Chương 1179: Chapter 1177: The Hellscape

The serene atmosphere of the garden shattered the moment Ancestor Guizhong summoned the phantom of the Genesis Elephant. Tielan did not wait for the old man to launch his first strike before taking action. She had already crushed a distress token hidden within her sleeve the very second Guizhong ordered their capture. She knew the danger of fighting a fanatic holding the keys to a grand defensive array and she could only hope that her father received the signal in time.

The arrays would have surely slowed down such transmissions as well so she would have to hold on even longer than was expected. Tielan stepped firmly in front of Li Yu and raised her heavy warhammer. Her own inner world projected outward to form a fierce domain of battlefields and broken weapons that clashed violently against the crushing weight of the elephant phantom. The stone tiles beneath their feet spiderwebbed with deep cracks as the two supreme domains fought for dominance over the small garden.

Under normal circumstances, Tielan could take on the frail ancestor without fear. She possessed overwhelming physical strength and a combat intuition forged in the fires of countless wars. In a one on one fight in the open, she could most likely beat him or at least fight the old man to a bloody standstill. However the situation in the garden threw her at a severe disadvantage.

The ancient arrays of the Worldheart Clan funneled a continuous stream of energy into Guizhong and reinforced his already formidable strength to a terrifying degree. The old man proved to be much stronger than she initially expected even before the arrays empowered him. On top of facing an empowered enemy, she had to divert a large portion of her already losing inner world to form a protective shield around Li Yu to keep him safe and Guizhong knew that and used it to his advantage.

Guizhong raised his wrinkled hand and the giant elephant phantom mirrored the movement by lifting its ethereal trunk. The old man brought his hand down and a wave of destructive Qi crashed toward the mother and son. Tielan swung her warhammer upward to meet the attack as there was no backing down here. The heavy weapon collided with the descending wave of energy and produced a deafening boom that echoed across the mountain peaks.

The kinetic force of the impact tore the surrounding bamboo stalks from the ground and sent the elders tumbling backward to avoid the fallout. Tielan ground her teeth and planted her boots deeper into the cracked stone to hold her ground but the reinforced power of the ancestor slowly pushed her backward. Li Yu stood behind his mother and felt a furious fire ignite within his chest.

He hated the fact that someone dared to attack them in a place they came to for help and he was livid about the fact that someone was attacking his mother right in front of his eyes. Just as equally, he hated the fact that he was a hindrance to her in this fight. If Tielan did not have to shield him from the stray shockwaves, she could focus her entire strength on breaking the old man to pieces. Li Yu gritted his teeth and circulated his Qi to the absolute limit.

He projected out his own inner world to try and take some of the burden away from his mother. His domain expanded and pushed against the encroaching pressure of the elephant phantom that represented that old man's inner world. He wanted to shoulder the weight of the attacks so Tielan could go on the offensive. His effort proved futile against the vast chasm in their cultivation levels.

Even while Li Yu possessed a powerful inner world that exceeded his peers, it could not compare to those of people standing towards the higher peaks of the realms. The ancient pressure of the array empowered ancestor crushed against Li Yu's projection and forced his energy to retreat back into his body with a painful jolt. Guizhong noticed the attempt and let out a raspy sneer. It was like an ant trying to hold up the world and a foolish idea.

The old man channeled another surge of energy from the glowing runes beneath his feet and unleashed a concentrated palm strike aimed directly at the defensive barrier shielding Li Yu. Tielan saw the trajectory of the attack and could only manage to move her own body to intercept the strike as she was bogged down by his other attacks. She took the brunt of the force against the flat side of her warhammer but the weight of the enhanced blow bypassed her guard.

The impact struck her shoulder and forced her to slide several paces backward across the ruined garden. Tielan stabilized her footing and let out a sharp cough. A splatter of bright red blood escaped her lips and stained the front of her battle armor. It was a relatively light wound for her standards that looked much worse than it actually was but the sight of that blood triggered something primal and dark within her son.

