Chapter 617: Hell on Earth
Images of everything within the Heaven Eyes’ detection range entered Nie Tian’s mind one after another.
Thick, black smoke was rising from empty human villages.
In the central square of a small city, dead commoners were piled into a hill with flies buzzing around them.
From the way they were placed, the outsiders seemed to have used them as sacrificial offerings to their ancestors.
Many old people, women, and children could be seen in the stinking hill of corpses.
Apparently, these people had been dead for days, but their lifeless faces were still filled with pain and horror.
The foul smell of rotting corpses pervaded the entire city. Dried blood could be seen everywhere.
As the Bone Blood Demon flew on, Nie Tian discovered village after village and city after city like this. Every single commoner had been slaughtered and used as sacrificial offerings to the outsiders’ ancestors.
As more and more images like this were sent to Nie Tian’s mind by his Heaven Eyes, Nie Tian’s expression became increasingly grim.
Li Langfeng, who had recently entered the late Worldly realm, also saw the devastating situation on the ground with the help of his soul awareness. As cruel as he was, he fell silent, killing intent slowing building up in his eyes.
Nie Tian didn’t see a single commoner survivor along his way.
Li Langfeng’s eyelids throbbed as intense killing intent burst forth from his eyes. “This is outrageous! These outsiders are treating the commoners of the Realm of a Hundred Battles as animals! No matter what, we’re still intelligent beings. How do they dare do such a monstrous thing?”
“I might have held a bit of fantasy with inter-race wars before today, but I won’t anymore,” Nie Tian said, his face very cold. “It’s either kill or be killed, simple as that. So we need to kill as many outsider invaders as we can! We’d best not let a single outsider leave alive!”
Li Langfeng sighed deeply. “I’m no stranger to conflicts among the realms in the Domain of the Falling Stars. But our internal conflicts have never affected the lives of the commoners, and commoners don’t concern themselves with the conflicts among the various Qi warrior sects. No matter which sect obtained the dominion of a realm, they’d get along with the commoners. They’d never do such a monstrous thing.”
As the Bone Blood Demon continued to fly in the Dong Clan’s direction, Nie Tian finally saw some outsiders.
They were a handful of high-tier Demons. They seemed to be taking their time riding towards the Dong Clan on their spirit beast mounts, chatting and laughing as they did.
However, they were feasting on white and tender human arms at the same time.
Blood dripped from their fangs and streamed from the corners of their mouths.
A furious and sorrowful roar escaped Li Langfeng’s mouth as he got a clear view of what they were eating. “They’re eating the arms of young women!”
Before Nie Tian could react, he jumped off the flying Bone Blood Demon and unleashed numerous belts of deadly poisonous auras, which danced in the air like mad snakes before piercing into the few fourth grade Demons.
Like they were bitten by numerous serpents, the Demons quickly dropped dead.
Fighting to suppress his fury, Nie Tian commanded the Bone Blood Demon to descend from the sky. Looking at the dead Demons and the tender arms they were holding, he said angrily, “These high-tier Demons consider themselves as higher beings, but they even feasted on the arms of human girls!”
“Damn monsters!” With these words, Li Langfeng summoned a sword from his ring of holding and mangled the Demon’s corpses badly, as if he would only feel better this way.
“This calamity must be ended as quickly as possible!” Nie Tian said, gritting his teeth.
Li Langfeng took a deep breath and said, “Fortunately, your master single-handedly turned the situation around in the Realm of Flame Heaven. Those outsiders must not have expected that your master has mastered time power. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have dared to attack the Cloudsoaring Sect first with full force. If they had also spread out and massacred commoners, the Realm of Flame Heaven would have become hell on earth too.”
Nie Tian’s face grew very grim. “The Realm of Flame Heaven was lucky to have escaped such a fate, but the Realm of a Hundred Battles… Are the other realms suffering the same fate as the Realm of a Hundred Battles?”
Upon hearing these words, Li Li Langfeng fell silent.
While they talked, the Bone Blood Demon swiftly drained the handful of Demons of their blood.
Afterwards, Nie Tian gazed off in the direction of the Dong Clan and said, “Let’s go!”
The Bone Blood Demon took off with them again.
As they sped through the sky, Nie Tian saw a large number of Phantasms through his Heaven Eyes that were swarming towards the Dong Clan from different directions.
Floating over them were countless evil spirits, which had been made from the hundreds of thousands of commoners they had massacred.
Manipulated by the Phantasms, the evil spirits flooded towards the Dong Clan.
Over the clouds, Nie Tian soon came to see the Dong Clan, which was surrounded by millions of evil spirits.
Like a sea of locusts, the evil spirits were storming the Dong Clan’s grand spell formation and gnawing on the protective ward.
At the same time, more evil spirits that had been made from the massacred commoners were still converging on the Dong Clan from all directions.
From the look of it, the outsiders planned to breach the Dong Clan’s ancient spell formation with an army of evil spirits.
A large number of Demons, Phantasms, Blackscales, and Stonemen were surrounding the Dong Clan, watching the army of evil spirits storm the Dong Clan’s grand spell formation.
