The days that followed Li Yi's trial passed in an eerie calm, as if the world itself held its breath. But beneath the surface, across the boundless stretches of the Xuan Realm, tremors began to stir—both in spirit and in stone.
In the southern expanse of the continent, far beyond the Qingxuan Mountains and the Whispering Cliffs, the Soultear Plains stretched endlessly. Once barren and quiet, it now boiled with corrupted Qi. Strange purple storms churned overhead, and twisted beasts roamed the land in restless herds.
At the heart of the corruption, a single rift pulsed—barely larger than a man's head, suspended a hundred meters above a blackened altar.
It was the crack in the seal.
No ordinary cultivator could approach it; those who did found their spirits unmoored, their bodies bloated and warped by abyssal energy. Even peak-stage Ascendant Soul cultivators of the Upper Clans who tried to study it fell to their knees, vomiting blood as the space around them screamed in resistance.
Only one figure stood beneath it, unaffected.
A tall man draped in flowing black robes, his face concealed behind a mask carved from obsidian, lines of violet energy flickering across his arms like runes made from lightning. His aura was silent—unreadable—yet every beast within a thousand li bowed instinctively, their skulls pressed to the earth.
He was the Void Heir.
With a single gesture, he tore a lesser realm from existence—collapsing it into nothing more than spiritual dust—and funneled its remnants into the rift. The crack trembled. It grew wider by the width of a single hair.
He whispered to it like a lover.
> "Soon."
---
Back in the Qingxuan Sect, atop a floating platform that hovered above an ancient formation stone, Li Yi stood with Lan Qing'er, Mo Ruyan, Xue Lian, and three elders of the sect's inner council. Around them, formation diagrams flickered across jade tablets, showing everything from weather disturbances to sudden death zones in remote forests.
"I've seen this pattern before," Elder Wen muttered, his brows furrowed. "The Void energy is devouring spiritual nodes. Once they're drained, they collapse the ley lines of the region, causing imbalance. The Soultear Plains will soon be a dead zone."
Lan Qing'er turned to Li Yi. "What do you plan to do?"
He stared at the projection of the crack. Even from a magical illusion, its presence made his Chaos Core tremble.
"Fight it," he replied. "We need to seal the crack."
The room fell silent.
Xue Lian chuckled darkly. "You say it like sealing the sky is a casual affair."
Li Yi didn't respond. His hand rested lightly on the hilt of his mist-blade—the one he'd claimed during the Trial of Conviction. It hummed gently, as if sensing the coming tide.
"Prepare the sect's mobile formations," Li Yi ordered. "Gather all cultivators at Core Formation and above. Send word to the four allied sects. We move in five days."
"And if they refuse to help?" asked Mo Ruyan.
"They won't," Li Yi said. "If the crack widens, they die too."
---
Day One of Preparation
Li Yi secluded himself beneath the Starfire Pagoda, a structure built to harness celestial energy from the Nine Heavens. There, surrounded by flowing silver starlight, he sat in a lotus position, refining his core with the Celestial Breathing Technique. Every inhale drew constellations into his body; every exhale expelled impurity.
He had already reached Nascent Chaos Realm – Peak Stage during the Trial of Origin. But now, he was pushing toward the threshold of Immortal Ascension.
That threshold was terrifying.
One misstep would cause his divine soul to collapse, his Chaos Core to explode, and his entire cultivation path to turn to ash.
But Li Yi was not afraid.
He stretched his divine sense outward, merging it with the stars overhead, using the Starlight Harmonization Sutra to synchronize his soul with cosmic rhythm. In that moment, he saw through time.
He saw a vision of his mother, cloaked in moonlight, battling a horde of abyssal demons. Her blade danced between worlds. Her aura shook space.
And beyond her—a fortress made of divine gold, cracked and bloodied. The last bastion of the God Realm.
He opened his eyes.
> "I must ascend. For her… and for all realms."
---
Day Two
Mo Ruyan led the formation corps, engraving complex runic arrays into massive jade slabs, designed to amplify offensive and defensive techniques.
