless stars were split apart, cut to pieces.
Those stars were not real, merely condensations of starlight. Though shattered by Han Qing's blizzard sword, they did not truly fall but instead turned into countless fragments gleaming with starlight.
In the night sky before the divine path, countless traces of shooting stars appeared. At the very front of each trace was an extremely tiny fragment of starlight.
On the stone platform and in the water of the channel, countless streaks of starlight with trailing tails also appeared, looking exceptionally beautiful.
Those densely packed, minuscule shooting stars passed through the violent blizzard and landed on Han Qing's body.
Pat, pat, pat, pat—like a sudden rainstorm, like wind and sand beating against a tent. The surface of that ancient armor instantly gained countless tiny wounds.
The dust in the gaps of the armor was shaken away, and the rust on the armor's surface was gradually knocked off by the starlight fragments. Faintly, some traces of crimson could be seen.
"Useless coward!"
Seeing that the Star Observer had used starlight to enter the blizzard and gain the upper hand in the field, Endless Azure could no longer wait for her husband to strike first. Filled with resentment, she let out a low shout and swiftly dashed over.
Accompanying her figure as she arrived below the divine path were towering waves hundreds of feet high—cold seawater, carrying the intent of death and extinction.
In a battle at the sacred domain level, to achieve victory, one could not hold back in the slightest. The moment she struck, she used her most powerful Daoist art!
Boom! Like thunder, the sound of terrifying waves crashing echoed through the Heavenly Book Mausoleum. Endless waves surged toward Han Qing!
Han Qing's aged face showed no change in expression, like an old tree root that had been cut down for centuries.
The look in his eyes also remained unchanged, like an old well that had been dry for centuries.
Facing the combined assault of the strongest techniques from two peerless experts, he still held his sword and chopped straight forward.
His sword came from the northern snowfields, cold and murderous to the extreme.
The blizzard howled violently, trying to devour those countless tiny shooting stars and freeze those towering waves solid.
Could he do it?
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The world before the divine path of the Heavenly Book Mausoleum was divided by three sublime auras, presenting three miraculous scenes.
The night sky was split into three parts: one side full of shooting stars, one side full of blizzard, and one side full of azure waves.
In the distance, a small red flower appeared and disappeared among the blizzard, the stardust, and the raging waves, as vivid as before.
Countless snowflakes fell, freezing the channel water, only to be broken again by the tiny shooting stars. Then, endless dead water carrying the intent of extinction came crashing over.
The rust marks on Han Qing's armor were all scraped off by those small shooting stars, then washed by the endless seawater, becoming extremely bright.
The armor's surface reflected the extremely complex light of starlight mixed with seawater, coating the night sky above the Heavenly Book Mausoleum with a faint, deep color.
With two dull thuds, a mark left by a horsetail whisk appeared on the bright armor's chest. Beside it was a star-shaped pattern, about an inch deep, nearly piercing through.
Blood slowly flowing from the gaps in the armor was instantly frozen into blood blossoms by the low temperature, like blood coral.
Facing the strongest attacks of two sacred domain experts simultaneously, no matter how profound Han Qing's cultivation was, he was forced into a disadvantage, clearly entering a dangerous situation.
Yet that small red flower behind the blizzard, deep in the stardust, high above the azure waves, still swayed silently, clearly having no intention of joining the battle.
Don't Be Red suddenly looked up toward the peak of the Heavenly Book Mausoleum.
A look of astonishment appeared in his calm, clear eyes.
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress stood at the peak of the Heavenly Book Mausoleum. No matter how intense the battle below the divine path was, her expression did not change in the slightest; she didn't even glance at it.
Her gaze fell on an extremely distant place, tens of thousands of miles away.
Her divine soul was also tens of thousands of miles away.
At the stream beside the old temple in Xining Town, tens of thousands of miles away, that monk suddenly opened his eyes and looked across.
A night breeze gently brushed the treetops, also lifting the hem of the stunning woman's robe across the stream.
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress stood by the stream, yet seemed as if she was no longer there.
The monk frowned slightly, flicked his sleeve, and tossed the string of prayer beads in his hand into the stream.
With a plop, the beads fell into the stream but did not sink. Instead, they suddenly scattered into dozens of beads, shooting rapidly in all directions across the water.
Those blood lotuses, swaying between two auras, were struck by these Buddhist beads and began to move violently, pulled by invisible ropes, drifting slowly and arduously toward the opposite bank.
He sensed something, so he was willing to sacrifice this personal Dharma bead string to lock the starlight around the stream and keep her divine soul here.
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress's lips curled slightly, revealing a mocking smile, and she also flicked her sleeve.
The gentle night breeze fell onto the stream's surface. The blood lotuses drifting over could no longer advance. The Buddhist beads scattered like stars on the stream trembled for some unknown reason.
When the night breeze stilled, she had already vanished by the stream.
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Due to many considerations, the wilderness between the capital and Luoyang had not been heavily cultivated; most of it was open fields.
