The nine Strongest ones of human civilization likewise stood along the River of Time.
Unlike the other rank twelve strongest ones, who were watching the once again placid surface of the river with grave expressions, the majority of the nine Strongest ones kept their attention on those other rank twelve beings.
Only after seeing each of those rank twelve strongest ones vanish in succession did the nine Strongest ones give a barely perceptible sigh of relief.
“Xuanyuan, what do we do now?”
“Are we still going to demand an explanation from the Tianyu Clan, the Prison Clan, and the Insect Race?”
The Strongest one known as Gu Li asked quietly.
That had been their reason for coming.
So many rank twelve beings ganging up on the Milky Way Star Lord—how could they possibly not give an explanation?
“An explanation?”
Xuanyuan, one of the Strongest ones, could not help but glance at Gu Li.
If things had turned out the way they originally anticipated—namely, if one of the Milky Way Star Lord’s avatars had truly been killed—they definitely would have sought an explanation, making those alien rank twelve beings pay dearly.
But that was not how events unfolded.
Xuanyuan even felt a hint of sympathy for the Tianyu Clan Patriarch, Celestial Feather Chen, who had suffered such severe injuries that the odds of his surviving the impending cosmic destruction seemed slim.
At this point, trying to press the issue worried Xuanyuan—he was concerned that it would thoroughly provoke the Tianyu Clan and potentially ignite an all-out war among the top-tier clans.
“Forget it.”
Xuanyuan shook his head.
Indeed, it was the alien rank twelve beings who flipped the table first. But given the dire outcome for Celestial Feather Chen, Xuanyuan felt that was probably enough.
After today, losing Celestial Feather Chen would be tantamount to the Tianyu Clan losing one rank twelve strongest one. For a long time to come, Celestial Feather Chen would likely remain out of sight, and the Tianyu Clan, being a peak-level force, would surely shrink its territory.
With those regions left vacant, no other clan would dare contend with human civilization.
“The Milky Way Star Lord...”
Before long, the nine Strongest ones turned the discussion back to Lin Yuan.
His performance while facing over a dozen rank twelve strongest ones had shattered the nine Strongest ones’ entire understanding.
The nine Strongest ones of human civilization believed they knew Lin Yuan quite well—certainly better than the alien rank twelve beings did.
They had personally witnessed the extensive rule models encompassed by Lin Yuan’s martial path at rank eleven and knew that his rule comprehension surpassed their own.
As for those alien rank twelve beings, they only knew there was something called a “rule model,” and even if they suspected the Milky Way Star Lord to be the founder of the martial path, they were only making educated guesses about the depth of his rule comprehension.
Yet not even Xuanyuan had expected Lin Yuan’s power to be quite so formidable.
Comprehending rules was one thing; raw combat strength did not rely solely on that. Even if an ordinary person managed to grasp the space-time rules, their basic power level would remain low, and they would struggle to threaten an advanced evolver.
“And this was only one of the Milky Way Star Lord’s avatars. If it had been his true body...”
The Strongest one known as Void God was amazed. Celestial Feather Chen’s severe injury was largely due to the River of Time, but in the main universe, Lin Yuan had already managed to suppress Celestial Feather Chen just by deploying his two Primordial Souls. That alone spoke volumes.
Both Primordial Souls were like that. If Lin Yuan’s true self joined in, Celestial Feather Chen would probably face an even more dire situation.
“Good thing the Milky Way Star Lord belongs to our human civilization,” murmured Yu Die, one of the Strongest ones.
The other Strongest ones all agreed.
Had some other race produced a monster like the Milky Way Star Lord, these nine would be on edge day and night. Now, however, it was the alien rank twelve beings who could not sleep soundly, all because the Milky Way Star Lord belonged to humankind.
Meanwhile, in the Prison Clan, their rank twelve strongest one, Fan Hou, was deeply shaken. He had witnessed the entire battle between Celestial Feather Chen and the Milky Way Star Lord, from the main universe to the River of Time.
“How is the Milky Way Star Lord so powerful?” Fan Hou could hardly believe it.
Yes, Celestial Feather Chen was heavily wounded largely because of the River of Time. But without the Milky Way Star Lord’s intervention, Celestial Feather Chen would never have ended up in such a predicament. And forcibly dragging a rank twelve being into the River of Time—how could that be easily done?
“If it had been me who took action back then...” Fan Hou’s heart trembled.
Having used his secret technique “Bowing to Nine Suns,” his essence was already weakened. Cautiously, he had used injury as an excuse to withdraw from the assault on the Milky Way Star Lord.
Otherwise...
Celestial Feather Chen had finally broken free of the river’s constraints only because his condition was still at its peak. But Fan Hou, already weakened, would have fared far worse if dragged into the river. Even if he managed to escape in the end, his injuries would likely surpass Celestial Feather Chen’s, leaving him virtually no chance of surviving the cosmic destruction.
“This is big trouble.”
Fan Hou’s thoughts raced, leaping to future consequences.
The Milky Way Star Lord had not even stepped into rank twelve yet and already possessed such might. What if he really did become rank twelve? At that point, wouldn’t the entire universe revolve around human civilization, forcing every other peak-level clan to hide away?
“Huh?”
“They’re looking for me?”
