"Do we have any Ninth-Order?" Yang Kai asked.
"How would we have a Ninth-Order?" Liumu scoffed.
Yang Kai was stunned. This was quite different from what he'd imagined. With over a hundred Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands, accumulated across countless ages, he had assumed each one would have at least one Ninth-Order Open Heaven anchored in place.
But apparently that wasn't the case.
The Ink Clan in the Black Prison were extraordinarily dangerous. If the Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands truly possessed any Ninth-Order Open Heaven, those cultivators would certainly not sit idly by. Regardless of which faction they came from, they would have come here to deal with the threat — only thus could the eradication of the Ink Clan be assured.
Yet up to this point, not a single Ninth-Order Open Heaven had shown themselves, and Liumu had just confirmed as much.
In other words, the Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands truly did not possess any Ninth-Order Open Heaven.
But how was that possible? With countless years of accumulated heritage, couldn't a single Ninth-Order have emerged from so many factions? Those prodigies who leapt straight to the Seventh Order, though exceedingly rare, did exist. Had none of them ever successfully advanced to the Ninth-Order realm?
Yang Kai couldn't quite make sense of it, but now was hardly the time to dwell on such matters.
He fixed his gaze on the Ink Clan and asked, "Can we win?"
"Whether we can or can't, we fight!" Liumu said in a grave voice. "The Black Prison has been completely sealed off. Until this battle is over, no one is leaving!"
The Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands had clearly resolved to fight with their backs to the wall — victory or death. Even if they lost this battle, the Black Prison was now fully sealed, and the Ink Clan would remain trapped inside it forever, unable to escape.
Yang Kai's heart sank slightly. The Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands had already prepared for the worst, which only confirmed, from the side, how formidable the Ink Clan truly was.
"One, two, three…" Over on the other side, the Ink Clan member counted softly, her voice pleasant and melodic. Then she let out a coquettish laugh. "Never mind — too many to count. I'll just kill you all and the problem solves itself."
There were indeed many people, and every last one of them was a Seventh or Eighth Order Open Heaven. Anyone below the Seventh Order had no right to set foot on this battlefield.
The Seventh and Eighth Order cultivators gathered from across all the Cavern Heavens and Blessed Lands numbered well over a thousand. Every single one of them was an Upper-Order Open Heaven, each having endured countless ages of cultivation. Any one of them, plucked at random, would command the reverence of the vast majority of people in the world.
Over a thousand cultivators arranged themselves into more than a hundred formations, led by their respective Eighth Order Supreme Elders, surrounding the Ink Clan on all sides. Each wore an expression of utmost gravity, their eyes fixed upon the Ink Clan member who loomed like a giant spider.
Though all of them had long been aware of the Ink Clan's existence, this was nonetheless the first time any of them had laid eyes on one in person. The sight was somewhat different from what they had expected.
Many had assumed such a malevolent being should appear more imposing, but in truth, it was simply grotesque and repulsive.
"Go tend to your wounds first! There may be a place for you later!" Liumu tapped Yang Kai's forehead lightly with his foot, then flickered forward to the perimeter guarded and sealed off by the powerhouses of Golden Antelope Blessed Land, taking his stand at the very front like an immovable mountain.
Yang Kai retracted his dragon form and retreated swiftly.
The Madam came forward from the rear to meet him. Their eyes met, and Lan Youruo's gaze fixed on Yang Kai's midsection, where a massive wound gaped open. Dark, writhing power churned at the edges of the cut, impeding any healing, and blood still flowed without cease.
Lan Youruo reached out to support him and guided him back toward a safer position, asking with concern, "How are you?"
"Middling," Yang Kai answered. Then he added worriedly, "What about our people?"
"They've all withdrawn from the Black Prison. Right now, only Upper-Order Open Heaven cultivators remain inside. Everyone else was evacuated ahead of time."
Yang Kai nodded slightly. Anyone below the Upper-Order had no right to participate in this battle. Leaving them behind would only give the Ink Clan an opening — the moment they were tainted by the power of Ink, they would become Ink Disciples, splitting the attention of the Cavern Heavens' powerhouses at the worst possible time.
An early evacuation was the best course of action.
The two of them retreated to a relatively safe area where abandoned spirit continents remained from shattered mineral stars. Yang Kai flickered over, found a spot, and sat cross-legged.
His left hand blazed with a golden radiance, his right hand shone with a blue light. Yin and yang converged as the purifying glow enveloped his wound.
His Small Universe was anchored by the Heavenly Earth Springs, so no matter how powerful the Ink Clan member was, it could not disturb his Small Universe in the slightest. But the wound inflicted by the Ink Clan was riddled with dense Ink power that gnawed and clung to the flesh. The Ink power had to be expelled first before the wound could have any chance of healing.
Yang Kai had faced off against that Ink Clan member inside the cage for over a hundred years, suffering countless injuries along the way. By now, he had become thoroughly familiar with the process of treating such wounds.
Under the purifying light, black smoke rose from the torn flesh and dissolved into nothing. In short order, the Ink power was cleansed entirely, and only then did Yang Kai channel the power of the Wood Element to mend his injuries.
The ferocious blow the Ink Clan member had landed before his escape had been truly savage. Even transformed into his dragon form, Yang Kai had nearly been cleaved in two. His survival had been nothing short of a miracle.
Recovering from such a wound would not be easy. What was more, during his hundred-year standoff inside the cage, he had maintained constant vigilance, and both body and mind were utterly exhausted. He truly needed time to recuperate.
A violent surge of energy suddenly rippled from a distant point, accompanied by blinding flashes of light.
"It's started," Yang Kai murmured, raising his head to look toward the battlefield.