In the deep night of early autumn, these fields, just drenched by a torrential rain, were extremely muddy and difficult to traverse, not much better than the great swamp northeast of White Emperor City.
To the Daoist Calculator, this was nothing.
After leaving the capital, he had been walking eastward. Before long, the outline of that majestic city could faintly be seen ahead.
But he did not continue forward. Instead, he stopped in the wilderness and glanced at the hourglass in his hand.
The upper half of the hourglass was nearly empty, the falling sand stream very thin, as if it might break at any moment.
He looked up at the night sky.
The sky, which should have been densely packed with stars, now showed not a single star, only endless black.
At the edge of the night dome, many fast-moving cloud wisps could faintly be seen, and only there could a hint of silver light be glimpsed.
Those night clouds constantly tore at each other, tangled, and combined, forming an increasingly clear picture with the darkness in the center.
It was an enormous black dragon, spanning the entire night sky, like a mountain range.
The edges of this black dragon shimmered with silver light, giving a particularly cold feeling.
The Daoist Calculator stood in the wilderness, looking at this dragon formed by the night sky, his expression turning solemn.
Since the battle began, he had finally been located by Heavenly Sea Saint Empress.
He could even clearly sense that her divine soul was returning from tens of thousands of miles away, and that Heavenly Sea atop the Heavenly Book Mausoleum was also withdrawing her gaze.
If her gaze ultimately fell here, if her divine soul returned to her body, if she came here, then he would have no choice but to fight her head-on.
Even if she was now at her weakest point in two hundred years, he still did not want to fight her directly.
Twenty years ago, he had already learned enough lessons.
A clear light seeped out from the depths of his Daoist robe.
This clear light was extremely sublime and holy, beyond description in human language.
His Daoist robe began to tremble slightly, especially at the cuffs, which shook the most.
With a tearing sound, the cuff of the robe split, and more than a dozen extremely fine threads were pulled out by an invisible force.
In the night sky, more than a dozen cracks appeared on the body of the black dragon, clearly formed by Daoist magic, and the clear light shone from within.
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Her divine soul returned from ten thousand miles away.
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress's phoenix eyes became even brighter.
She withdrew her gaze from the distance, not looking toward Luoyang, but instead looking down at her feet.
An extremely clear phoenix cry suddenly rang out in the Heavenly Book Mausoleum, resounding through the night dome!
This phoenix cry was so domineering that beyond it, all things between heaven and earth dared not make another sound!
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress vanished before Chen Changsheng's eyes.
On the white divine path, two streaks of black light, like smoke or mist, suddenly appeared.
The edges of the black light cut through space, making an extremely sharp sound.
Those were the wings of the phoenix.
Heavenly Sea Saint Empress finally revealed her strongest side before the world.
Nothing could be faster than her—not sound, not sight, not even thought.
She did not go to Luoyang but landed like a black lightning bolt on the stone platform below the divine path.
The dark phoenix wings fanned the night breeze but thickened the darkness.
From the pitch-black night, a white, crystalline finger extended.
That finger calmly and irresistibly destroyed all the blizzard, shooting stars, and seawater ahead, pointing toward the Daoist nun's brow.
That finger suddenly appeared in the Daoist nun's eyes.
Endless Azure's eyes surged with panic. Her originally somewhat beautiful face twisted and deformed from shock and fear.
She screamed in terror, her robes violently fluttering, creating rippling traces on the ground as she rapidly retreated.
At the same time, the horsetail whisk in her hand wildly danced before her, scattering wave after wave of deathly stillness.
But how could she evade that finger?
That finger was steady, calm, with no visible flame on it, yet it held the hottest temperature in the world—the true fire of the phoenix.
With a hissing sound, the deathly waves were instantly evaporated into countless white mists, then quickly dispersed.
The layers of water ripples on the ground were instantly dried up and began to burn. The fire spread with incredible speed to Endless Azure's feet, and with a roar, ignited the hem of her Daoist robe!
That finger continued forward, calm and steady, yet immensely majestic, as if even thousands of mountains and rivers ahead would have to yield.
Endless Azure watched the finger drawing closer, her face ashen, utterly despairing.
With a soft snap.
A small red flower appeared before Endless Azure's brow.
That small red flower was tender, its petals trembling gently in the night breeze, vivid and bright. A few dewdrops could even be seen on the petals, still slightly wet.
That finger landed on the small red flower. The petals trembled slightly, and the dewdrops evaporated at a visible rate, but much slower than the dissipation of the water waves earlier.
The true fire of the heavenly phoenix could burn away all things in the world.
The petals gradually softened, then withered, looking particularly wilted.
Finally, with a puff, they dissipated into the night breeze.
That finger also vanished at the same time, gone to an unknown place.
Endless Azure looked toward a certain spot and shouted sharply, "Flee quickly!"
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(Being sick with a cold really sucks. I want to curse.)
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