Chapter 74: Contest of Domains, The Pure Land of the Mortal World

My voice was not loud, yet it rang out clearly in the ears of every cultivator present.

“Late?” Xuan Sha acted as if he had just heard the world’s most ludicrous joke. He burst into a wild, arrogant laughter, dripping with disdain. “In my presence, time is defined by me! As for these ants…”

His dark red eyes swept over the bewildered mortals on the ground, filled with contempt and cruelty.

“To die beneath my demonic might is an honor for them!”

Before he finished speaking, the four guardians behind him formed hand seals simultaneously. Four streams of pitch-black demonic energy soared skyward, interweaving in midair to become a vast black dome, sealing off an area a thousand meters around, isolating it from the outside world.

It was the Demon Sect’s “Four Directions Heaven-locking Array.” Once deployed, nothing that transpired within could be glimpsed from without.

Only after completing this did Xuan Sha return his gaze to me, his grin twisting into something even more sinister. “Now, the stage is set. No one will disturb us. Tell me your name—I do not kill the nameless!”

“You are not worthy to know,” I answered calmly.

“Courting death!”

Xuan Sha was finally enraged. He wasted no more words, and with a sudden motion, pressed both hands downward.

“Demon Domain: All-Encompassing Netherworld!”

Boom!

Centered on him, endless black mist poured out like ink into clear water, spreading madly in all directions. The ground began to crack; the asphalt road turned into a parched, blood-red wasteland. The surrounding skyscrapers were corroded by the darkness, their walls sloughing away, transforming into grim mountains of bone. The air filled with the wails of countless resentful spirits, as though the entire Chunxi Road had, in that instant, been dragged into the depths of hell.

This was Xuan Sha’s domain! He forcibly twisted the real world into a demonic realm under his control.

Within this domain, he was a god.

The hidden onlookers scattered throughout the area were all aghast.

“It’s a domain! Xuan Sha has actually achieved a domain!” Tang Ao exclaimed in shock.

“Retreat! If we’re swept into the domain, we’re dead for sure!” The master of Kunlun, Xuan Tianzong, hurriedly led his disciples to the edge of the great array.

A domain was the hallmark of the peak of the Golden Core stage, the threshold to higher realms. In their understanding, once caught within a true expert’s domain, one was at the mercy of another.

Yet, just as the demonic realm was about to engulf Yi Yi and me, I raised my foot and gently stamped the ground.

There was no earth-shattering roar, no dazzling spectacle of light. Only a gentle, jade-like radiance spread from me, rippling outward in silence like water.

Wherever the clear light touched, a miracle occurred.

The parched, blood-red earth returned to clean, orderly paving stones of the pedestrian street.

The hideous mountains of bone restored themselves to gleaming glass facades.

The shrill wails of ghosts were replaced by the soothing background music from a café.

My pure light and Xuan Sha’s demonic domain formed a distinct boundary within this small area.

Within a hundred meters of me, Chunxi Road remained as it had always been: sunlit, vibrant, filled with the bustle of mortal life.

Beyond that hundred meters, chaos and demonic winds reigned—a nether hell.

My domain had no name.

It was simply the embodiment of my heart’s desire—a tranquil, pure land amidst the world.

The arrogant smile on Xuan Sha’s face froze completely. He stared, wide-eyed, in utter disbelief at the scene before him.

His demonic domain was his strongest weapon, the source of his pride. It allowed him to crush any peer with ease.

Yet now, his domain was blocked. No—that wasn’t even a block. The opponent had shown no sign of strain at all, but effortlessly kept his domain at bay, as if to say:

“Your territory has no place here.”

“Impossible… This is impossible!” Xuan Sha roared in despair, unable to accept this reality. He frantically marshaled his demonic energy, unleashing wave after wave of attacks against my tranquil “pure land.”

But no matter how furious his onslaught, the hundred meters around me remained calm and unshaken, as steady as a mountain.

Neither Yi Yi nor I had so much as a sleeve disturbed.

“So this is the result of your decades of hiding and cultivation?” I lifted my eyes, a trace of disappointment in my gaze. “Too weak.”

That remark was like a resounding slap, striking Xuan Sha’s face with brutal force.

“Aaaaah! I’ll kill you!”

He lost all reason, abandoning the contest of domains. His form became a streak of black lightning, enveloped in surging demonic energy, hurtling straight toward me. His right hand shot out, fingers splayed like claws, talons gleaming with an eerie black light—his famed technique, the “Nether Ghost Claw.”

That strike could rend metal and stone, even corrode the soul.

Yet facing this thunderous blow, I merely extended my right hand, bringing my index and middle fingers together, and flicked them forward at the onrushing shadow with casual ease.

No technique, just a simple flick of the fingers.

From my fingertips, a barely perceptible thread of Nascent Soul force, condensed to the utmost, pierced the air.

Bang!!!

A dull, earth-shaking thud.

That bolt of black lightning, too fast for any spectator to track, came to an abrupt halt in midair.

Xuan Sha’s “Nether Ghost Claw,” at the instant it touched the force from my fingertips, shattered to pieces. The unstoppable might crashed into his chest like a storm.

The protective demonic aura around him was torn apart as if it were paper.

He himself—like a cannonball shot from a high-powered gun—was blasted away at a speed ten times faster than he came!

Boom—

Xuan Sha’s body slammed into a distant, demon-corroded building, shattering the “mountain of bones” to dust.

As dust and debris billowed, his demonic domain, deprived of its master’s support, receded like the tide.

The Four Directions Heaven-locking Array shuddered violently, on the verge of collapse.

Heaven and earth returned to clarity.

Everyone was struck dumb.

Tang Ao’s jaw dropped, his teacup slipping from his fingers and smashing unnoticed on the ground.

The Kunlun master Xuan Tianzong and the Shushan elder Qing Xuzi stared, eyes nearly popping from their sockets, faces full of disbelief. They had known Senior Jiang’s cultivation was unfathomable, but until today had never realized how terrifying it truly was. Each was quietly grateful for the choices they’d made in the past.

The four haughty Demon Sect guardians stood rooted to the spot as if struck by lightning, their minds a blank void.

Just a moment before, the Demon Lord had ruled supreme, unchallenged beneath heaven.

Now, in the blink of an eye, he had been flicked away by that man’s casual gesture.

What unimaginable gulf in power was this?

As the dust settled, Xuan Sha’s figure emerged, half-kneeling in the ruins, a ghastly hollow caved into his chest, bones shattered beyond reckoning, blood pouring from his mouth, his aura barely a whisper.

He looked up at me, his eyes stripped of all arrogance and cruelty, leaving only terror and bewilderment.

His cultivation, his decades of painstaking mastery—before this man, they were… utterly worthless?

“Who… who are you…” he stammered, trembling, using the last of his strength.

“Who I am is of no importance.”

I took a step forward, my figure appearing before him in an instant, looking down from above.

“What matters is that the so-called legend of your Demon Sect—ends today.”