The ghost face was struck with terror, its body writhing desperately, but under the shroud of the power of laws, it could only quiver like a lump of dough reduced to a faint dark shadow, utterly unable to dissipate back into black gas and flee.
"With my current strength, I can only unleash a sliver of this Profound Heavenly Sword's power, and it can only deliver a single strike. Had this been at the very start, you might have had some chance of breaking free from its binding force. But now, after over a hundred cycles of continuous weakening, what chance do you have of escaping?" Han Li said coldly, giving the azure longsword in his hand a slight shake. It flickered and vanished into thin air.
The next instant, a soft whoosh sounded above the ghost face as a halo of azure light materialized noiselessly, spinning downward in a lazy spiral as it pressed down.
"No!"
The Inner Demon transformed into the ghost face let out a piercing shriek of absolute terror upon seeing the seemingly ordinary halo of azure light, as though catastrophe itself had descended.
But no matter how it screamed and struggled, once the azure light halo truly descended, the ghost face let out a sizzling hiss and was transformed into a wisp of black gas that was drawn into the azure glow.
A shrill, agonized scream echoed through the void!
The black gas was ground to dust within the halo by the swirling azure light, utterly annihilated and no longer existing.
And almost in the same instant that the Inner Demon vanished, the entire gray space let out a tremendous hum as the surrounding void cracked apart inch by inch, on the verge of complete collapse.
Joy flickered across Han Li's face, and without a word he made a slight beckoning gesture toward the void with one hand.
The halo of light flickered and vanished without a sound.
Then, emerald light flashed along Han Li's arm, and the sword mark that had disappeared eerily reappeared before sinking deep into his skin and vanishing from sight.
At the same moment, the entire space let out a tremendous boom before dissolving into countless motes of spiritual light as it fully collapsed.
The Primordial Spirit avatar that Han Li had manifested blurred, transforming into a ball of golden light that shot ahead of everything else toward the exit…
In the basin outside, the massive gray mirror suspended in midair cracked apart with a crisp sound before a ball of golden light streaked downward from it. With a single flash, it plunged into the Nascent Soul below.
The Nascent Soul, which had been perfectly still until that moment, immediately let out a long, dragon-like roar as brilliant golden light erupted from its body. It too transformed into a streak of golden light and merged back into the physical body.
The next instant, Han Li's true body opened his eyes as an awe-inspiring aura, vast as the heavens and seemingly fused with heaven and earth itself, swept outward from his body in a torrent.
A rumble like muffled thunder echoed throughout the void as the dense, dark clouds overhead scattered in an instant!
In their place, dazzling tide-like waves of radiant light surged inward from every direction, descending and converging over the basin into a sea of five-colored radiance so blinding it could not be looked upon directly, completely engulfing Han Li's form within its depths.
At the heart of the luminous sea, crystalline threads infused with some mysterious energy condensed into existence out of nothingness, then shot outward in all directions, swirling and spiraling through the air.
In the span of mere moments, Han Li was tightly cocooned by densely packed crystalline threads, and still more came surging in without end.
After no more than the time it took to drink a cup of tea, Han Li had been transformed into a massive cocoon of light, flickering in and out of visibility within the radiant sea, hovering suspended.
Within the sea of light, hues of every color surged and swirled rapidly as deafening booms echoed without cease, as though something of unimaginable terror was being forged within.
In the distance beyond the basin, the tide of radiant light rolled unceasingly along every horizon. Of the seven blazing suns that should have been hanging in the sky, most had vanished — only three remained, hanging high above.
Yet even these three remaining suns had dimmed noticeably, and faint threads of light streamed downward like tiny rivulets, plunging swiftly into the sea of light below.
Tens of thousands of kilometers away, hovering in the low sky, Crab Daoist raised his head to gaze at the three-sun anomaly high above, his face utterly expressionless.
The black-robed woman and the burly bearded man who were recuperating nearby on a dharma wheel and a massive gourd both drew sharp breaths at the sight. They exchanged a glance and cried out simultaneously: "Three Suns Pouring into the Body!"
A look of sudden understanding intermingled with sheer disbelief flashed across their faces.
…
"Three Suns Pouring into the Body — that brat named Han has actually broken through to the Mahayana stage!" An equally astonished voice rang out from another mountaintop elsewhere in the mountain range.
The speaker was none other than the figure known as the Tusk Shadow, whose face was entirely hidden behind a wolf-head mask, revealing no expression whatsoever.
Yet the strange light that flickered through her eyes made it clear that her words had come entirely from the heart, devoid of any pretense.
"What? Brother Han has already passed the Inner Demon tribulation?" Silver Moon, who had been gazing at the three dimming suns high above with a faint worry in her heart, was overjoyed upon hearing this and hastily asked.
"That's right. He should have already escaped the Inner Demon space and is now using the essence of heaven and earth and the true essence of the suns to reconstruct his physical body! With his original strength, one can only imagine how much his abilities will surge once he truly enters the Mahayana stage. At the very least, your late ancestor would most likely be no match for him," the Tusk Shadow replied without any tact, her words brimming with wariness toward Han Li.
Silver Moon, hearing this, was elated beyond measure.
At the same time, deep within a nearby forest, Xu Qianyu witnessed the anomaly in the sky and murmured under her breath, her face pale with shock.