Fan Hou’s expression shifted slightly upon receiving a message from other rank twelve strongest ones—an invitation to discuss how to deal with the Milky Way Star Lord. More precisely, how to handle him once he reached rank twelve.
Although the Milky Way Star Lord’s power was now abnormally strong, it was only on par with a rank twelve being at best. His method of injuring Celestial Feather Chen had relied on the River of Time and could hardly be replicated against other rank twelve beings who were on guard.
But in the future, once he advanced to rank twelve...
Everyone knew that crossing from rank eleven to rank twelve entailed a massive leap in life essence. At that point, the Milky Way Star Lord’s strength would undoubtedly skyrocket.
In the territory of the Calamity Clan, in a mysterious place beyond understanding, the strongest ones from the Calamity Clan standing outside a wooden house repeatedly reviewed the footage of the Milky Way Star Lord’s fight with Celestial Feather Chen.
“He’s a monster—a complete monster,” the Calamity Clan strongest one muttered incessantly. The Milky Way Star Lord’s ability far exceeded his expectations, defying common sense entirely.
“He’s not even a thousand years old, yet he has such power. Could the Milky Way Star Lord be the reincarnation of some peerless Great Saint?”
A voice came from within the wooden house, similarly laced with shock and disbelief.
The Calamity Clan’s history ran deep; they had survived one cosmic epoch after another within the universe. Even the Chaos Continents established by mighty Chaos Lords eventually met their demise in the void, but the Calamity Clan had almost achieved eternal survival here in the universe.
Sure, the universe would move toward destruction, but it would not be completely extinguished. After the great cataclysm, a new epoch would dawn. Even a mighty Chaos Great Saint who could cause a universe to collapse early, forcing it toward cosmic destruction, could not stop its rebirth.
No one could entirely erase a universe, not even those near-perfected lifeforms transcending time, because doing so would require contending with the fundamental Great Dao of the chaotic void itself.
And since the Calamity Clan could survive into the next cosmic epoch, aside from the universe’s instinctive dislike of them, they truly had no natural enemies in the universe.
The universe’s consciousness possessed only basic instincts and would not go out of its way to destroy the Calamity Clan.
“A reincarnation of a peerless Great Saint?”
Outside the wooden house, the Calamity Clan strongest one fell into thought.
At the level of a Chaos Great Saint, so long as even a shred of their true spirit persisted, “reincarnation” was possible. In that state, they would wash away everything from their previous existence, even erasing most memories. Only upon reaching certain prerequisites or realms would some memory fragments awaken, leading to a rapid rise again.
But very few Chaos Great Saints attempted reincarnation. After all, who could force such beings to reincarnate? Also, reincarnation was not without risks. If one failed to recover memories after the first attempt, the chances of success dropped even further with each subsequent try. Eventually, it might never happen, which was tantamount to true death.
Though the Calamity Clan strongest one felt the odds of encountering the reincarnation of a Chaos Great Saint were infinitesimally small, the Milky Way Star Lord’s feats could only be explained by something so extreme.
“Perhaps so.”
He mulled it over briefly, then nodded.
News of the battle at the time-space black hole—how a rank twelve strongest one personally targeted the Milky Way Star Lord yet achieved nothing, and how the Tianyu Patriarch, Celestial Feather Chen, was suppressed by the Milky Way Star Lord and dragged into the River of Time—spread like a tempest across the myriad races of the cosmic starfields.
“The Milky Way Star Lord pummels the Tianyu Clan Patriarch?”
“An eleven-level beats a rank twelve?”
“I don’t believe it, I don’t believe it at all.”
Countless experts from across the starry sky were incredulous.
Yes, the rank eleven lifeforms among them did sense the presence of a rank twelve-level conflict, but they never imagined one of the combatants was the Milky Way Star Lord.
Yet as these rumors continued to swirl, no rank twelve strongest one came forward to refute them. Above all, none of the Tianyu Clan’s patriarchs spoke up.
It finally dawned on the countless experts of the starry sky that this might well be true. If the Milky Way Star Lord’s so-called “trouncing” of the Tianyu Clan Patriarch were a fabrication, the Tianyu Clan’s patriarchs would certainly deny it, and the other rank twelve beings would not allow such blatant falsehoods to circulate.
Within human civilization, while many evolvers and high-level citizens were still debating the connection between the Milky Way Star Lord and the founder of the martial path, they received the news.
“The Milky Way Star Lord... actually overpowered a rank twelve strongest one?”
On the Red Kun Star of the Red Kun Lineage, the Red Kun Star Lord, who was instructing several peak masters, blinked in confusion upon hearing the news, unable to process it at first.
He recognized each character of that sentence, but put together, it sounded utterly surreal. Overpowering a rank twelve strongest one? His disciple?
“That Milky Way Star Lord who once sparred with me in the arena can now batter a rank twelve being?”
Even the Holy Son of the Wan Yang Lineage—who had long ceased to see the Milky Way Star Lord as a rival—felt no small amount of shock after hearing the news from Wan Yang Star Lord.
As this report spread throughout human civilization, countless evolvers were in an uproar. It was even more astonishing than a confrontation between rank twelve beings.
An eleven-level lifeform overpowering a rank twelve was like an ant shaking the sky.
The Milky Way Star Lord—what kind of divine power is this?
His might is unmatched!
...
20 chapters ahead on patreon: patreon.com/David_Lord
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