Chapter 1221: Yan Nu Was Originally Birds of the Same Forest, When Great Disaster Strikes They Fly Separately

"Tianren!" Huang Quan roared, spatial-temporal power erupting from his body.

Responding to the call was Tianren Wushu, who had been fully prepared; he had waited a long time!

Even though Yan Wuse had cleared a path for the lightning tribulation to strike around Jiang Buyi, and in the space connecting Jiang Buyi to the Emperor Tribulation, the final wave of the Ancestral Source Emperor Tribulation still impacted the light energy world. The tribulation's power interfered with the imperceptible light rays, subtly revealing a visible luster.

"Buzz!" The Blood World Pearl swiftly ascended from above Tianren Wushu's head. If anything could avoid being cut apart in this light energy world, the Blood World Pearl, as one of the ten great psychic weapons, was the only thing Tianren Wushu was certain of—even though he didn't know what material it was made of.

"Devour!" Even if he didn't want to use the Blood World Pearl's abilities, Tianren Wushu had to borrow its power now. As expected, the light energy world failed to cut the Blood World Pearl. Scarlet light spread across the entire area as the single word fell. The Blood World Pearl seemed to open its maw from an inner world, swallowing the surrounding transparent light rays of the light energy world and converting them for its own use.

"Lord of Calamity!" With an arched back, a towering and ferocious Lord of Calamity, forged from pure decay mist, shot up into the sky. Almost simultaneously, Tianren Wushu formed a hand seal and detonated it.

"Realm of Corruption!" With a loud boom, grayish-brown decay mist, imbued with holy power shimmering with scarlet light, scattered in all directions, falling like rain and snow. Within the light energy world, every ray of light touched by the decay mist instantly lost its luster, like melting ice and snow, ultimately succumbing to corruption, decay, and returning to nothingness.

In an instant, a massive gap was torn open in Yan Wuse's light energy world. Huang Quan, positioned perfectly within this gap, could now make more moves.

In a flash, his movements appeared half a step slower than Tianren Wushu's, but in reality, they were much faster. However, in terms of the speed at which their effects manifested, Tianren Wushu's realm-breaking came first, followed by Huang Quan's. Clearly, time itself had been manipulated here!

Despite Huang Quan's speed appearing secondary, their coordination under his exquisite time control was seamless.

"Spatial-Temporal Rift!" Huang Quan raised his hand, and the Scarred Xuan Sword on his back unwound its bandages, striking towards the firmament. With a thunderous roar, the vast First Hall of Sin, and the all-encompassing light energy world, were all cleaved by a spatial-temporal rift stretching across the void from north to south. Viewed from below, as if the sky were the ground, the firmament appeared as though a sword had split it in two. The great rift was like an inverted chasm; rules could not restrain the cleavage, and light energy could not resist the sword's damage.

If Tianren Wushu's sudden strike had torn a small crack in the light energy world, then Huang Quan's sword, based on the Scarred Xuan Sword—one of the ten great psychic weapons capable of inflicting true damage on all things—expanded that crack to a point where even Yan Wuse could not repair it.

The Spirit Refiners scattered across Void Island had already sensed a significant increase in the danger of this giant kingdom upon witnessing the Saint Fall. They never expected that in the direction of the First Hall of Sin, after the Saint Fall, the sky would tear open a second time! It wasn't a Saint Tribulation, nor an Emperor Tribulation; it was simply severed by a single sword! At this sight, the previous Saint Fall no longer seemed like a normal occurrence. It was possible that the abnormal phenomena of Saint Falls on Void Island had only just begun. Next, there would be a second, a third... and even more!

