Hundreds of cultivators, aided by the formation and the corpse puppets, had actually managed to keep those seven or eight Demon Lords firmly pinned in place for the time being.
Moreover, after a cascade of radiant light flashed within Sky Abyss City, over a hundred stone towers—each thousands of zhang tall—erupted from the ground and hurtled toward the demon army with a tremendous roar.
On the demon side, the massive war vessels and triangular demon towers hovering in the rear naturally rushed forward to meet them without hesitation. After a deep hum, they unleashed countless black beams of light from afar.
But the surfaces of the human flying towers flickered with five-colored radiance, forcibly blocking every single beam. As the towers drew near the demon lines, the gates on every level swung open simultaneously.
Countless puppet soldiers and all manner of spirit beasts poured out, swarming toward the demons like locusts.
The demon war vessels and triangular towers clearly harbored large numbers of demons as well. After a series of eerie shrieks, dense waves of demon soldiers and demon beasts flew out in dark, overwhelming swarms.
In an instant, streaks of light and roiling demonic energy blanketed heaven and earth, and the void erupted once more in a storm of blood and carnage.
Han Li had already withdrawn his divine sense and knew nothing of all this, merely waiting quietly at the center of the formation.
He understood clearly that since the battle had reached such a critical stage, they could be called upon at any moment.
Sure enough, the wait did not last long—barely half a shichen—when the enormous formation beneath them suddenly began to hum with a resonant drone. A hazy white radiance rose from beneath each of the male cultivators, engulfing their forms entirely.
These male cultivators were startled at first, but each quickly produced a triangular jade token from their robes and hurriedly activated it.
Multicolored spiritual light emerged from the jade tokens and transformed into pale purple runes that swirled and danced around the cultivators.
Han Li's mind stirred at the sight, but before he could think further, the white light within the formation suddenly surged several times over in intensity and let out a long, clear resonance.
Han Li felt his vision go white, and he was instantly teleported away by the formation's power.
A moment later, when the clear resonance came to an abrupt halt and the white light contracted and vanished, the thirty-six male cultivators and Han Li had all disappeared without a trace.
At the same time, high above a certain point on the Sky Abyss City battlefield, an enormous light formation materialized out of thin air. Then, with a flash of spiritual light, the thirty-six male cultivators and Han Li appeared.
The positions where the male cultivators materialized seemed to have been carefully arranged—scattered in what looked like random clusters here and there, but in reality forming a subtle and supremely intricate formation that neatly enclosed Han Li and four others within its center.
The instant Han Li materialized, dark energy roiled across the surface of his body, and a pitch-black battle armor eerily assembled itself upon his frame. At the same time, specks of cyan light flickered, and seventy-two small cyan swords silently emerged from within him, arranging themselves into a cyan sword lotus that revolved ceaselessly beneath him.
Only then did he raise his head with a grave expression and sweep his gaze across the other four figures.
Two of them were precisely the silver-haired elder and Monk Jinyue. Though both were shielded by several protective treasures, one's face was deathly pale and the other was covered in bloodstains—they had clearly suffered significant losses.
The silver-haired elder in particular not only had the front of his robe completely shredded, but was conspicuously missing an arm from the shoulder.
Standing opposite them were a blood-robed youth and a burly man wearing only a beast-hide apron, his bronze-colored torso left bare.
The burly man held in one hand a spiked club wreathed in emerald-green flames, and in the other gripped a dripping severed arm, his face twisted in a savage grin—as though he had been the one to tear the elder's arm clean off.
The arrival of Han Li and the thirty-six male cultivators brought a slight measure of relief to the silver-haired elder and Monk Jinyue, but the blood-robed youth and the burly man instantly locked their gazes upon Han Li alone.
Once the two made out Han Li's features, the youth's eyes immediately filled with venomous hatred, while the burly man narrowed his gaze, a dangerous glint of ferocity flashing through his eyes.
"Late-stage Body Integration! No—his cultivation is far more profound than an ordinary late-stage. Fellow Daoist Xue Guang, is this the target you wanted me to deal with? But his cultivation level doesn't quite match what you told me." The burly man's expression darkened as he turned to the youth with a question.