The Blood God

Twenty four swirling universes hovered above a battleground that was formerly the temporary camp of the anti-devil alliance. An unexpected invasion forced Zulong to quickly unleash the Twenty-Four Sea Calming Pearls to lend support to his army. Da Hai just left, Yi Fei'e just left, the devils just had to pick this time to suddenly attack.

Yet Zulong could not put his current situation down as a surprise. After all, the Devilish Dao's tactic to lure him away by attacking his home fit right in to this current strategy. Even as he stomped a hundred Golden Immortal ghost devils to death, he lamented the sheer consistency of the forces that constantly attacked them.

The dragon craned his neck up, briefly catching glimpses of his female counterpart. Her dazzling form was engulfed in mesmerizing flames, clashing against a ferocious enemy. Their other counterpart, Qi An was not present sadly. Last he heard, the Qilin Sovereign was moving around the West Continent on his own again. His help would've been appreciated.

It was not purely ghost devils who came. Though they represented a majority, what with familiar faces who'd fallen not long ago along with devils across all of the west's history who'd long passed on. Living devils supplemented their forces, using their ghostly ancestors as shields.

UWOO!

Zulong felt a sudden surge of yin based qi from his left. His dragonic eyes darted in that direction to see the Chongming Bird battling it out with a ghost devil. Yet it was not a standard ghost devil, it was a fused hodgepodge of deceased beings mixing their power together.

'New trick?'

To him, it felt like a battle formation that allowed numerous weaker cultivators to pool their strength together in order to fight a greater foe. At the same time, it was different in a sense that this did not seem like people co-operating, rather a fusion in a more literal sense.

"Cursed dragon die!"

Zulong's long body curled into the air. A male devil flew by him wielding a middle rank xiantian spiritual treasure hammer. Its edge bounced off his shining scales. Zulong gave this devil no indication as he used this opportunity to rip the fiend's head off.

"Damn you!" The devil shouted. Despite losing his head, the devil wasn't dead yet. Zulong used his tail as a whip and struck him deep into the ground below. His opponent was only a Great Principle Chaos Immortal, so the dragon didn't know what he was thinking attacking him with no support.

"ARGH!" Zufeng yelled above him. Her wings were brought before herself as a shield. Her opponent, the true source of Zulong's concern was cornering her despite her great cultivation.

"Hundun!" Zulong roared. He had to dart across the battlefield to even get to these two. But knowing the threat a Limitless Supreme Chaos Immortal posed, he had little choice but to put him as his first priority.

"Ah Da Hai's eldest disciple. I have never truly fought you before, let me test what he's teached you," Hundun cheerfully said. His cloaked form stood admits the burning hell Zufeng unleashed to jog towards the dragon sintead. His attitude threw Zulong off more and more.

"Hundun! Tell me, what did you do with my brother?"

"You'll have to be specific, I've fought two of your brothers," he replied to the furious dragon.

Strictly speaking, Hundun should have alot of grievances with his whole lineage. Yet from the looks of it, this godfiend was having fun with them. He did not unleash his true form, nor did he give his all. There was no doubt Hundun was fighting them seriously, but they could tell he was holding trump cards back.

Yet the faceless deity traded strikes with Zulong. Despite the latter using 'Nine Clawed Killing' along with a slew of powerful spells, Hundun countered them all with equal force. Zufeng joined the dragon a second later and the three darted across the battlefield.

It was as if Hundun was being pushed back. From time to time, their flight took them racing through devil lines. This naturally resulting in weaker devils being ripped apart by the shockwaves of their battle.

Other dragons were fighting hard despite losing a chunk of their forces to reinforcing the oceans. Leize was the only leading figure among Primal Zenith Chaos Immortals present after Jiang Koilong was ordered to move out. The lighting dragon felt true pain at the poor timing.

As much as the pure blooded dragon hated to admit it, the immortal cultivators from the East Continent helped alot to alleviate the pressure. Now the majority of them were gone too. He couldn't help but think Zulong made a misstep by just letting them go. That his heart was too soft after hearing them experiencing the same crisis his home was undergoing.

"DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!"

The cries of a macaque beating his chest was another sight to behold. Liu Er, sporting a large bruise on his cheek fought like a madman. He grinned gleefully holding the shattered remains of another treasure he broke accidentally with his titanic strength.

He summersaulted callously through the dying devil giant, right onto the face of another devil who he latched onto. The devil, despite being a Primal Origin Chaos Immortal howled in pain as a part of his face was ripped off and swallowed by the monkey's gaping maw. He stumbled his footsteps, crashing through the side of a pavilion

"Thank goodness for that," Leize murmured as he tangled with his own opponents. Say what you will about him, but Liu Er was wrecking havoc among the devil forces. The lightning dragon gripped the devil he was fighting's head.