"Escape!" Though he had shattered the light energy world with a single sword, Huang Quan still feared the capabilities of the veteran Half-Saint, Yan Wuse. This one was not Jiang Buyi. In terms of combat power alone, ten Jiang Buyi's combined might not be a match for this battle-oriented peak Half-Saint. The Ten-Person Council of the Sacred Palace had extremely strict selection criteria for the Three Emperors. In simple terms, to hold that position, one must demonstrate talent and ability comparable to a Saint Emperor, even as a Half-Saint. The most fundamental condition for achieving this was to first pass the combat strength test. Huang Quan didn't want to waste any extra energy on the formidable character of Yan Wuse. His objectives had been more than fully accomplished. Jiang Buyi had fallen, the Half-Saint divine rank was secured, the Door to the Lesser Plane was acquired, and both the Three Tribulation Calamity Eye and the Three Aversion Pupils were obtained. In this engagement, he had perfectly accomplished all his goals: delaying, slaying, and plundering. Given this, why stay? To clean up the mess for the Holy Servants?

Speaking of the Holy Servants, one must mention the last Three Tribulation Calamity Eye that Huang Quan intentionally left behind. Of course, he wasn't without time to stop before this and take the Tear Clan Eye from Mei Yiren and Xu Xiaoshou. But he couldn't. With the Hell King's people escaping, someone had to bear the Sacred Palace's wrath. If this Tear Clan Eye had also been with the Hell King, the Sacred Palace would have relentlessly pursued them. But by leaving one with a Holy Servant member, the task of covering their retreat would become theirs. As for whether the Holy Servants could ultimately keep this Three Aversion Pupil, Huang Quan didn't care at all. Snatching food from a tiger's mouth was already difficult. How could one take everything, leaving nothing for others? If they could keep it, that was their ability; if he wanted it, he could talk about it later. If they couldn't keep it... this was simply the last bit of face Huang Quan left for the Sacred Palace, and it was perfectly normal if they couldn't.

"Absolutely do not look back!" Within the spatial-temporal rift, Huang Quan even deliberately distorted time, escaping with Tianren Wushu from half a breath before his own action. By doing this, their escape perfectly coincided with the moment the spatial-temporal rift was cut open, leaving no temporal gap. After all, light was too fast! And Yan Wuse's combat awareness was impossible to ignore! Only by tirelessly bursting out of Void Island's rule restraints from the spatial-temporal rift, and fighting their way through the shattered spatial currents to the Sacred Divine Continent, could they then truly be considered free. Yes, Huang Quan's idea was to forcefully cross, just like Ye Xiaotian's attempt! This was the greatest confidence of time and space element Spirit Refiners. However, if anything were to delay them in the interim, Huang Quan could not guarantee that he and Tianren could completely escape Void Island unharmed.

To outsiders, the changes within the battle were extremely fast. As soon as Huang Quan moved, Tianren Wushu's time became blurred, and it was unclear what had been done, but the two immediately vanished from their original positions, escaping upwards. Immediately after, a massive spatial-temporal rift appeared in the firmament, and Huang Quan and Tianren Wushu precisely flashed into it.

"So fast!" Xu Xiaoshou's heart tightened. His combat awareness was good; he could generally see through the Hell King's side's movements. Ultimately, the time attribute was too powerful, and in Huang Quan's hands, it could create too many variables. However, there was clearly something even faster on the scene!

Yan Wuse couldn't reverse Jiang Buyi's fatal situation, so he merely accompanied him on his final journey. But this didn't mean he was indifferent to the Holy Servants or the Hell King's people. Almost the instant the light energy world showed a change, meaning the moment Tianren Wushu made his move, Yan Wuse realized these scoundrels were about to cause trouble again. As he glanced over with a smile, the two from Hell King's organization had already entered the spatial-temporal rift.

"Tsk..." Yan Wuse's half-mouth curled up, and his figure transformed into a speck of light, vanishing into nothingness. When he reappeared, he had actually flashed into the spatial-temporal rift as well, as if predicting their move! However, from the scene of Huang Quan and Tianren Wushu, whose figures were unusually blurred under the influence of spatial-temporal rules, escaping side-by-side at the same speed along the Saint Path, it was clear... This was not a prediction at all! It was purely that his combat awareness kept up, figuring out all of Huang Quan's escape routes the instant he made his move!

