113 A Heaven-Shaking Sword Beam

The beast tide had been raging for over a month with no signs of abating. Eight Golden Core-stage demon beasts had sealed the void, cutting off all communication for those trapped within. More cunningly, the demon clans had covertly employed secret arts to shroud Hutuo Island for the entire duration, ensuring that no one from the outside world discovered the anomaly.

Hutuo Island sat thirty thousand miles from the Heavenly Sword Sect—a distance neither too far nor too near. Without a passing Golden Core master, it would be impossible for mere Foundation Establishment cultivators to perceive the disturbance.

Within the Big Dipper Seven-Kill Formation, Pang Yue looked exhausted, yet his eyes burned with increasing intensity. A full month of sleepless combat had forced him to continuously push his avatar’s potential to its limits, honing his cultivation. As the saying goes, talent cannot be spurred without adversity, and one cannot achieve greatness without deep contemplation and facing peril! The only drawback of this avatar was its short cultivation history, but by leveraging the massive influx of heaven and earth energy gathered by the formation, this month of bitter struggle had propelled him to the fifth level of the Foundation Establishment realm. He deployed the Cloud Heaven Nine-Scene Sword Technique repeatedly, holding the defensive line firm.

Of the others from the Heavenly Sword Sect, only Timur and Cao Jingzong had managed to endure alongside him from the very beginning. The other four had been forced to retreat to the Mingxin Sword Sect to recuperate. Whenever a vacancy appeared in the formation, Cao Jingzong would have the purple gourd behind him unleash a world-shaking streak of sword light to fill the gap.

"Fellow brothers and sisters, stay alert! The eight Golden Core demon lords are losing patience; they intend to use lightning-fast tactics to break our formation while our spirits are fatigued!" Cao Jingzong, who oversaw the entire operation of the Big Dipper Seven-Kill Formation, kept a constant watch on the movements of the eight great demons.

Pang Yue grew cautious. The Golden Core demons of Ten Thousand Demon Island were not like the beasts of the outer seas; their intelligence was on par with human cultivators. Success or failure hinged on a single, fleeting moment! The previous month of attacks had been merely an appetizer.

Suddenly, Pang Yue reached out and grabbed a monstrous fish-beast, slicing it open with a flick of his finger. A pitch-black demonic vine, adorned with ten-colored exotic flowers, silently flew out from the fish’s carcass and came to his side. The vine carried two magical artifacts: an amber-gold octagonal square pot engraved with patterns of azure dragons, fire phoenixes, cranes, and chimera, shimmering with a faint, wondrous gray divine light; and a primitive square mirror with a chilling, icy luster. These were the Demon-Refining Pot and the Profound-Fixing Mirror, delivered by his Demon-Talisman avatar.

The Demon-Refining Pot, through the long-term refinement of his true self and avatar, had reached the pinnacle of top-tier artifacts, only a hair’s breadth away from becoming a first-grade dharma treasure. The Profound-Fixing Mirror had just entered the threshold of mid-tier artifacts. These two treasures from his past life brought Pang Yue an indescribable sense of confidence and security. He exhaled a long breath, feeling the tight, strained tension in his heart finally begin to ease.

Half a day later, exactly as Cao Jingzong had anticipated, the eight gargantuan Golden Core demon beasts outside Hutuo Island suddenly transformed into eight streaks of heaven-shaking light, charging toward the island. One streak shifted shape into a woman in a plain green dress, possessing almond-shaped eyes and peach-blossom cheeks—a beauty of unparalleled grace. She lunged straight at Pang Yue, waving her hand to unleash a surge of ink-black demonic energy that instantly breached the defense of his Cloud Heaven Nine-Scene Sword Technique.

"You have been arrogant for long enough; now suffer my blow!" the woman shrieked. Behind her, the black demonic energy morphed into a tentacle, lashing out to entangle Pang Yue.

Pang Yue sighed to himself, "The Demon-Talisman avatar truly arrived at the perfect time!" He poured his magic into the Demon-Refining Pot, brushing a wave of gray divine light toward the tentacle. The corrosive black energy, colliding with the gray radiance, rippled violently before its momentum plummeted. In an instant, the tentacle was extinguished.

The woman’s eyes widened in horror. Chilled, she barked, "What treasure is that in your hand?!"

Pang Yue had no intention of answering. He activated the pot, and the gray divine light swept across, instantly engulfing the woman. She felt her demonic power and aura forcibly suppressed by an entire realm, dropping from Golden Core to the late Foundation Establishment stage. Her brows knitted in alarm, and she surged her power, attempting to break the binding.

Suddenly, a brilliant, peerless streak of sword light slashed across the horizon, splitting the sky in two! The timing was impeccable, the precision divine! The sword light was swift and flawless. The Golden Core demon had been suppressed by the Demon-Refining Pot for less than a single breath. In the fleeting moment of her confusion and surprise, the sword light struck with terrifying sharpness, cleaving her in two.

In the duels of sword cultivators, victory or defeat is decided in a heartbeat. Even after a month of bitter fighting, there remained a hidden, inexhaustible reserve of power! After the woman fell, she revealed her true form: a gargantuan squid. On one of her tentacles hung a jade bracelet, flickering with faint spatial fluctuations—clearly a storage treasure. Pang Yue flickered his sword light, severed the tentacle, and retrieved the bracelet.

More demons surged toward him, but Pang Yue, hidden within the luminous hub of the Big Dipper Seven-Kill Formation, remained shielded by the gray divine light. Any beast that ventured within a hundred feet of him had its cultivation stripped by a realm; those at Foundation Establishment were reduced to Qi-Refining, and those at Qi-Refining became mere beasts. A sky filled with sword light swept forward, covering the southeastern horizon and reaping lives incessantly.

Suddenly, a thunderous explosion rocked the island! The sea surged in reverse, and the sky roiled with shockwaves. A massive, azure-colored fish with a long tail was struck by a streak of blinding sword light that descended like a rainbow from the heavens, slicing it clean in two! The sword light pierced the sky with unparalleled ferocity, and after felling the fish, it surged forward, expanding instantly to strike another Golden Core demon!

"It’s Cao Jingzong!" Pang Yue was stunned. Only today did he realize that there is always someone better, a mountain beyond a mountain! He watched as the sword light swept across the sky, felling another great demon with a single strike. "Even if I were to fully unleash my Cold Ice Demonic Sword, I could not achieve this level of power. Cao Jingzong must be borrowing the strength of the Big Dipper Seven-Kill Formation..." Pang Yue analyzed inwardly.

The sword light felled a third Golden Core demon before vanishing in an instant. Including the one Pang Yue had killed, four of the eight great demons had been eradicated in mere moments! Cao Jingzong stood in the void, silently recovering his strength. Timur and the others fought in pairs, holding their own against the remaining demons. The Master of the Mingxin Sword Sect, Xiaoyue, utilized the sect’s grand formation to trap another demon, holding the upper hand.

Cao Jingzong had single-handedly turned the tide of battle in a flash of lightning! Of course, Pang Yue was an unexpected variable in this; had he not slain one of the demons, Cao Jingzong might have been forced to sacrifice his own foundation to fight alongside him. Cao Jingzong opened his eyes, looked toward Pang Yue, and offered a grateful smile.

Nearby, Master Xiaoyue finally finished off her opponent and moved to assist in the slaughter of the remaining three demons. Victory was certain!