"Unhand me worm," the devil screamed. But Leize wrapped his entire body around the devil's immense body. He understood that he lacked the raw physical strength of crushing this devil like his ancestor Zulong. Instead, he electrocuted the dragon with heavenly lighting cultivated after a million years.

As the ground beneath them both shattered piece by piece, Leize caught sight of another junior fighting. Leizhu the self proclaimed Thunder Patriarch, with the head of a bird and a muscular body, was beating a set of drums. He unleashed scores of electricity that penetrated the ghostly bodies of the ghost devils he was fighting.

'Give him a few yuanhui and he may even overtake me,' Leize wondered with anticipation. If there was one good thing about this war, it gave opportunities for young heroes to reveal themselves.

"Hey that was my kill!" Liu Er's scream brought his attention back. This time, Leize witnessed the seven armed Houtu encasing the devil Liu Er was killing earlier in a shell of dirt. Houtu seemingly ignored Liu Er, and with a snarling face, compressed the devil into a tiny ball.

"You animal! That pavilion was the healing ward!" She angrily chastised the macaque.

"Yeah no need to yell Karen," Liu Er said. "Fuck's sake, people die all the time," he added in his normal voice. As if he didn't care he'd angered the goddess born of Pangu's blood at all.

"You," Houtu recoiled at the monkey's attitude.

"You two stop bickering!" Leize ordered from across the sky. "Resolve it after the danger's over."

Liu Er smirked with a smug grin. He either didn't notice the bruise on his face getting in the way or didn't care. Houtu can't quite tell, she only relented when a claw rested on her shoulder.

"Come on sister, ignore him," Zhu Jiuyin said. "We have to help the rest of our siblings."

"My charges…too many…too much," Houtu spat with bated breath. Her ears were ringing at the noise. But it was not the sound of battle she was paying attention to, nor the screams of those fighting. "Second brother, it's so loud. It's so cold. I feel…I feel."

"What is?" Zhu Jiuyin narrowed his gaze. But he had to pull his attention away to face another horde of ghost devils as well as a few living ones.

"So much dead, so much suffering. The soil can't handle it for much longer," Houtu said after her elder brother moved away. "Death is being overwhelmed. What should I do?"

…

Minghe could feel something approaching, a tranquil and peaceful feeling full of warmth and compassion. It was not an unfamiliar feeling, he'd sensed it before during this adventure into the West Continent. Sometimes there in the distance, quickly coming in and out of his peripheral vision.

He hated it.

He opened his eyes in a pool of darkness. Abi and Yuantu were held in his arms like the trusted partners they were. Joining them together, he stabbed forward.

SHAA!

Minghe emerged from the stomach of a dying devil. Blood sprayed everywhere with forty percent of it directly onto his person. His pieces of organs clung onto his body, all dripping with crimson liquid.

"I thought you were dead," Rushou, one of the twelve connate lifeforms from Buzhou said in bewilderment. He was holding a long spear made of steel and riding on to soulless metal dragon statues, one foot on each dragon. He stared at the bloody scene around him.

Unlike many, Minghe deliberately ignored ghost devils. He only ever attacked living devils, and he'd always made sure to cut them surgically to spray the most blood possible. Around Minghe was a mountain of corpses.

"You know according to intelligence, more will just take this lot's place. Those dragon folks said it's better to cripple them," Rushou said.

"Good, the higher the cultivation, the higher essence their blood will have," Minghe said in the same quiet tone he'd always spoken in.

Rushou shrugged, he stabbed his spear down saying, "You missed a few by the way." The dragons beneath his feet were already busy biting into the intact Nascent Souls hiding in place.

"Rushou, there you are," Di Jiang's deep voice signaled the flabby creatures appearance. "Don't run off so suddenly, we have to stick together." Di Jiang's wings flapped furiously, Minghe wondered how they could even lift the creature.

"Minghe right?" Di Jiang greeted the blood god. They've never talked, but Di Jiang was aware of this man.

"Hello brothers," Minghe said. This seemingly familiar form of address sounded like nothing coming from Minghe, but it alarmed Di Jiang and Rushou.

"What is the meaning of this?" Di Jiang asked.

"You're born from blood, I was born from his belly button. We're both filthy," Minghe said with a small smile that drew Di Jiang's ire. Though neither side started a fight, Di Jiang's opinions of this warrior went down severely. Conversely, Minghe held not real resentment for them.

It was only the appearance of a giant orca that broke the ice. Di Jiang's eyeless face was alarmed, this being came so quick. Minghe and Rushou could both see the fleshy remains of Colossal Shark clan members clutched in its jaw.

