Volume 1, Chapter 121 – The Donghuang Bell Unleashes Its Might

The instant the secret realm’s gate of light shattered completely…

“Buzzzzz!”

Countless streaks of light and shadow surged from the secret realm’s entrance like floodwaters bursting through a dam!

They were the disciples of the various sects who had been trapped inside!

Most were dressed in tatters and drenched in blood, their faces alight with the wild joy of surviving disaster, though the terror of what they had endured still lingered.

“We’re out! We made it out!”

“We’re saved! I’m still alive!”

“Look! We’re outside! We’re really outside!”

“Martial Uncle! Senior Sister!”

Cries of shock and relief, sobs, and shouts for fellow disciples erupted all at once.

At the forefront were the disciples of Yaochi Immortal Palace, led by Liu Ruyan, Gu Luoli, and Ye Ling’er.

Their ranks were the most intact. Though every one of them was wounded and exhausted, their formation remained orderly and their discipline unbroken.

The moment they rushed out of the passage, they all looked toward the silver-haired figure in the sky.

“Master!”

“Master!”

Liu Ruyan, Gu Luoli, and Ye Ling’er called out almost simultaneously, their voices brimming with irrepressible excitement and relief.

Gu Han’s gaze swept over them. When she saw the blood staining their clothes, an almost imperceptible chill flashed through her eyes.

She nodded slightly, her calm voice carrying clearly to the ears of every Yaochi disciple.

“It’s good to have you back.”

Just four brief words, yet they allowed the taut nerves of every Yaochi Immortal Palace disciple to relax completely. Many of their eyes instantly reddened.

With the Palace Master here, they had nothing to fear even if the heavens fell!

The disciples of the other factions also found their respective elders and tearfully recounted what they had experienced inside the secret realm.

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Mubai of Qingyun Sacred Land leaned on Su Wan’er for support, his face deathly pale as he described the horror of the stone statues coming to life in the hall and the Venerable’s remnant soul awakening.

Ling Chen of the Flowing Cloud Sword Sect had a ghastly wound across his chest. He fainted the moment he emerged from the secret realm.

Lingxu Sacred Land, Tianyuan Sacred Land, Wondrous Sound Pavilion…

Almost every surviving disciple still wore an expression of lingering terror.

News that “Venerable Tianqiong’s remnant soul had awakened,” that “the stone statues had slaughtered the disciples,” and that “the secret realm had closed early” quickly spread among the elders of the various factions, drawing waves of shocked exclamations.

Yet amid the chaos and elation of their narrow escape…

“Who was it?!”

A roar filled with boundless fury and resentment thundered from the depths of the shattered passage to the secret realm, which had yet to dissipate completely!

The pressure within that roar instantly drained the color from the faces of the low-level disciples who had only just escaped. Many collapsed to the ground on the spot!

Even the Void Return, Body Integration, and Mahayana elders of the various sects felt their minds tremble violently as they stared in horror at the remnants of the passage!

Gray-white mist churned wildly within the broken passage.

A blurred figure was slowly walking out!

It was none other than the refined middle-aged man who had stood on the raised platform inside the hall.

But not a trace of serenity remained on his face. In its place was utter fury, twisting his features into a savage mask!

His slightly hollow eyes locked on the silver-haired figure in the sky: Gu Han!

“You… ruined… my… plans…”

The broken, hoarse words sounded as though they had been forcibly pieced together from countless shattered fragments of consciousness, and they seethed with towering hatred.

“You… must… die!”

It had intended to devour the secret realm’s origin and absorb the attacks from outside to stabilize itself, then bide its time and proceed gradually.

Never had it imagined that someone would be able to shatter the secret realm’s entrance directly and cut off its source of “nourishment”!

Hatred surged through it, driving its already chaotic and deranged wisp of a remnant soul completely berserk!

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“This Venerable will kill you!”

The next moment, it raised a hand toward Gu Han and viciously clenched its fist!

“Rumble!”

The space within a thousand zhang of Gu Han abruptly froze and collapsed inward!

Endless gray-white mist welled up from the void and transformed into billions of fine, razor-sharp “threads of Dao laws.”

