The Demon Domain's reserves were undoubtedly far more formidable than the Star Boundary's, and that was precisely why Yang Kai was so desperate to find a way out for both Great Worlds. He wasn't thinking about the demon race — he was thinking about the Star Boundary. If the war between the two worlds dragged on to the very end, the Star Boundary's chances of victory were perilously slim.
The most impregnable fortress always crumbles from within, and Yang Kai was currently inside the enemy's walls. Whether he could actually bring down a foe as powerful as the Demon Domain was something even he had very little confidence about.
One could only do one's best and leave the rest to fate.
The last time Yang Kai had entered the Zhou Tian Continent, he had also transited through Bei Li Mo's territory, entering from a neighbouring continent under another Demon Saint's dominion, so the distance hadn't been too great.
The army's pace was not slow. In merely four days, they arrived at the World Gate entrance to the Zhou Tian Continent.
The Zhou Tian Continent had originally possessed two World Gates, but one of them had been sealed when Yang Kai made his escape. Now only a single one remained — and that sealed gate had ultimately been obliterated when the Demon Saints blasted through the void, utterly destroying it. The army had arrived at the only surviving World Gate.
Bo Ya had no idea why Yang Kai wanted to come to the Zhou Tian Continent. After all, following the catastrophe of their previous encounter, the entire continent had been shattered beyond recognition, its very Laws of Heaven and Earth crumbling and decayed. Every demon on the continent had long since been sacrificed in a blood ritual. The Zhou Tian Continent was, for all intents and purposes, completely devoid of value. Even the sole remaining World Gate showed signs of instability — once it vanished, the entire Zhou Tian Continent would likely be erased from the Demon Domain's map forever.
Though puzzled, Bo Ya asked no questions. Bei Li Mo had recently ordered him to lead the Ao Xue Ice Guards under Yang Kai's command, and she had made it explicitly clear: don't ask what shouldn't be asked, and obey Yang Kai's instructions without exception.
He was a Half-Saint. Under normal circumstances, it would be unthinkable for one to take orders from a mere high-rank Demon King. But since the Demon Saint herself had given the order beforehand, he had no choice but to comply.
After ordering Bo Ya and the five-hundred-thousand-strong army to make camp near the World Gate, Yang Kai passed through it alone, arriving once more on the Zhou Tian Continent.
He looked out and saw a world cloaked entirely in grey, without the faintest glimmer of radiance. The earth was fractured, and void rifts stretched across the sky like wounds that could never be healed.
A wave of melancholy washed over Yang Kai's heart. This was the burial place of an Emperor, but thinking back on everything that had happened that day, he'd had no choice whatsoever. Emperor Ming Yue had traded his own life to entrust those final instructions — and that final responsibility — into Yang Kai's hands.
He had no idea how he would face Lan Xun when he returned to the Star Boundary. Before departing for the Demon Domain, she had placed such enormous hope in him. Who could have imagined that, in the end, her own father would die at his hands…
Just thinking about it gave him a headache.
Putting his feelings in order, Yang Kai wandered aimlessly across the Zhou Tian Continent. The entire world looked like a shattered plate — fragments of the broken continent lay everywhere.
The place where Ming Yue had fought the Demon Saints still lingered with traces of mysterious aura and the scars of battle. The area where the Boundless Blood Sea had once existed still held a vivid crimson hue. Only the foundations of the Twelve Pillars of Demon Formation had vanished, presumably reclaimed by the demon race.
Once he confirmed that no traces of living beings remained anywhere on the continent, Yang Kai summoned the Mysterious World Bead and let Gun Gun — the bead's World Spirit — begin devouring the continent's fragments.
Ever since consuming several of the Demon Domain's continents, Gun Gun's size had grown ever more massive. A single gulp, and an entire fragment of the continent disappeared into its belly.
Within the Small World, atop a desolate mountain, Huo Lun stood before his wooden hut, gazing up at the sky with a lonely, desolate expression.
Over these past days he had also wandered around this strange world, only to discover that apart from himself, there wasn't a single living creature to be found. A layer of invisible barrier hung in the sky, preventing him from flying too high — he was blocked the moment he reached a certain altitude. And this world seemed to have its own edges as well, edges that were equally impossible to breach.
He felt like a bird trapped in a cage — only the cage happened to be enormous.
What the hell was this place! Huo Lun had asked himself that question more times than he could count, but never found an answer. He recalled that before the fellow who had brought him here departed last time, he had mentioned that this world might one day become another Demon Domain. At the time, Huo Lun had found that claim rather absurd — even the most barren continent in the actual Demon Domain was ten million times better than this.
A thunderous boom echoed, and what sounded like rolling thunder rumbled from the sky.
Huo Lun's spirits surged. Overwhelmed with elation, his eyes went wide as he craned his neck skyward.
He had been living here for nearly two months, and the entire world had been utterly unchanged — no living things, not even a single sound. Now that thunder suddenly cracked across the sky, this abrupt change naturally revealed to him a side of this world he had never seen.
Whatever this change might be, it was still better than living here in total solitude.
He shot into the air, rushing toward the source of the thunder, hoping to get closer and glimpse whatever secrets lay within — to understand what exactly had changed in this world.
Another thunderous boom erupted, so tremendous that heaven and earth themselves seemed to tremble.
And there, under Huo Lun's tense and electrified gaze, the sky actually split open with an enormous rift — as though some invisible beast had opened its colossal maw.