Chapter 1747: Return
Countless silver runes surged forth from the underside of the mountain, forming a giant light formation that instantly sent a burst of enormous power crashing downward.
After being struck by the three pillars of golden light, the Dark Beast Monarch had only just barely returned to its senses before an overwhelming weight appeared over its body.
It immediately let loose a thunderous roar of rage and alarm, and its fur instantly stood up on end before transforming into a vast expanse of golden light that surged through the air.
With the Dark Beast Monarch's Body Integration Stage powers, the golden light would've been able to free it from the surrounding restrictions under normal circumstances, but in its severely debilitated state, the golden light only managed to travel around 10 feet away from its body before being stopped cold by the enormous weight crashing down from above.
A fearful look appeared on the Dark Beast Monarch's face.
It possessed a range of powerful abilities, but without magic power to support itself, it was unable to unleash any of them.
Right at this moment, the giant silver ruler up above swayed before conjuring up countless ruler projections, all of which crashed down upon the Dark Beast Monarch.
The Dark Beast Monarch let loose a shrill cry of anguish as its physical body was instantly surrounded by countless arcs of silver lightning, sending the acrid smell of burning flesh and fur wafting through the air.
Right at this moment, a giant azure sword also swept downward from above. The Dark Beast Monarch was completely immobilized by the enormous weight and silver lightning, so it was unable to evade. Azure light flashed, and its body was sliced in half.
A loud explosion rang out, and a golden Dark Beast that was around half the size of the original Dark Beast Monarch suddenly sprang out of the carcass.
A burst of crimson mist erupted from its body, and it flew through the air as a ball of crimson light.
"Hmm?" A faint cry of surprise rang out from the nearby space, following which a resounding boom erupted.
The giant black mountain had instantly teleported through the air before crashing down upon the fleeing crimson light with unerring accuracy.
However, a peculiar scene then ensued.
The crimson light instantly erupted in all directions while a thin streak of golden light shot forth from within; it was a fist-sized golden Dark Beast on this occasion.
It had left behind another empty husk in its attempt to escape.
A cold harrumph rang out from above, and silver light flashed, following which a head-sized silver Fire Raven abruptly appeared ahead of the fleeing miniature Dark Beast. The Fire Raven spread its wings and pounced toward the golden Dark Beast, which didn't have enough time to evade and was devoured by the bird.
The miniature Dark Beast didn't even get a chance to utter a single sound before it was incinerated into nothingness by the Spirit Engulfing Heavenly Flames.
Right at this moment, a dull thunderclap rang out, and an azure and white thread of light abruptly appeared near the silver flames.
The light then receded to reveal Han Li, and he quickly raised a hand and made a grabbing motion.
A thumb-sized golden crystalline core was immediately drawn out of the flames and into his grasp; it was none other than the Dark Beast Monarch's demon core.
Han Li only briefly inspected the demon core before casting his gaze toward another direction.
There, the white winged tiger demon was situated several thousand feet away, appraising the demon core in Han Li's hand in an enraged manner. There was a greedy look in its eyes, but it didn't dare to approach Han Li.
Han Li's eyes narrowed slightly as he waved a hand toward the giant black mountain and silver ruler, upon which both treasures reverted back to their original size before flying back to him.
Meanwhile, he merely held the demon core and stood still in mid-air, appraising the white tiger demon in a completely expressionless manner.
The phenomena taking place in the surrounding area became even more violent, and arcs of silver lightning began to appear among the five-colored clouds.
Immediately thereafter, torrential rain began to fall, and a dense layer of mist appeared over the entire sky.
The white tiger demon became rather blurry in the distance, and it was still hesitating about how to proceed.
Han Li harrumphed coldly as a disdainful look on his face, and he flapped his wings gently, conjuring up balls of azure and white lightning that hovered around him.
A string of loud thunderclaps rang out, and the white tiger demon's pupils abruptly contracted upon seeing this. It then let loose an indignant roar before reluctantly flying away as a ball of white light.
Han Li didn't set off in pursuit of the white tiger. Instead, after it disappeared into the distance, he flapped his wings again, and all of the balls of lightning silently disappeared.
The small black mountain and silver ruler also vanished in a flash.
This white tiger was also at the early-Body Integration Stage, and it had far more magic power left than the Dark Beast Monarch did. The Vast Glacial Realm was about to close soon, so Han Li naturally wasn't willing to take any risks by going after the white tiger beast.
It was simply not worth risking any mishaps at such a critical juncture.
The white tiger beast was clearly quite an intelligent creature. It was extremely furious that Han Li had taken its prey, but the ease with which he had slain the Dark Beast Monarch made it realize that there was no way it could defeat Han Li in its current state. As such, it could only reluctantly depart.
The Leopard Kirin Beast was becoming more and more excited in the spirit beast bracelet, and it was already beginning to snarl incessantly, clearly very eager to get its paws on the Dark Beast Monarch's demon core. It was transmitting its will to Han Li, and he could tell that it was growing very impatient.
