Chapter 429: Rice Flower Fragrance Fills the World

The spiritual master, who had previously besieged Li Weiwei while riding a deer-like exotic beast, stood atop the county’s tallest building, holding his breath in fear as Li Weiwei entered the town.

The Divine Wing Marquis personally intervened but did not return.

What exactly happened with that distant loud noise?

The spiritual master asked coldly, "Who exactly are you? And where is the Marquis?"

Li Weiwei glanced at him from afar.

The spiritual master's heart trembled. Already haunted by fear, he slapped a talisman onto his body, turned, and fled, vanishing into the jungle outside the county at top speed.

Li Weiwei was stunned.

His opponent was a Seven-Star Spiritual Master with profound talisman skills; why would he flee without even attempting to fight?

Li Weiwei did not pursue him. He searched around but found no trace of the Wind Chaser Beast.

He leaped across rooftops, heading towards the direction from which the blood mist emerged. Landing on the watchtower where the spiritual master had stood, he looked towards the hundred-meter-diameter cave entrance not far away.

At the cave entrance, countless civilians were being herded.

It was indeed a blood sacrifice, and not of livestock, but of humans.

At this moment, the swarm led by seven Phoenix-Wing Moth Sovereigns was locked in battle with seventy to eighty experts from the Demon Kingdom. The surviving humans immediately scattered and fled.

"Don't let a single one escape; kill them all."

Li Weiwei's eyes sharpened with cold resolve. He steeled himself against the rising negative emotions, mobilizing a steady stream of spiritual energy and channeling it into the Purple Cloud Thunder Seal in his palm.

The Thunder Seal flew forth, expanding to several *zhang* in size, and crashed into the cave entrance.

Immediately, purple lightning crackled within the cave, dispelling the blood mist and producing sounds of shattering and collapse.

The blood sacrifice was interrupted.

The blood patterns spread across the ground vanished.

Li Weiwei, stepping on a luminous yellow dragon silhouette, flew down to the cave entrance. Raising his sword above his head, he summoned the Six Jia Yang Thunder, unleashing several continuous strikes downwards before leaping into the depths himself.

The altar was built deep underground, where the space was vast.

Li Weiwei landed atop the altar. The air was thick with the pungent stench of blood. He looked around; beneath the altar was nothing short of a sea of blood, filled with countless white bones.

His heart momentarily stopped beating.

Undeniably, most of the city's inhabitants had been sacrificed here.

This was a war of extermination!

It was a struggle for survival that affected the entire sentient realm; no one could remain aloof. It was either fight or die.

Li Weiwei felt no agonizing pain, only a profound silence. He then shattered the young Marquis with a single palm strike, tossing his remains into the sea of blood, where they were indistinguishable from the countless other bones.

"Boom!"

He channeled his spiritual energy, summoning the Purple Cloud Thunder Seal to utterly destroy the altar.

Li Weiwei leaped up, flying back to the surface.

Within the county town, the sounds of battle, screams, insect chirps, collapsing buildings, and the hoarse cries of survivors intertwined into a chaotic cacophony.

Li Weiwei felt a suffocating sensation in his chest, yet he remained utterly silent, gazing towards the distant Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain.

The three-thousand-*zhang* high cliff was shrouded in a curtain of light.

The blood patterns on the light curtain were rapidly fading.

From the peak of the Immortal Plain, deafening sounds of wind and thunder could be heard. A dim, yellowish light illuminated the surroundings, and the earth shook violently as sword energy blazed. It was clear how fierce the battle there was, as if divine beings were clashing in the heavens.

He wondered how the transcendent duel was progressing.

Were Taishi Bai, Taishi Yu, and Xingyue Nu still alive?

A perception swept over Li Weiwei, feeling like a light breeze.

"No, this is not good. An Everlasting Realm grandmaster's spiritual sense is probing. These developments must have alerted other Demon Kingdom powerhouses at their blood sacrifice altars."

Li Weiwei sprinted towards the city gate, recalling all seven Phoenix-Wing Moth Sovereigns. He then used the last life-saving talisman given by Taishi Yu, the "Divine Travel Talisman," and sped eastward at his fastest possible speed.