Meanwhile, Xue Lian forged spiritual anchors using soul-metal from meteorite fragments, crafting weapons capable of resisting abyssal corruption.
Lan Qing'er delved into forbidden records from the Sect's secret archives, uncovering notes left by the founder of the Qingxuan Sect—himself a survivor of the last Abyssal invasion, ten thousand years ago.
She found a prophecy:
> "When stars descend and chaos blooms, A child born of three realms shall rise. One foot in shadow, one hand in flame, They shall seal the rift with blood and name."
She read it again and again.
Her hand trembled as she looked toward the heavens, then toward the secluded pagoda where Li Yi still meditated.
> "Born of three realms…"
She understood.
---
Day Three
Li Yi emerged.
His aura had changed. The air around him shimmered with primal order and raw chaos, flowing together in harmony. His eyes glowed with starlight, and each step he took left behind a faint trail of ethereal mist.
Though he had not broken through to Immortal Ascension yet, his body and spirit were ready.
"Tomorrow," he said to the gathered cultivators, "we march."
The Qingxuan Sect's army—numbering over six hundred Core Formation cultivators, fifty Nascent Soul elders, and a dozen Ascendant experts—gathered in formation beneath the floating platform.
Beside them stood warriors from allied sects—the Stormwind Temple, the Scarlet Saber Sect, the Jade Orchid Pavilion, and the Nine Serpent Clan.
All had come.
All had seen the signs.
Li Yi raised his sword to the sky. "We fight not for power. Not for legacy. But to protect the heavens below from the abyss above. We are the wall between realms. Let no demon pass."
The cheers echoed across the mountains.
---
Day Four: The March
The army moved like a flowing river of light and Qi, protected by layered formations, spirit beasts, and artifact-laden airships.
Along the way, they encountered corrupted zones—once lush forests now reduced to skeletal trees bleeding black sap. Li Yi paused at one such site, closing his eyes.
He extended his Chaos Qi and purified the land. Flowers bloomed in his wake. Birds returned.
The cultivators behind him stared in awe.
> "He doesn't just destroy," whispered one disciple. "He heals."
Xue Lian smiled faintly. "That's why he'll win."
---
Day Five: The Crack in the Sky
They reached the Soultear Plains at dawn.
Lightning danced across the sky, and the rift pulsed violently above the black altar, wider now—perhaps the size of a carriage wheel.
The Void Heir stood before it.
He turned as they arrived, tilting his head. "So… the son of Li Tianyu and the Moonflame Princess finally steps forward."
Li Yi narrowed his eyes. "You know who I am?"
"I knew before you did," the Void Heir said. "Your birth was prophesied long before the seal was formed. You are the only threat to the Abyss."
"Then I won't disappoint."
They launched the attack.
Elders unleashed divine techniques. Formation masters triggered elemental storms. Array masters locked the rift's fluctuations, sealing it in momentary stillness.
Li Yi shot forward like a comet.
He and the Void Heir clashed mid-air, each strike shaking the plains below.
Blade met palm.
Fist met divine Qi.
They moved faster than light, exchanging hundreds of blows in seconds. Li Yi's Chaos Core pulsed in rhythm with the stars. His mist-blade morphed in real-time, adapting to the Void Heir's techniques.
But his opponent was relentless.
"You are strong," the Void Heir admitted. "But you have not ascended. You are still tethered to mortality."
Li Yi grinned. "Then let me show you what mortality can do."
He released it.
The technique he had prepared for this moment—the fusion of the Celestial Breathing Technique and the Starlight Sutra.
> "Primordial Chaos: Celestial Descent!"
A beam of starlight pierced the sky, crashing into the rift. The crack screamed, trembled, and halted its growth.
The Void Heir fell back, arm cracked, blood trailing behind him.
Li Yi collapsed to one knee, drained.
But the sky did not widen.
For the first time, the abyss recoiled.
---
End of Chapter 33