"Yan..." Tianren Wushu, originally controlled by Huang Quan, was escaping along the spatial-temporal grand path. But upon sensing something amiss, he suddenly turned back and saw Yan Wuse's smiling face—it was nothing short of terrifying! This one of the Three Emperors had his lower body transformed into light, while his upper body remained unchanged, calm and composed. He rested his left hand on his right elbow, right hand on his chin, completely at ease, running and smiling: "Like a turtle's crawl."

"Yan Wuse?!" It was Tianren Wushu's turn to be frightened by someone else; his pupils contracted, and visible tension gripped him. In the next breath, the gray three-petaled flower in his right eye spun, and Tianren Wushu attempted to activate the Three Aversion Pupils.

"Beautiful eyes." Yan Wuse seemed to be admiring, so relaxed that it was impossible to tell he was fighting. He merely opened his tiger-like eyes, and two scorching white beams of light shot out from his pupils ahead of time. Swoosh! Swoosh! Tianren Wushu, under the influence of spatial-temporal rules, had the only part of his face exposed outside his mask—his eyes—instantly pierced by white light. Those two light beams, faster than the Three Aversion Pupils, not only penetrated Tianren Wushu's illusory state, exiting from the back of his head, but also suppressed almost all of Tianren Wushu's mobility, and as the light energy spread, it disrupted his qi sea's holy power. Finally, it even pulled Tianren Wushu's body, which was losing control and about to fall behind, keeping him suspended and continuing to move shoulder-to-shoulder with Huang Quan.

Yan Wuse even leaned in slightly, puckered his lips, and blew a breath into Huang Quan's ear, though Huang Quan, under the spatial-temporal rules, couldn't feel it. "So diligently on your way, are you rushing to reincarnate?"

Inside the spatial-temporal rift, after that sound, the three figures vanished into darkness, completely disappearing, undetectable even by Xu Xiaoshou. The next second, a point of white light bloomed, and within the inverted rift in the sky, a white scorching sun abruptly emerged! Those on Void Island looked up, witnessing the strange sight. Then, with a deafening roar, the rift instantly shattered, and the spatial-temporal power, before it could even dissipate, was assimilated into the color of light. Dust motes rose and fell, and the massive black valley was suddenly dyed scorching white. When Yan Wuse made his move, heaven and earth never incorporated other colors.

"Myriad Paths Retreat!" Huang Quan, neither startled nor alarmed, showed no fear. As the scorching sun hung in the sky, an ancient clock appeared on his back, and its hands shifted backward.

"Impressive," Yan Wuse hissed, applauding softly. "That's the very trick that made this Emperor spin in circles earlier, wasn't it? But the same trick shouldn't be used twice on someone who's prepared. Does Chief Huang Quan understand this principle?" He simultaneously used light beams from his eyes to drag Tianren Wushu along so he wouldn't fall behind, and channeled his internal holy power to spread across the firmament.

"Myriad Sceneries Adornment!" The white scorching sun that had risen in the spatial-temporal rift also exploded. However, the scattered light rays converged into visible streaks, shooting through the air in all directions across Void Island. In an instant, the light rays plunged into the Forest of Miracles, into the Blood Realm, into the Abyssal Fall... They pierced into the Nine Great Forbidden Zones, into the peripheral areas of Void Island, spontaneously forming a massive birdcage that seemed capable of trapping all living beings on the island. The hands of 'Myriad Paths Retreat' tried to shift backward but seemed to be damaged, encountering an irresistible force, failing to move and remaining in place.

Huang Quan's pupils finally trembled.