By the time the Divine Travel Talisman's power was exhausted, Li Weiwei was already over four hundred *li* outside the county town, finding himself in a hilly, mountainous region dotted with tombstones and grave mounds.

Looking back, he could no longer see the Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain.

Only the sun was rising higher and higher.

His pursuers had not followed, clearly needing to guard the altar.

Li Weiwei could predict the grim fate of the surviving civilians in that county town, but he was powerless to change it. He could only bury this helplessness deep within his heart, vowing to cultivate diligently so that one day he might be strong enough to change this cruel world and bring forth light and justice.

"What a fragrant scent..."

Li Weiwei looked south.

In the air, a large quantity of tiny golden pollen drifted, flowing over the hills, passing by him, and swiftly moving north.

Soon, the entire surroundings shimmered golden, as the pollen danced on the wind, even tinting the sky a pale gold.

As the pollen fell to the ground, it vanished instantly.

Li Weiwei sensed that something was amiss. Holding his breath, he drew his Myriad Things Staff-Spear and surveyed his surroundings cautiously. At the tail of the staff-spear, the Earth Spirit Lad chuckled, emitting joyful sounds.

"What is it?" Li Weiwei asked.

The Earth Spirit Lad informed him that the Yin energy beneath the ground was rapidly intensifying.

"Crunch!"

A tombstone, a few *zhang* away from Li Weiwei, immediately emitted a faint golden glow as the pollen settled upon it.

From the grave mound behind the tombstone, a rotting hand emerged from the soil.

A horrifying sight unfolded before Li Weiwei's eyes.

From the grave mound, a decaying corpse rapidly clawed its way out.

The decaying corpse was clad in tattered clothes, howling and revealing a mouth full of sharp teeth, its eye sockets burning with golden flames. Catching the scent of a living person, it half-ran, half-leaped towards Li Weiwei.

Li Weiwei swung his staff, shattering it to pieces.

"Crunch!"

"Crack!"

Across the entire hill, skeletons burst forth from the grave mounds one after another; some were already reduced to mere bones.

"It's the scent of rice blossoms..."

"The Yin Corpse Sowing Dao... the rice blossoms have finally covered the land. Countless corpses beneath the earth are transforming into Rice Corpse Yin Soldiers, poised to sweep through the twenty-eight prefectures. They will devour every human they encounter until all humanity in this sentient realm is consumed."

Their running speed and strength were more than double that of an ordinary person.

In a matter of moments, Li Weiwei was surrounded by hundreds of Rice Corpses.

"Thud!"

Li Weiwei unleashed his Dao Heart's Outer Manifestation, sending all the Rice Corpses flying, then continued eastward.

Along the way, the Rice Corpses were endless. Catching the scent of living humans, they would pounce, gnawing and attacking.

Even with Li Weiwei's cultivation, he secretly worried that his spiritual energy would be depleted and his body would be exhausted, as they simply couldn't be killed indefinitely.

"With Fuzhou as the center, several prefectures, including Qiuzhou and Liangzhou, are entirely covered by the power of the Yin Corpse Sowing Dao. As the scent of rice blossoms drifts by, billions of Rice Corpse Yin Soldiers will awaken, becoming predators across the entire sentient realm."

"I only hope that the Zuoqiu Clan can breach the Rice Cult's main altar soon, to resolve this immense catastrophe at its root."

Seven hundred *li* away.

Master Can, resembling a blood-mud figure, arrived from the east. Standing atop a mountain, he gazed at the overwhelming rice blossom pollen spreading across the horizon. "The Yin Corpse Sowing Dao has finally erupted," he murmured. "They intend to transform the Lingxiao sentient realm into a Rice Realm."

A remarkably pleasant voice responded, "The Lingxiao sentient realm is an excellent place to cultivate Benevolent Rice. In a short time, it can produce a large number of Rice People, who can then mine, salvage coffins, and forge magical artifacts, thereby solving the Demon Kingdom's immense shortage of weapons and provisions."