"Hm? Innate gods," the Orca patriarch said. He swallowed the sharks down his throat and transformed into a man who looked to be in his thirties with half black, and half white hair. "As the top predator of the seas, may I interest you all to end this pointless battle and surrender to the my glorious Devilish Dao?"

"Top predator of the seas? You're dreaming," Gonggong and Xuanming had also made their way here. The twelve brothers may've split up into groups throughout the battle, but they were never far apart. "Only I Gonggong, the god of water deserves that title!"

"My comrades spoke of you guys," the orca devil said. "You all held up the heavens previously. Back then it was impressive even though for me who was already a Primal Zenith Chaos Immortal. But I've grown exponentially since that period as well."

Minghe sniffed the air around him and started smiling in an understanding look. "How filthy, all the blood around him. They're screaming at you. You're a compatriot closer to me then these guys." He drew Abi and Yuantu and attacked without hesitation.

Minghe's cultivation was only at the Primal Origin Chaos Immortal realm. Even though four of the twelve brothers from Buzhou starting fighting alongside him, all of them were hard pressed by the devil. Their brawl started as another great battle that drew numerous attention.

Minghe's figure was surrounded by crimson liquid. Blood flowed around him and his swords like rising waves of seawater. Both Abi and Yuantu were stained with so much grime, it was unbecoming of treasures of their level.

Di Jiang's punches, Minghe's slashes, it drew Liu Er's attention as well. Of course, the monkey's thoughts were a bit different from others. 'Minghe is nothing more then a moron who copied others and failed at everything. Nothing but a slave to destiny. Even those swords are worthless. No, I'll collect his 12 Pet…12 Petal…Peta…Pe…12 Ranked Red Lotus later.'

Liu Er was smirking as he digested more and more devils. He half consciously felt stronger and stronger, as if more and more secrets of the universe was unlocked in his mind. The other half continued on as normal, like the regular Liu Er who thought only of himself.

Beneath the light generated by the twenty four swirling universes, the orca gave his opponents a beatdown. His magical arts appeared around him like black ink, yet their pressure irradiated with bloodlust. Like knifes, they dug into the flesh of Pangu's children.

Di Jiang found himself bleeding, one of the rare occasions this has ever occurred. Gonggong could not believe his flesh was damaged to this extent. Rushou's metallic skin could barely hold back these cuts.

The bloated Di Jiang attempted to bear hug the Orca, hoping to crush spacetime around him to permanently erase the Primal Zenith expert. He only found a black spear condensed from the devil's power piercing his abdomen.

As the Orca devil slashed Minghe hoping to bisect the innate god, his hand struck true. Minghe paled as his lower body detached, it quickly transformed into a mass of crimson water much to everyone's shock. A second palm strike shattered Minghe's physical form into a rain of crimson liquid.

"The smell of iron, blood?" The Orca devil backed away from Minghe, who'd retaliated by using Abi and Yuantu. Both swords did not need to be held to obey. His 12 Petals Red Lotus spun behind the mass of water that was once Minghe, suddenly transforming into an inferno.

The screams of untold quintillions of living beings sundered the ears of everyone indiscriminately. It got so bad, Minghe's own allies a great distance away clutched their heads in pain.

Devils, dragons, avians, innate creatures, even devils below certain power thresholds felt nauseous. Zulong, Zufeng, Leize, many high level experts could see with their senses that there was something disturbing about Minghe's move. To them who had gathered karmic merit in the past, this was the antithesis.

THUD!

The Orca devil felt his ears bleed facing the inferno. Under Minghe's command, his red lotus condensed into a wheel full of screaming voices. Insane curses, insane ramblings, the build up of resentment within transformed into a red multi armed giant. Its physical strength vastly exceeded it's own creator.

Minghe could sighed in relief as masses of crimson water reformed his body. "As long as the Blood Sea never dries, I'll never die."

"Nice trick," the Orca devil released his true form once again. He was shocked sure, and while devils cannot claim to be unaffected, their penchant for excessive indulgence in their own emotions and desires lessened the effect.

"STOP! MAKE THIS STOP!" Houtu's distant cry could be heard by her brothers near Minghe. Di Jiang did not hesitate to act.

"Stop that comrade!"

"Why? He's on the backfoot, we'll slaughter him."

"Look closer you maniac, you do nothing but impede your allies!"

Di Jiang was right in the end. Minghe's mastery was simply not high enough, the giant orca controlled two streams of water which ripped the multi armed giant into a gory mess. Sinful blood fell onto Minghe like an avalanche.

"HAAaaaa!" The blood god did not dodge, he welcomed it. His cloths stained red, his hair damp, his skin painted by crimson. That devil may've ended his spell, may be vastly superior than him, but Minghe still wanted to kill him.

"Ignorant brat," the orca said. "Ever seen the Colossal Shark ancestor? I'll treat you just like I treated him."