Li Yu watched the red droplets hit the tiles and his mind descended into boundless madness like never before. Something in his mind snapped as the rational thoughts of strategy and survival burned away in an instant, leaving only a singular desire for extreme violence. His killing intent exploded outward like a dormant volcano erupting without warning. The pure malice leaking from his pores washed over the garden and painted the physical world in a terrifying crimson hue.

A hellish landscape of blood and suffering overlapped the serene reality of the Worldheart Clan and even managed to slightly hinder the projection of Guizhong's inner world. Li Yu slowly lifted his head and the elders scrambling near the edges of the garden froze in terror when they saw his face. His left eye glowed with a piercing red light while his right eye consumed the light around it with a deep pitch black darkness.

Li Yu did not care about the consequences of his actions to himself or really anything in this moment besides getting what he wanted right now. His only desire was to kill the man before him. He willed every fiber of his being to secure the strength needed to end the life of the man standing across from them. He was ready to give up everyone and burn away everything he possessed in order to do so.

He would sacrifice his Qi, his blood essence and his very future just to gain the power to kill the damned bastard who dared to strike his mother and make her bleed in front of him. His consciousness plunged deep into his soul space and he materialized on the tranquil island and rushed directly toward the edge of the spiritual water where the Fisherman Soul sat in perpetual silence. Li Yu knew that he did not have the strength to face this man in any areas but one.

His monstrous and abnormal soul abilities and at the center of those things was the Fisherman Soul now standing in front of him. Li Yu threw himself to the ground and dropped to his knees. He smashed his spectral forehead against the solid earth in front of the ancient figure with his eyes burning in madness and unyielding rage. It was an instinctive drive that drove him here and do what he was doing.

He begged the mysterious entity to help him because the Fisherman was the only thing he could count on to deliver a miracle in this desperate moment. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

'Give me the power to tear him apart!' Li Yu pleaded but sounded like he was commanding the Fisherman Soul all the while smashing his head against the ground again and again.

'I will pay any price you ask. Just let me kill him!' Li Yu did not realize it in the depths of his rage and desperation but his voice began to change. The normal cadence of the young man faded away and his voice turned into the exact tone and voice of the Fisherman Soul. It was the same voice that the mysterious entity usually had when speaking. The hatred for the world, the boundless madness, the simmering anger and all the negative emotions of the cosmos bled into his words.

His voice shifted entirely to match the Fisherman as he begged over and over for the strength to enact his vengeance. The Fisherman Soul turned its head beneath the woven straw hat. The ancient entity listened to the hateful voice echoing its own tone and a profound resonance formed between them. It was like the two were finally seeing each other eye to eye for the very first time in both their existence and it was then that the Fisherman resonated with Li Yu like never before.

The ancient entity stood up and its own killing intent exploded outward to breach the boundaries of the soul space. The malice poured into the physical world and overlapped a second hellscape on top of the one Li Yu had already created. The Fisherman's hellscape was even darker and far more cruel than the crimson domain of the young man. Ethereal hooks dangled from the sky and the scent of rotting souls filled the air while the temperature in the garden plummeted to freezing extremes.

The elders trapped near the entrance fell to the ground and clutched their throats as the dual hellscapes choked the breath from their lungs. Even Guizhong felt a shiver of dread run down his spine as the overlapping domains of death pushed against his array empowered phantom. The Qi in the surrounding area slowed to a crawl and both the combatants were brought to a crawl which stunned them both. The resonance did not end there. A third figure materialized on the island within the soul space.

The Human Soul stepped forward to stand beside Li Yu and the Fisherman. The three entities formed a perfect triangle upon the spiritual earth and the Human Soul opened its eyes to reveal a cold and calculating executioner intent as well. The Human Soul unleashed its own killing intent and projected it into the physical reality. A third hellscape overlapped the previous two and locked the garden in a terrifying sphere of suppression.

The triple layered hellscape distorted the light and turned the area into a true domain of nightmares where only death remained a certainty. Similarly to how the Calamari had wrapped reality around itself, the same thing was happening here but the effects were different. Li Yu raised his head from the dirt in the soul space and yelled with the hateful voice of the ancient entity to kill the bastard standing before them. The Fisherman Soul gripped the long rod and took action.

