Chapter 1227: Xu Qing Is Furious!

Chapter 1227 Xu Qing's Great Fury!

The wind of Wanggu Continent carried the familiar dampness of memory.

It came from the boundless ocean, and from the alien essence within this world.

Utterly unlike the Fifth Star Ring.

Sensing this, Xu Qing opened his mouth to speak, but his lips moved in silence.

The world around him blurred in his eyes—perhaps the alien essence warped the void, perhaps the spirits of Wanggu clouded all.

Only... the old woman before him, clad in black robes, her face etched with storms, remained piercingly clear.

Wrinkles like furrows of time, carved by wind and rain, and seemingly by fate itself.

The little butterfly of long ago, Xu Qing remembered well.

In memory, she had been a girl, once at odds with him, then... the one who led him to the Summer Immortal Palace, where he first saw the aged matriarch of the human race.

Yet these memories, clashing with what he now saw and felt, filled Xu Qing with a sense of unreality.

"My master once said: 'Those who haven’t endured ultimate pain cannot know its weight. It is... a refusal to believe, an instinct to deceive oneself, to pretend nothing happened.'"

"Because beyond ultimate pain... lies the void."

The old woman smiled bitterly.

"And when I witnessed the cataclysm myself, saw all I loved vanish... only then did I grasp my master’s words. For a thousand years, I’ve walked in that shadow, unable to emerge."

"Today, seeing you... I hope you can walk free."

Her voice turned ashen. Slowly, she turned away, walking into the distance. Her silhouette radiated desolation, steeped in endless solitude.

Xu Qing lifted his head, watching her recede. Suddenly, he spoke.

"Where... where is my master? My senior brother? Zi Xuan and Ling’er... and... and my friends, my fellow disciples... everyone. What became of them?"

His voice, unrecognizable to those who knew him, rasped like gravel grinding bone.

He dared not ask, yet the question tore from him, trembling beneath the hoarseness.

The old woman halted. Her back remained to Xu Qing. Silence stretched.

Finally, her words flowed like history’s tide, echoing from the flute of time.

"A millennium ago, the Ancient Immortal descended, seeking an object."

"He went first to the human realm, beheld the statue of the Sword-Bearing Emperor, then raised his hand. All humanity perished."

"Even the mighty Empress Li Xia was but a child before him, her mind erased, reduced to a divine slave at his side."

"Your master did not intervene. To him, humanity meant nothing; only those within his sight held value."

"The Ancient Immortal spared the Southern Phoenix Continent, as if bound by karmic threads to your master."

"Yet in the end, your master emerged, standing before the Ancient Immortal, blocking his search. Because... the object he sought... was your senior brother!"

"Your master fought for him. Your senior brother returned from Huangtian, manifesting the peak of quasi-immortal power. Yet the outcome remained unchanged."

"In that battle, your master perished. Your senior brother went mad, becoming the Ancient Immortal’s sacrificial offering."

"Afterward, your sect was utterly erased. Your other senior brothers and sisters... all gone."

"The Southern Phoenix Continent sank into the boundless sea. Southern Phoenix... became a corpse."

"Then the Ancient Immortal departed. Huangtian trembled, reviving anew. The Ancient Spirit Emperor seized the chaos, and all Wanggu plunged into turmoil."

"The Zi Xuan you mention... I recall her. She fell in exile, devoured as sustenance for a new god."

"As for Ling’er... I remember her too. Swallowed by the Ancient Spirit Emperor, her fortune reclaimed."

"And all you knew... most perished within this thousand years."

Xu Qing bowed his head.

The old woman spoke no more.

This... was everyone’s end.

Wind swept from afar, howling, scouring this place.

It stirred dust, lifted Xu Qing’s long hair, yet could not lift the stillness within him.

This... was everyone’s end.

The old woman’s sigh dissolved into the gale. A final whisper:

"Had you not left something behind in Wanggu, I would have thought you dead beyond these realms."

She shook her head slowly, carrying her solitude into the distance.

Perhaps, though her master was gone, she still bore the Summer Immortal Palace’s duty—though she no longer knew if that purpose held meaning.

Yet... it was her master’s dying wish.

Thus, her form faded, vanishing into the world’s distortion.

Time flowed.

Xu Qing stood there, unaware of his own state. He knew only that his thoughts had frozen, his being suspended.

Even his soul.

Only the wind’s whisper persisted in his ears.

Yet as he listened, the howl seemed to become a sob.

Then, like a tidal wave, boundless agony surged, engulfing him without warning.

The world before him turned crimson.

Blood staining his vision.

He opened his mouth to murmur, but blood gushed uncontrollably from his lips.

All he could do was stagger backward.

"So... ultimate pain is void..."

He could not weep; it seemed all was lost.