"Return favour. Colossal Shark's. Behalf."

The orca devil, Minghe, Di Jiang, and the rest found the ground beneath them distorting. Up became down, left became right, front became back. Di Jiang felt so dizzy, he gripped his knees to stabilize himself.

THWACK!

Yet the orca's flipper reacted as if the vertigo effect did not bother him. It parried the kick of Chenghuang's furry hind legs. His finned tale rose in response, emanating ferocious power that ripped apart the fabrics of reality.

"West Sea. You Lived," Chenghuang said as he began his own engagement with the devil.

"Indeed, my kind was driven out of the West Sea by your masters," the orca said. "But it helped us find the right path."

The foxlike Chenghuang danced around the larger devil. The latter could garner much greater power strikes. The techniques passed down to Chenghuang by the godfiend Shangxia did not seem to be working.

Within his mind, Chenghuang could already guess why. The path of Seven Emotions and Six Desires also held tremendous control over their own senses. The desires portion, which detailed the body's senses made it nigh impossible for a sufficiently powerful devil to lose control of them.

"Even with a Primal Zenith Chaos Immortal like that fox thing, it isn't enough?" Gonggong muttered.

Di Jiang was heavily injured, and Minghe was looking for openings to attack. Neither anticipated a ball of fire slamming into the orca's body.

"Who?" The devil cultivator was kicked back again by Chenghuang. Rows of flaming arrows descended like solar rays. With this support, Chenghuang disengaged to safety from the orca after leaving a bleeding slash wound.

A fiery beam of light descended beside Di Jiang, a charming man the same size as Di Jiang held out his hand. Di Jiang's featureless face displayed nothing as he accepted the hand in question.

"Solar Star Di Jun," the charming man introduced himself. "Glad our group came back just in time."

"Bt Buzhou Di Jiang, this is our first time speaking," Di Jiang returned the greeting.

Above them, dozens of Chaos Immortals joined the fray. Most importantly of all, a massive moth flew to engage Hundun.

BANG!

Di Jun and Di Jiang peered back over to the orca. They found the devil flinching from having been struck by a massive bell. Taiyi's form made several hand gestures to perform offensives spells with the Chaos Bell.

"Yeah! Show him the might of the Solar Star!" Di Jun cheered.

…

In the battlefield consisting mainly of ghost devils, the golden presence of Jieyin and Zhunti arrived with clasped hands. Both of them immediately began chanting.

"Those two, I know them," a ghost devil said. "You two sacrilegious thieves always pronouncing around our land. You two will die here."

"Junior brother, let's send these poor souls away first," Jieyin said. His radiant light was like cancer for these ghost devils. They suddenly found themselves screaming like never before. Even numerous devil higherups were startled

"This light, it's dampening our mantras," a Chaos Immortal devil realized. As the two innate gods stayed fairly lowkey, much of their powers were hearsay. For whatever reason, their unique techniques acted so strongly against devil arts.

Hundun was still trading blows with Zulong and Zufeng. His featureless face chuckled at the sight of Jieyin and Zhunti. "Those two rascals are finally displaying their might. Always knew they were talented."

"You two, let's end things here for now," Hundun said to both sovereigns. He spread his arms, unleashing a wide flurry of force. The made enough distance for Hundun to start ripping into the void between realms. "I've got better things to do."

"Wait!"

"Oh before I go. DEVILS! THE BATTLE IS LOST, RETREAT!" Hundun's voice echoed the final command this invading force will see.

Zulong didn't seem like he'd accept that. His serpentine form lunged forward claws raised. But he could not grab hold of the godfiend. "Damn him!" He roared.

He stilled mid air, soon he turned back around. Zufeng was already flying back to clean up straggling devils.

"Big brother," Yi Fei'e and Yinglong appeared by his side soon after. The former retook he small Dao body while the latter's appearance made Zulong's heart ache. Yinglong had assumed his true form to greet Zulong, but the sovereign wished he hadn't.

Yinglong's physical appearance looked weak. But Zulong's gaze lay within his brother. "I swear I'll kill that Hundun," he promised.

"Your participation in this war is over," he further added. "I'll escort you to a safe location immediately."

"You don't have to baby me," Yinglong said. "My Dao fruit may be damaged, but its something I can bounce back from. Focus on the war brother, you're needed here more."

As things calmed down again, the army fully reorganized itself. At some point along the way, Jieyin and Zhunti came to see Zulong and Zufeng. A newly returned Qi An joined them as well.

Few days after that, the two western brothers left feeling disappointed. While Zulong and Zufeng said they wouldn't go out of their way to destroy the west nor its mortal inhabitants. They also didn't care if they got in the way. Essentially how they did things until now.

In the far east, another encounter by two innate gods was about to take place.