They wove themselves into a net of death capable of destroying everything, closing around Gu Han to slice her apart!

Wherever it passed, space was silently annihilated, leaving pitch-black fissures behind!

The terrifying might of the attack seemed to freeze the souls of every cultivator below!

“Palace Master, watch out!”

Li Hanyi’s expression shifted slightly.

Liu Ruyan, Gu Luoli, and the others cried out in alarm, their hearts leaping into their throats!

Yet faced with this terrifying strike, one that even an ordinary Immortal Ascension expert would have treated with utmost caution, Gu Han remained perfectly calm and unruffled.

She did not even look at the approaching net of death.

She merely raised her left hand.

Above her upturned palm, the small dark-gold Donghuang Bell hovered in silence.

“Clang…”

A peal of the bell rippled quietly outward, seeming to resound directly in the depths of everyone’s soul.

Gu Han gently pushed the Donghuang Bell forward.

The instant it left her hand, it rapidly expanded!

In the blink of an eye, it transformed into an enormous dark-gold bell a hundred zhang tall. Hovering above Gu Han’s head, it seemed capable of suppressing all creation!

The images of the sun, moon, and stars; earth, fire, water, and wind; and mountains, rivers, and the realm itself suddenly lit up across the bell’s surface!

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An ancient, boundless, supremely exalted Dao Resonance erupted with overwhelming force, as though it could stabilize heaven and earth and suppress all things!

“Break.”

Gu Han’s red lips parted, and she softly uttered a single word.

“Dong!”

The Donghuang Bell rang with a deafening boom!

Golden sound waves that seemed almost tangible swept outward in every direction from the Donghuang Bell!

Wherever the sound waves passed…

The approaching net of gray-white mist dissolved and disintegrated instantly, like snow beneath the blazing sun!

It could not offer even the slightest resistance!

“What?!”

Venerable Tianqiong cried out in disbelief.

Its furious strike had actually been dispersed so effortlessly by that bell?

Just what rank of artifact was it?!

Could it be a quasi-immortal artifact?!

There were only two quasi-immortal artifacts on the entire Canglan Continent, and it had seen them both. Yet it had never seen one of this form…

Before it could recover from its shock, Gu Han issued her second command.

“Suppress.”

As the word fell, the mouth of the Donghuang Bell turned downward and aimed at the figure.

“Buzzz!”

The Donghuang Bell abruptly trembled, and the images of the sun, moon, and stars and of earth, fire, water, and wind flowing across its surface instantly blazed with dazzling light!

A force even more domineering than before descended with a thunderous crash, like the starry river of the Nine Heavens pouring down from above!

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“No!”

Venerable Tianqiong let out a shrill howl!

Under the Donghuang Bell’s suppression, its wisp of a remnant soul was forcibly torn apart, disintegrated, and annihilated!

“I am… Tianqiong… immortal…”

The broken, resentful words echoed all around like the wail of a dying beast.

It tried to burn the last of its soul power in a desperate final struggle.

Yet before the Donghuang Bell, a quasi-immortal artifact, this remnant soul that had been shattered and lost in madness for sixty thousand years seemed pitifully insignificant and powerless.

The bell rang once more!

“Dong!”

It sounded like the final gavel of the Great Dao’s judgment!

The last traces of Venerable Tianqiong’s remnant soul and its struggle vanished abruptly.

Only a trace of Dao Resonance lingering in the air remained as proof of everything that had just happened.

The entire Tianqiong Plains fell deathly silent.

Only the dark-gold Donghuang Bell remained suspended in the sky, radiating a vast, ancient aura capable of suppressing all things.

Below, the elders of the various sects and the disciples who had narrowly survived all stared upward!

They gazed at the enormous bell in the sky and the peerless, snow-haired figure beneath it.

Shock was no longer enough to describe what they were feeling.

The remnant soul of Venerable Tianqiong, an Immortal Ascension expert, had been suppressed and dispersed just like that?

Was this the power of the Palace Master of Yaochi Immortal Palace?

And just what rank of artifact was that bell?