Li Langfeng also saw the situation at the Dong Clan, and said with a grim expression, “The Dong Clan is under siege. The outsiders are wearing their spell formation down bit by bit. It’s hard to say how much longer it will hold. Nie Tian, if we fly any closer, the outsiders will probably discover us. Once they do, they’ll send powerful members after us.”
Right now, they were still a significant distance from the Dong Clan, which, from Li Langfeng’s point of view, was still safe.
Even seventh grade Phantasms that were skilled in soul magics wouldn’t sense them from such a distance.
However, if they flew any closer, the Bone Blood Demon would most likely be exposed and attract the attention of powerful outsiders.
By then, they would probably have to face more than one seventh grade outsider.
Even the Bone Blood Demon wouldn’t necessarily win such a battle.
Therefore, they needed to determine how many seventh grade outsiders were gathered around the Dong Clan before deciding whether they would further approach the Dong Clan.
Nie Tian took out his Sound Stone. “Let me contact the Dong Clan first.”
…
In the Dong Clan.
Many Dong Clan members were gathered around a large-scale teleportation portal that was thrumming with intense spatial fluctuations.
Dong Wangling, the patriarch of the Dong Clan, was gazing silently at the teleportation portal. His expression was complicated as the other clan members argued anxiously.
Face grim, Dong Tengfei said, “Patriarch! We can’t afford to wait any longer. Once our grand spell formation is breached, the consequences will be catastrophic! In my opinion, it’s time we abandoned the Realm of a Hundred Battles and move to the Dark Shadow Dimension. Even though the spiritual Qi of Heaven and Earth there is quite faint, making it problematic for cultivation, we’ll get to live at the very least.”
“He’s right, patriarch,” Another elder said. “ In order to sustain our grand spell formation, we’re draining millions of spirit stones every day. It’s already been two weeks. If we don’t make any changes soon, we’ll use up our spirit stones eventually.
“By then, we won’t have any spirit stones to use in the Dark Shadow Dimension. Our life there will be even harder.”
Dong Qianqi, the current clanmaster of the Dong Clan, chimed in with a grim expression, “If we leave for the Dark Shadow Dimension, we’ll need to destroy this teleporation portal as soon as we leave, so that the outsiders won’t be able to follow us there. But once we do that, it’ll mean that we’re abandoning everything we have in the Realm of a Hundred Battles. It might be a thousand years before we can return.
“Besides, the Gu Clan, the Cao Clan, and the Pill Pavilion Sect are also struggling to hold on.
“If we leave, we’ll be abandoning them as well. When their grand spell formations are breached, they’ll have to not only face their own opponents, but also the two seventh grade outsiders that are attacking us.
“Even if we run out of options and have to evacuate, we’ll have to inform them of our decision first, so we can evacuate at the same time.”
Dong Tengfei sighed. “It seems to me that it’s about time we contacted them and retreated to our arcane realms. The crisis in the Domain of the Falling Stars will be lifted naturally if the patriarch of the Heaven Palace Sect manages to break through into the Void domain. But... who knows whether he’ll succeed?”
Dong Baijie and Dong Li were also gathered by the teleportation portal, but it wasn’t their place to state their opinions on such an occasion.
By now, many of the Dong Clan’s subordinate clans had already moved to the Dark Shadow Dimension, along with the Dong Clan members whose cultivation bases were lower than the Greater Heaven stage.
These people had only stayed because they hoped for a favorable turn of events.
However, nothing seemed to be happening.
The major sects in the other realms had also been forced to hole up behind their grand spell formations under the great pressure from the outsiders.
Dong Wangling finally opened his mouth. “Once we leave, we’re not coming back any time soon. Our ancestors spent thousands of years and went through many hardships to make our clan one of the most powerful forces in the Domain of the Falling Stars. If we abandon everything and retreat to the Dark Shadow Dimension, our clan will definitely decline.”
“But at least we’ll get to live on,” Dong Tengfei said sadly.
At that moment, sharp sounds suddenly came from Dong Li’s Sound Stone, which was in her inner pocket.
Dong Baijie shuddered. “It’s Nie Tian!”
He knew that only Nie Tian could contact Dong Li through that Sound Stone. It must be him.
Now that Dong Li’s Sound Stone was making sounds, there was only one explanation: Nie Tian was in the vicinity!
Dong Li’s expression also flickered as she exclaimed, “Why is he in the Realm of a Hundred Battles?!”
She also knew that that special Sound Stone couldn’t be used to transmit messages between realms. Now that it was making sounds, Nie Tian had to be close!
Dong Qianqi, the clanmaster of the Dong Clan, was taken aback. “The successor of the Ancient Fragmentary Star Palace! Shouldn’t he be in the Realm of Split Void right now?”
“Ask him what’s going on!” Dong Wangling, the patriarch of the Dong Clan, exclaimed.
Dong Li, who was already holding the Sound Stone, then communicated with Nie Tian. Soon, the tips of her eyebrows rose, and joy appeared on her gorgeous face. “The crisis in the Realm of Flame Heaven was lifted! Nie Tian is here to help us deal with the outsiders!”