The emptiness within, a black hole, swallowing all.

Sinking into that abyss, without beginning or end.

This feeling, Xu Qing felt he should know—like drifting in the Sea of Time’s Chaos, though he could not recall its shape.

Only the old woman’s parting words echoed again and again in his heart.

Gradually, certain phrases within those echoes became sparks, gathering slowly in his gaze.

"Your senior brother went mad, becoming the Ancient Immortal’s sacrificial offering."

"Ling’er... swallowed by the Ancient Spirit Emperor, her fortune reclaimed."

"Empress Li Xia... her mind erased, a divine slave."

"Had you not left something behind in Wanggu..."

A spark may kindle.

Xu Qing’s head stirred slightly.

“The senior apprentice brother might not be dead.

Ling’er might still be separable.

Empress Lixia might yet hold hope.

Zixuan might have a next life…”

“I still have a long road ahead… Besides, all this is merely what others have said; it is not entirely true!” A flame ignited in Xu Qing’s eyes at that moment.

“And here, I left one thing behind.”

Xu Qing abruptly lifted his head; his gaze seemed to pierce through infinity, his divine sense perceiving all eight directions.

He gazed at the ruins, at the familiar yet alien world, at the gods strewn across the ground… His heart cried out, his soul churned.

After a long while, a faint response, nearly extinguished, drifted from the direction of the Endless Sea.

The next instant, Xu Qing’s body vanished abruptly.

…

Beneath the Endless Sea, deep within thick mud, hideous sea serpents writhed.

Intense divinity pulsed from them, and upon closer look, each serpent bore a grotesque, eerie ghostly face.

Deep within the mud lay a skeleton.

Only half its body remained; everything below the waist was gone.

The surviving upper half was riddled with wounds, scarce flesh clinging to bone—indistinguishable from a corpse.

It seemed sealed here; even as a remnant, divine arts fluctuated within it, steadily degrading its form from godhood toward mortality.

Nearby sea serpents occasionally slithered close, devouring the residual flesh.

Originally, absent mishaps, this cycle would persist indefinitely until the skeleton finally dissolved.

But now, the tranquil, pitch-black seabed stirred.

As if space shattered!

All alien energies, all oppressive forces here, vanished abruptly as if erased.

In their place emerged a figure walking through the void!

It was Xu Qing.

With each step, all sea life trembled; even gods fell silent.

Until he stood above the serpent-infested mud.

At his glance, all serpents quivered; the mud churned itself, revealing the buried skeleton.

Gazing upon it, Xu Qing’s heart surged.

This skeleton was his divine avatar.

Yet the soul within it was now a guttering wick, moments from extinction.

From the skeleton’s wounds, Xu Qing saw the immense trauma his divine body had endured—a testament that this avatar had survived the ancient cataclysm.

“Merging this divine form into me through shared origin will let me perceive all that befell this avatar—and verify everything!”

A fierce impulse rose within him. He stepped closer, raised his right hand to absorb the remains.

But as his hand neared, Xu Qing froze. Staring at the divine remnant, his expression turned strange.

“My divine body came from the Fragmented Mask… Even if the soul perished, how could flesh shatter so utterly? How could divine arts so easily seal it?”

His pupils contracted sharply. He snapped his head upward, gaze piercing the Endless Sea toward the sky.

There… the Fragmented Mask was gone!

And until now, he had felt no suspicion.

Recalling past events—battlefields, encounters with divine lords—he remembered only the broad strokes, no details; even Wanggu Continent seemed blurred.

These thoughts flashed through his mind like mirrors igniting one by one. Suddenly, he spoke:

“Aurora Palace, Heaven Beyond Heaven!”

“CRUSH!”

His voice transformed heaven and earth. The Endless Sea roared; Wanggu Continent shook to its foundations. The world trembled.

CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!

As if a celestial palace descended from beyond!

Then, in the next instant, everything before Xu Qing shattered like a bursting bubble.

All fragmented, recoiling into starlight, replaced by the cosmos. The palace’s might erupted now—

Erasing illusion, revealing truth!

The world convulsed!

Xu Qing saw everything.

This was no Wanggu Continent—it was still within Heaven Beyond Heaven!

And the skeleton before him was not his divine body, but clearly… the half-man half-spider true god!

This true god sought Xu Qing’s voluntary fusion—to transfer its essence, reborn through borrowed shell!

Xu Qing awakened!

His awakening triggered violent backlash against the returning god, amplified by the palace’s suppression and Heaven Beyond Heaven’s power.

The true god’s face contorted; golden ichor gushed from its body, agonized wails echoing everywhere.

“How could you awaken?!”

But Xu Qing, facing it now, burned with ultimate fury—

A rage that had never before peaked so high in his life.