"Heh heh." Seeing this, Yan Wuse's old face twitched, and he gave a mischievous smile. The source of all light rays from 'Myriad Sceneries Adornment' converged on him, as if dressing him in a resplendent holy garment comparable to a white sun. He continued to drag Tianren Wushu, escaping alongside Huang Quan, speaking with a smile: "So-called time, after all, is finite. So-called human power, too, has its limits. Indeed, Chief Huang Quan can, by himself, alter the time rules in a small area and thereby affect someone located elsewhere. However, this Emperor is now bound to Void Island, and my personal time is intertwined with the time of this giant kingdom. If you wish to change this Emperor's time, or the time of any specific location on Void Island, you cannot bypass the entire island and me. The power of time is immense, but you, Huang Quan, are too green; you've only just become a Saint! Do you possess the ability to rewind this Emperor, along with Void Island, back to a breath ago?"

The answer was clearly no; clearly, he could not! If he truly could rewind time, everything that had happened in the Nine Great Forbidden Zones would also revert, and all of Yan Wuse's techniques, as one of the Three Emperors, would have to retract back into his body. If Huang Quan could do that, he would already be able to slay Yan Wuse, so what would he have to fear?

"Regarding the study of time, this Emperor might not be beneath you, you know!" Yan Wuse chuckled as he pinched a sun wheel between his fingertips and aimed it at Huang Quan's neck. Huang Quan's entire being scattered, as if all traces of his recent existence were an illusion—he had altered his own timeline, retreating to before he entered the spatial-temporal rift. But this time... Tianren Wushu did not return. Huang Quan's heart sank; he had tried to change Tianren Wushu's time as well, but had he failed? He looked up, seeing that not only had Tianren Wushu's eyes been pierced, but now light rays connected from his various joints to Yan Wuse's body. And the light rays on Yan Wuse's body were connected to Void Island... as a whole!

Huang Quan sighed deeply; only two choices remained. Either fight, a desperate struggle. Or escape, abandoning Tianren Wushu, just as he had abandoned the Three Tribulation Calamity Eye.

"Swordless Art, Boundless Sword Flow!" Meanwhile, Mei Yiren, ever sagacious, only activated his Swordless Art after Huang Quan had made his move. By this time, Yan Wuse's attention was certainly drawn to the two from the Hell King's organization. Huang Quan knew how to solve the problem of 'the abandoned Three Tribulation Calamity Eye'. However, Mei Yiren's solution was even more extreme: he solved it as 'the abandoned Hell King'. So, at the scene, only a Liberated State Heavenly Machine Divine Emissary remained, awaiting resolution.

"Xu Xiaoshou!" Just as the cry settled, having broken free from the light energy world, Mei Yiren's peripheral vision caught sight of his student activating the 'Weakness' Sword Dao esoteric array diagram beneath his feet. Following suit, he also employed 'Boundless Sword Flow', and his figure dissolved into an illusory state. "Master Shou, what about me?" Han Ye lost his footing and was clearly anxious. Both of them knew sword arts, but he didn't! "You run by yourself, run separately. If one lives, one lives." Xu Xiaoshou knew that Han Ye's Super Saint Escape was faster alone, and Mr. Yiren had also clearly given a look indicating that he couldn't take a 'useless person' who couldn't even use Boundless Sword Flow. With a whoosh, Han Ye vanished on the spot, not even uttering a word of nonsense, clearly understanding that he was a burden and that talking too much would lead to death.

Xu Xiaoshou paused for a moment, then saw No. Two in the distance turn his gaze and glance this way. He clearly shuddered, a prelude to flashing over, but he flashed in place instead. Xu Xiaoshou understood. Behind No. Two, scattered plum blossoms drifted down.

"Illusory Sword Art!" Without a word, Mei Yiren pulled Xu Xiaoshou's hand. Using his few remaining chances to act, he chose to employ a special escape technique that was harmless to Void Island, likely wouldn't reduce his remaining actions, yet was very powerful, falling under the category of a unique escape art usable when 'Swordless Art' prevented locking on.

"Spatial-Temporal Leap!"