Chapter 224: The Battle of the Primordial Gods

Being immersed in this Primordial World surrounded by numerous Outer Gods, what Li Shun felt and experienced was utterly different from the insights he had gained in ordinary illusions before.

Exposed without the slightest concealment to the terrifying gazes of those indescribable beings, it was as though a mortal had been forcibly stripped of his flesh and skin, left completely bare to face the raging winds and torrential storms deep within the Chaos. Deep within Li Shun's soul, he felt a bone-chilling cold, and not even the slightest sense of security remained.

“Looking up to the azure heavens, yet unable to see them; searching for the Great Dao, yet finding no way out.”

This ancient maxim from a Confucian classic suddenly surfaced in Li Shun's mind.

Originally, these words recorded the despair felt by an ancient Confucian Sage when he had fallen into confusion of mind and found the heavens and earth shrouded in darkness. Yet at this moment, Li Shun was horrified to discover that they perfectly described the terrifying scene before him, with the Outer Gods descending into the world and demons running rampant.

“I wonder what the disciples of the Hundred Schools who came from the other branches are experiencing right now.”

“These Outer Gods…”

“What exactly are they coveting in this Primordial World that they would go to such lengths?”

“Logically speaking, they should know better than anyone that the Primordial World has already fallen apart in reality. Why, then, are they still descending here one after another, like starving wolves that have caught the scent of blood?”

Just as Li Shun's heart was filled with uncertainty, another change suddenly swept across heaven and earth.

The originally dark and shattered sky of the Primordial World seemed to have been drawn by some immense force. Without warning, it suddenly burst into brilliant light.

The radiance was so intense that it was even more dazzling than the strange phenomenon of the Ten Suns hanging in the sky earlier.

An incomparably fierce white light appeared from an unknown source. Like a divine sword, it tore apart and dispersed the boundless gloom brought about by the pressure of the Outer Gods.

At the boundary between heaven and earth in the far north, a pair of eyes slowly rose into view.

Each vertical pupil was like a resplendent sun.

The true body of the owner of those eyes had already grown so enormous that it surpassed the limits of sight. There was simply no way to glimpse its entirety.

Yet beneath the indifferent gaze of those ancient eyes, the shadows of the Outer Gods that had been crawling beyond the cracks in the heavenly curtain, eagerly waiting to strike, suddenly froze as one.

They were forcibly suppressed!

Immediately afterward, a strange, resonant cry that pierced the Nine Heavens rang out from the extreme east of the Primordial World.

Accompanying that cry, Li Shun felt the very air currents throughout heaven and earth boil and grow several degrees hotter.

In the central region of the Primordial World, a towering earth-yellow figure also rose from the ground.

The figure appeared vaguely humanoid, but its features were completely obscured by thick divine radiance formed from the laws of heaven and earth. Its appearance could not be discerned at all.

All that could be seen was the boundless divine brilliance erupting from its body.

The divine radiance surged upward against the current, seemingly transforming into countless colossal hands capable of supporting the heavens. One by one, they smoothed over and sealed the pitch-black gashes torn through the Nine Heavens by the Outer Gods.

As the cracks in the heavens gradually closed and disappeared, that horrifying sensation of being firmly watched by the Outer Gods, as though countless thorns were digging into his back, also vanished without a trace.

Once the heavenly curtain had completely closed, concealing the realm beyond the heavens once more, the ancient beings who had manifested one earth-shattering phenomenon after another suddenly seemed to step through the void in unison.

They headed directly beyond the world's barriers.

Through the thick veil of the heavens, Li Shun could vaguely see that an unimaginable battle between gods was erupting in the boundless realm beyond the world.

“These beings…”

Li Shun's heart trembled violently.

“Could they be the native gods of the Primordial World who are still alive?!”

Images of ancient texts he had once read flashed through his mind as he desperately tried to identify these native deities.