A faint smile appeared on his face, and he sent the golden demon core into the storage bracelet.
An elated cry immediately rang out from within the bracelet, and the Leopard Kirin Beast eagerly swallowed the demon core whole. It then transmitted emotions of gratitude toward Han Li before immediately sprawling onto the ground and closing its eyes.
Not long after that, it fell into a deep slumber.
This had already happened once before when the Leopard Kirin Beast had devoured the demon cores of those high-grade Dark Beasts, so Han Li wasn't surprised by this at all. Instead, he was looking forward to seeing how the Leopard Kirin Beast would turn out after this.
The inner core of the Dark Beast Monarch was clearly far superior in caliber to those of the high-grade Dark Beasts, and he was very much looking forward to seeing how it would enhance the Leopard Kirin Beast.
After that, Han Li hovered in mid-air and didn't do anything else.
Several hours later, a thunderous rumbling boom rang out from within the five-colored clouds, and they came plummeting down from above.
Han Li's body was instantly inundated by cloud and mist, within which lightning was flashing violently, and bursts of astonishing spatial fluctuations were surging in all directions.
After about 10 minutes, all of the cloud, mist, and lightning in the sky suddenly dissipated, and Han Li had already vanished.
The same scenes were unfolding all over the Vast Glacial Realm, and thousands of foreign beings were ejected from this realm by the power of laws.
......
Piercing five-colored light flashed before his eyes, and it was impossible to look directly into the light even with his Brightsight Spirit Eyes. The ground beneath his feet then disappeared, and he was struck by a rush of dizziness.
When a solid surface appeared beneath his feet again, a deafening explosion suddenly rang out nearby, following which a chilly sensation descended toward his head.
Han Li was quite startled by this development, and black Qi immediately erupted from his body, upon which his black suit of Heavenly Devilish Armor instantly appeared.
"Clang!" He opened his eyes right as a faint clang rang out, and he looked up to find a flying sword that was around a foot in length above his head. It was currently being kept at bay by the black light being released by his suit of devilish armor, and the owner of the sword was a horned being in a suit of silver armor.
It was a Jiao Chi being!
Han Li's expression darkened as he inspected his surroundings, and he could see all types of treasures and balls of light of different colors hurtling through the air around him.
There were thousands of foreign beings engaged in battle with one another, and close to half of them were Jiao Chi beings, while the rest were the guards of the Heavenly Cloud Races that were responsible for protecting the formations.
High up in the air, there were two gargantuan Jiao Chi Race battle arks that resembled small cities hovering at an altitude over hundreds of thousands of feet. There were even more Jiao Chi beings and Heavenly Cloud beings engaged in battle up there.
Most of the restrictions set up around the two giant formations had already been destroyed, and Cloud City had also become a fierce battlefield.
Strangely enough, there were no holy race beings in this battle; even the most powerful participants in this battle were only at the pinnacle of the Spatial Tempering Stage. Even so, the situation in the city was still extremely chaotic.
The giant formations were buzzing and flashing incessantly, and he seemed to be the only one who had been teleported back thus far, so it was no wonder that he had been attacked first.
Han Li's expression darkened even further, and he looked up at the Jiao Chi being who had just attacked him before sweeping a sleeve through the air to release a small azure sword.
The sword flashed with azure light before suddenly vanishing into thin air.
The Jiao Chi being was quite startled by the fact that Han Li's armor had managed to keep his flying sword at bay, and he was immediately struck by a sense of peril at the sight of the small azure sword that had just disappeared. Spiritual light instantly flashed from his body as he attempted to flee into the distance, but it was already too late.
The azure sword appeared right beside the Jiao Chi being before whizzing around his neck, decapitating him in a flash.
The headless body plummeted from the sky, and the unrelenting sword Qi completely destroyed the Nascent Soul hiding inside the body as well.
Only then did Han Li raise a hand in an expressionless manner to withdraw his flying sword.
Right at this moment, spatial fluctuations suddenly erupted, and four humanoid figures appeared in the formation one after another amid flashes of spiritual light.
Han Li narrowed his eyes, and he immediately recognized two of them; they were none other than Liu Shui'er and Shi Kun.
The other two consisted of an ordinary-looking middle-aged man and a young man, both of whom had entered the Vast Glacial Realm as part of his group.
Han Li swept his gaze over the middle-aged man, and his pupils abruptly contracted as he detected the early-Body Integration Stage spiritual pressure emanating from his body. This completely mundane-looking middle-aged man had successfully made a breakthrough in the Vast Glacial Realm.
The remaining three displayed no changes in their spiritual pressure, so they had all clearly failed.
At this moment, spiritual light flashed from the other formation, and four more people appeared.
Han Li cast his gaze toward that direction and only recognized one of the people there; it was Fairy Yue. The elderly man with the Xu surname was nowhere to be seen.
Fairy Yue wore a faint smile on her face, and her aura had also completely changed, indicating that she had also succeeded in her breakthrough to the early-Body Integration Stage.