Outside the cavern, the winds and clouds shifted in color as bolts of dark lightning crackled across the sky.
No stars or moon could be seen—only the rampant ripples of energy and the sudden flashes of blinding red light. Amid the howling gales, heaven and earth had long since descended into utter chaos, rendered unrecognizable.
Countless mountain peaks had been razed, leveled to flat ground. Vast stretches of forest burned, transformed into a sea of flames.
At this moment, outside the cavern, it was as though the end of days had arrived. All scenery had been obliterated. The only things remaining were the guardians of this Nine Heavens Profound Realm, lying dead or maimed amid the interwoven ripples of energy.
Though the barrier prevented Chu Feng from hearing anything outside, the sheer carnage before his eyes made it seem as though he could hear the sky collapsing and the earth splitting apart—the tragic, heroic screams of the dying. His heart trembled with shock.
The creators of this devastating scene outside the cavern were three figures.
Any one of those three could shatter the void and cause the earth to crumble with a mere gesture. They were beings of truly heaven-destroying, earth-shattering power.
Two of the three, Chu Feng recognized. They were Elder Red Demon and Sima Huolie.
Elder Red Demon commanded the might of an Imperial-level barrier, energy soaring through the sky as he simultaneously condensed multiple grand formations. Each formation radiated an oppressive force that seemed capable of crushing everything in its path.
But that was not all. At this very moment, he had thrown open dozens of barrier gates, and in the blink of an eye, several hundred Spirit World creatures surged forth. Some wielded razor-sharp blades, others carried the overwhelming aura of fierce beasts. They roared with earth-shaking fury as they charged onto the battlefield.
It was terrifying. Though these Spirit World creatures were merely from the Beast Spirit World, every last one of them was at the Half-Emperor realm—each possessing power that could annihilate heaven and earth.
As for Sima Huolie, he did not employ barrier techniques or martial arts. Instead, he wielded a three-foot-long blade of bluish steel with absolute mastery.
Yet this seemingly simple sword could sweep through the void horizontally and cleave the heavens vertically. With it alone, he demonstrated his incomparable strength—and this was no ordinary blade, but an exceptional-grade Royal Weapon of remarkable caliber.
The third figure was a person with disheveled hair, clad in black robes.
His black hair hung in wild disarray, completely obscuring his face. All that could be seen was a single white eye.
Yes—a white eye, empty and hollow, devoid of a pupil. It was deeply unsettling. In truth, it did not resemble a human eye at all.
However, the most terrifying thing about this black-robed figure was not his eye, but the gourd in his hand.
It was a gray gourd, covered in black patterns that now glowed with an eerie light, like countless black worms writhing and crawling across its surface.
From within that gourd, one shadowy figure after another shot forth.
These shadows were horrifying. Each one towered over ten meters tall, sporting fangs and claws, their entire forms pitch-black, yet each possessed a pair of blood-red eyes.
The shadows were too many—in the blink of an eye, there were already tens of thousands, and their numbers were still rapidly growing.
Most critically, these black shadows were not merely shrieking and wailing like ghosts. They wielded Half-Emperor-level power, channeling martial force and slashing with their claws in a frenzy of destruction.
All of these shadow monsters emerged from that black gourd.
Under the pressure of that gourd-wielding figure, even Elder Red Demon and Sima Huolie were struggling immensely. In a matter of moments, they had been forced onto the defensive.