Yet the descriptions recorded in the ancient texts and the divine figures he had witnessed with his own eyes only vaguely resembled one another.

There was simply no way to confirm their identities.

The divine battle that erupted beyond the heavens lasted a full three days.

Even at the very final moment, when this Primordial World illusion was on the verge of collapsing completely, violent tremors continued to occasionally shake heaven and earth.

Clearly, the battle beyond the world's boundaries had not stopped for even an instant.

With Li Shun's insignificant strength at the Spirit Resonance realm, he had no ability whatsoever to participate in such an unprecedented divine war.

He could only tremble in fear atop Mount Buzhou, secretly observing the various changes that flashed across the heavenly curtain.

At the same time, he carefully committed every abnormal movement throughout heaven and earth to memory.

After all, a battle between gods was not something one encountered often.

Whether in an illusion or in reality, such an event was an exceedingly rare opportunity for any cultivator.

Eventually, the ancient and weathered scene before his eyes shattered inch by inch like fractured glass.

A tremendous force suddenly seized Li Shun's soul and violently dragged it away, sending him plunging back into the real world of Great Qian.

However, unlike his return during the previous province, an entirely different change occurred.

The instant Li Shun returned to reality, his keen divine sense immediately detected a strange aura permeating heaven and earth.

That aura was astonishingly similar to the might of the Outer Gods he had just encountered beyond the heavens of the illusion.

“The Outer Gods' gaze has reached the real world?”

Li Shun's heart suddenly tightened.

Almost instinctively, he raised his head sharply and looked toward the sky of the present world.

And he was far from the only one to do so.

At this moment, atop Mount Dai, every disciple of the Hundred Schools who had survived the illusion and escaped alive had turned deathly pale.

They all stared rigidly at the heavenly curtain above them.

Clearly, before the illusion shattered, they too had witnessed the terrifying sight of those gods tearing apart the heavens.

Fortunately, the most despairing catastrophe had not actually occurred.

The sky of Great Qian remained as clear and blue as ever, with not a cloud in sight.

Yet the faint trace of the Outer Gods' aura lingering in the air, sending shivers down one's spine, was undeniably real.

After such an incident, there was naturally no longer any celebration banquet for the grand gathering.

Every participant who had survived the illusion was immediately confined on the spot and placed under isolation and investigation without even being given a chance to catch their breath.

While waiting for the investigation inside an estate at the foot of Mount Dai, Li Shun clearly sensed several incomparably powerful auras concealed around the estate.

They had joined forces to seal the entire area as tightly as an iron fortress.

And every single person responsible for establishing this formation radiated the overwhelming pressure of a Creation realm expert.

Although Li Shun had just faced the supreme might of the Outer Gods, beings capable of destroying heaven and earth, within the Primordial World illusion, he did not feel that the Creation realm experts guarding the outside were in any way weak.

After all, due to some restriction imposed by the laws of heaven and earth, those lofty Outer Gods seemed unable, or perhaps unwilling, to forcibly descend their true bodies within the barriers of the present world's reality.

The incarnations or projections they cast into Great Qian were constrained by the world's rules.

Their strength was therefore generally suppressed somewhere between the Creation realm and the Heaven-Earth realm, fluctuating according to the strength of the projected power.

Thus, once Great Qian's Creation realm experts joined forces, they possessed sufficient confidence and strength to resist an invasion by the incarnations of the Outer Gods within the home ground of the present world.

“Looks like this Hundred Schools gathering truly caused quite a stir.”

Although Li Shun himself was one of the instigators, he felt little guilt over the matter.

He merely gathered his thoughts, held his breath, and quietly waited for the harsh interrogation that was about to begin.

The person who came to summon him for questioning this time was no longer his fellow disciple and senior, Zhao Cheng.

Instead, it was an entirely unfamiliar middle-aged man.

However, judging from the faint aura of righteous grandeur that naturally radiated from his every movement, this man was evidently also a cultivator from the Confucian school.