In the shadowed recesses of that remote corner, Old Dog Gou Langtu watched everything before him in stunned silence, his face a mask of disbelief.
“How could this be?”
“It can’t be... it shouldn’t be!”
“By all accounts, Ye Yu was nothing but a facade.”
“All the strange phenomena we witnessed were supposed to be mere illusions.”
“How did the tables turn so quickly?”
“Could it be... that this fellow truly is one of the legendary Supreme Deities of the Divine Realm?”
Before Old Dog Gou Langtu could finish his thought, a dozen terrifying beasts charged toward his position!
When the foremost beast swiped its massive claw down...
Everything around him shattered to pieces!
Fragments of rock sprayed out, pummeling the folds of his divine robe.
Had he not sidestepped at the last instant, he would have been grievously wounded!
And in that moment, he was utterly certain: none of this was illusion—Ye Yu was that Supreme Deity in disguise, playing the fool to catch them off guard!
Damnable bastard. Why pull such a stunt for no reason? Did he find it so entertaining?
Old Dog Gou Langtu’s expression grew troubled, but his mind raced with another question: how had these beast phantoms detected him, even though he’d hidden himself so thoroughly and emitted no divine-energy signature?
The answer was simple: his Obedience Value floating above his head had betrayed him!
Indeed, the moment Ye Yu had activated his special effect manifestations, nearly every deity present had seen a red number—an Obedience Value—hovering above their own heads. But those values had been relatively low, because everyone believed Ye Yu’s extraordinary displays were only illusions.
It wasn’t until that great Ghost Deity of the Divine Realm had fallen—a turning point of monumental significance—that they realized the truth. Ye Yu, already at the Divine-Deity Realm, wielded the Path of Special Effects. With but a thought, he could weaponize his manifestations. Slaying a Divine-Realm Ghost Deity had been no great challenge.
Had a Divine-Deity Supreme Deity appeared instead, Ye Yu could not have acted so casually. Yet by effortlessly cutting down that Ghost Deity, he had shattered their expectations and revealed that all was real.
Then /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ the numbers above their heads began to spiral upward!
Chaos ensued as the gods scrambled to flee. Previously, Ye Yu would have let them—if they all escaped, at least he would have survived this peril. But now he wanted no one to leave.
Only when the threat of death truly loomed could he maximize their Obedience Values. By unleashing those beast phantoms in pursuit, the gods felt death could strike at any moment—and their Obedience Values doubled accordingly.
Perhaps this was the true key to unlocking the dreamscape! Ah, if only he had realized sooner, he might already have broken into the Ancient-God Realm. But regret was useless. What mattered was seizing the moment.
Cleverly, Ye Yu had refrained from sending beasts after the truly powerful—De Rain and Chen Guangju—so as not to expose his ruse too quickly. Instead, he targeted the weaker deities. “Pick on soft targets,” he thought. “If it works, I don’t mind doing it again and again.”
In a mere half incense-stick’s time, he harvested a massive trove of Obedience Value and converted it all into cultivation, breaking through two realms and reaching the late stage of the Divine-Deity Realm!
That was when he noticed a flicker of Obedience Value in the shadows—no visible figure there, yet the dancing numbers were undeniable. He dispatched beasts to investigate, and sure enough, Old Dog Gou Langtu was blown out into the open.
“Heh, so you’re hiding here!” Ye Yu mused. “Don’t bother running. Let the beasts harass you until I break into the Golden-Deity Realm—then I’ll finish you off. And I’ll grab the Xuanba Devour-Heaven Axe while I’m at it. Why not?”
But Ye Yu’s attention was focused more keenly on De Rain, the Eighth Elder of the Ji Yue Pavilion—a genuine Supreme Deity with the strength to crush him in an instant. Dealing with him was troublesome: if Ye Yu didn’t send beasts after him, De Rain would sniff out the deception; if he did, the Supreme Deity would shred the beasts to pieces.
Ye Yu pondered briefly, then let the matter drift from his mind—because De Rain had already raised his blade, clearly intent on striking.
Such recklessness! Any normal deity, faced with these phenomena, would have fled or at least kept a safe distance. But De Rain charged headlong forward. Perhaps time had dragged on too long without movement, tipping him off.
Ye Yu knew he couldn’t withstand a Supreme-Deity strike—and he certainly didn’t want the dreamscape shattered by one blow. So he again invoked the Path of Illusion.
With a thought, the beasts drew back. From the air, a colossal Demon Lord formed and spoke in a thunderous voice, echoing in every deity’s ears: “This ends now. I have ancient ties with the Ji Yue Pavilion’s Grand Master; if I were to slaughter you all, people would accuse me of bullying the weak. I will spare your lives—except for that old dog.”
“De Rain, I know you resent this. I will grant you one chance to strike with full strength, so you may see the true gap between us.”
Under the weight of divine power, his words boomed like thunder. The Ji Yue Pavilion’s deities showed expressions of relief, while Old Dog Gou Langtu turned ashen.
De Rain let out a mocking laugh. He took Ye Yu’s display for mere theatrics—but none of that mattered now. When his blade fell, everything would be over.