"Yu Daozhen supporting the Rice Cult and establishing the Rice Realm will be a significant achievement for him, allowing him to gain the upper hand in the power struggles within Xiaoyao Capital."

"If he fails at the last hurdle, Demon Consort Chang Yulu and her ruthless faction will surely seize the opportunity to launch an attack."

Xia Jin ascended the mountain, her breathtakingly beautiful eyes gazing towards the distant Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain, which was enveloped by swirling masses of blood mist, resembling a vast cage.

Enveloped in spiritual radiance and the scent of blossoms, she wore a robe of green gauze and feathers. Her figure was exquisitely graceful, and through the ethereal shroud, one could discern her remarkably slender, fair legs and snow-white arms.

She was Xia Jin, the most beautiful of the four Demon Kings of the Lingxiao sentient realm: the Flower Demon of Qixia Lake.

She asked skeptically, "Uncle-master, you wouldn't deceive us, would you? If the Mist Heavenly Son had truly returned, the Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain wouldn't be in this state; he would have settled everything with a single sword stroke long ago."

Master Can cursed, "This old man risked immense danger to see your master, fearing that you would misjudge the situation and follow Qilin Zang to your deaths on the Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain. And you dare to doubt your uncle-master? In this life, your uncle-master dares to do anything, except harm your master."

"Anyway, the situation is clear now! Qilin Zang is back for revenge. You don't really believe he's going to contend with Yu Daozhen for the Lingxiao sentient realm and establish a demon kingdom, do you?"

"If the Rice Realm is established, will your Qixia Lake have any space to survive in the future? Fight! First, destroy the blood sacrifice altars beneath the Immortal Plain."

Xia Jin had already made her decision. "As long as it doesn't involve ascending the Immortal Plain and trapping myself in danger, this King doesn't mind assisting the Mist Heavenly Son. As for my master, her involvement in the battle on the Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain would be too impactful, and our Flower Demon clan cannot afford to risk offending the Flying Phoenix. However, my master will act against the Rice Cult's main altar."

"I hope my junior sister can acquire the 'Book of Radiant Stars'; that would be a huge gain!"

The news that the "Book of Radiant Stars" was at the Rice Cult's main altar was how Master Can managed to lure his junior sister out.

Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain, Beitang Pass.

The armies of the five northern prefectures were arrayed before the pass gates, holding spears and wearing swords, standing ready.

Tang Shituo was stationed outside the Northern Heaven Gate, the northernmost point of the Cloud Heaven Immortal Plain, protecting the lifeline for the evacuation of Lingxiao City's populace.

From this vantage point, he could overlook the epic battle to the south and also witness the fighting outside the eight blood sacrifice altars beneath the Immortal Plain, a battle line stretching for thousands of *li*.

In the northern territory, the two transcendent beings, Old Ancestor Wanyan and Old Ancestor Tuoba, were clashing with two Departed Spirit transcendent beings beneath the Immortal Plain.

Those two Departed Spirit transcendent beings were specifically stationed in this direction to prevent the Snow Sword Tang Clan from destroying the northern blood sacrifice altars.

There were more than just these two Departed Spirit transcendent beings; other figures appeared in the distance near Beitang Pass, deterred by Tang Shituo from making any rash moves. They were waiting for Tang Shituo to head to Lingxiao City, at which point they would seize the opportunity to annihilate the Snow Sword Tang Clan's army and breach the pass.

A vast stream of refugees was evacuating from Lingxiao City's northern gate. Martial cultivators of the Everlasting and Dao Seed realms led the way, followed by those of the Five Seas realm.

The higher their cultivation, the faster they fled.

"Activate the Heaven Gate formation and let them pass."

After Tang Shituo gave the order, his gaze locked onto a black-robed elder hidden within the crowd. With a flicker of his body, he instantly appeared before the elder. "Li Longshu, do you still think you can escape?"

In the next instant, the black-robed elder's body exploded. Li Longshu, who had been concealed within the elder's form, was already severely wounded; how could he possibly be a match for Tang Shituo?

Amidst a scream, Li Longshu perished completely.