As this was being done, the entity only said one thing to the young man kneeling in the dirt.

"Remember this feeling as well." Before the Fisherman could cast the glowing hook into the physical world, a loud booming voice shattered the tension in the sky above the mountain.

"Guizhong cease this treason at once!" The Sect Master of the Worldheart Clan arrived through a hastily torn rift along with two other ancient ancestors. They looked down at the ruined garden and felt the terrifying triple hellscape radiating from the young man standing behind Tielan. They knew that their crazy ancestor had brought the wrath of the Worldkeeper and many other groups upon their heads and they acted instantly to try to prevent a total disaster.

The Sect Master and the two ancestors formed a series of rapid hand seals and seized control of the grand defensive arrays. They forcibly ripped the command away from Guizhong and severed the connection feeding him power. The glowing runes beneath the old man flickered and died out in an instant as they regained control. Guizhong stumbled forward and his towering elephant phantom shrank drastically as the borrowed strength vanished from his veins. The sudden weakness left the mad ancestor exposed and vulnerable.

As that was happening, the Fisherman Soul had already taken action. The timing lined up perfectly with the loss of the arrays for the Fisherman's attack to land by pure chance. The ancient entity had flicked its wrist and the ethereal hook flew out from the soul space to pierce the physical reality. Li Yu watched the glowing hook streak through the air toward the stumbling old man and his rage shifted into something far more cruel. A quick death was too good for a man who harmed his mother.

Death was a release and Li Yu wanted to deliver punishment.

'A quick death is too good for him!' Li Yu yelled within his soul space as his dual colored eyes tracked the projectile.

'Capture the scum and we will make him wish he is dead! Bring his soul to me!' That was the only way to quench the burning rage consuming his heart. The Fisherman Soul heard the command and altered its attack slightly in mid flight. The glowing hook adjusted its trajectory and phased directly through the physical flesh of the old man without leaving a mark. The ethereal barb buried itself deep into the spiritual core of Guizhong and hooked his soul with an inescapable grip.

Guizhong let out a silent scream of unimaginable agony as the hook dug into his essence. The Fisherman yanked the long rod backward and dragged the entire soul out of the physical vessel in a single go. The glowing spirit of the ancestor thrashed and wailed against the line but it was powerless to resist the ancient authority of the catch. The physical body of Guizhong began to fall limp and lifeless in an instant.

The empty shell was collapsing onto the cracked tiles like a discarded puppet with its eyes rolling back into its head. The ethereal hook flew back into Li Yu and dragged the captive soul into the depths of his inner space to await a fate far worse than death. At the exact same time, the sky above the Worldheart Clan tore open with a deafening screech that sounded like the fabric of reality itself ripping apart. A colossal rift appeared high above the towering peaks and blotted out all of the light.

Zhan Tian stepped out of the swirling vortex with his glaive gripped tightly in his hands. The eight generals followed right behind him while the imposing ranks of his entire army materialized in the sky to cast a dark shadow over the entire clan. The Worldkeeper had come here as soon as he received the word via the crushed token from his daughter.

It took time for such communications to travel across the vast distances of the cosmos and to make it through the initial arrays meant to slow down or prevent such things within the clan. Not much time had passed since the fight in the garden began at all and showed how quickly these fights can progress. Of course once Zhan Tian got word, the response was overwhelming. Zhan Tian looked down and his sharp eyes immediately found his daughter standing in the ruined garden with a stain of bright red blood on her armor.

Similarly to Li Yu, his rage was boundless and the Worldkeeper did not ask for an explanation and he did not wait for the Sect Master to speak. Zhan Tian was already moving the moment he arrived. He descended from the colossal rift like a falling meteor and brought his glaive down in a brutal arc while aiming directly for the falling body of the man who dared to attack his family. The blade cleaved through the air and struck the lifeless body of Guizhong.

The physical shell of the ancestor was cut cleanly in half and the remaining kinetic force of the strike shattered the entire mountain peak into a cloud of falling dust and debris. Zhan Tian landed amidst the destruction with a fury that promised no mercy for anyone standing in his way.