Chapter 1568

: Puppets!
However, just when Meng Hao was about to actually step onto the Immortal God Continent, a powerful force of expulsion exploded out to stop him.
That power was emanating out of each and every cultivator from the Immortal God Continent, from each blade of grass and each tree limb, from every mountain and river. It was the will of the entire Immortal God Continent itself.
Meng Hao was not welcome or permitted.
His eyes flickered with bright light, and he was just about to force his way through, when suddenly, an extremely uneasy feeling gripped his heart, and he stopped in place. He looked up, and it was at this point that he noticed that the mountains and lands of the continent were all trembling as the land mass itself began to turn pitch black.
As the blackness spread, sounds like muttering voices echoed out from all of the various mountains peaks. It was like the chanting of scriptures, or the whispering of all living things.
At the same time, within the darkness off in the distance, Meng Hao could see a point of light. Closer examination revealed that it was actually a sun!
There were nine of them, rising up into the air. The power they emanated seemed capable of ripping apart the black of night, and as that power spread, Meng Hao could feel it starting to tear away at him. 1
Considering that Meng Hao had already Transcended, he felt only a slight sense of danger, and yet that was still enough to cause his pupils to constrict.

This is some sort of divine ability….
he thought, eyes narrowing. As the nine suns rose up into the air, and their light spread in all directions, he could feel the ripping power battering at his body.

This isn’t something that an ordinary person could create. This magical technique must have been created by the Immortal God Continent’s Transcendent cultivator!
Meng Hao’s eyes suddenly shone with a strange light.
It was almost as if he were able to pass through the ages of time, reach into the past and actually fight with that Transcendor of ancient times!
Meng Hao snorted coldly, lifted his right foot up, and then stamped it down. A huge boom echoed out, accompanied by a black mist that boiled out from inside of him and spread out through all Heaven and Earth.

Nine suns sunder the night,
Meng Hao said coolly.
But my night is the night of the Demon. It can defile anything and everything, and cannot be destroyed!
More and more black mist roiled out, covering everything, making the darkness of night darker, making it impossible for the light of the nine suns to tear it apart.
The nine suns suddenly flickered, and the nine figures inside of them vanished. Then the area around Meng Hao began to distort, and nine black-robed figures appeared. Their cultivation bases immediately rumbled with power as they formed a deadly spell formation that could seriously injure even someone half a step into Transcendence. As for a peak 9-Essences cultivator, a person like that would be wiped out of existence.
But this was Meng Hao they were facing.

So, you finally show your faces?
he said coolly. He didn’t seem to care at all that the nine suns were attacking in unison. He even let their divine abilities and magical techniques slam into him.
He was like a vast ocean, and the divine abilities of the nine suns were like stone oxen that disappeared without a trace as soon as they touched the surface of the water. Nothing happened at all. It was almost as if Meng Hao had consumed the divine abilities. Dazzling light flickered around him as the divine abilities then rebounded, shooting back at the nine suns with hundreds, no, thousands of times their original power.
There was literally no way to compare the two. One was like the light of a firefly, and the other was the light of the full moon.
RUMBLE!
Nine divine abilities shot back toward the nine suns. The suns groaned, and before they could even do anything, were completely overwhelmed by power thousands of times that which they had unleashed.
It all happened in the blink of an eye. Eight of the surrounding nine suns were transformed into ash, destroyed in body and soul.
Only one wasn’t killed, an old man who Meng Hao reached out and grabbed by the neck.
Meng Hao’s expression was the same as ever as he held the only survivor among the nine suns up in front of him. The old man glared back, and was just about to self-detonate when Meng Hao’s divine sense crushed down onto him, quenching the power of detonation. Then, the divine sense stabbed into the man’s mind as a Soulsearch began.
What he discovered, however, was emptiness.
The old man began to shake, to twist and distort, and finally, he died under the power of the Soulsearch. Meng Hao didn’t acquire even a single memory. It was as if… the old man actually had no memories, as if the only thing he knew how to do was kill.

A puppet,
Meng Hao murmured.
Yet another puppet.
Based on his thousands of years of experience, on his Transcendent cultivation base, and his dealings with the starry sky of the Vast Expanse and with the will of Allheaven, he had long since come to a theory regarding the Immortal God Continent and the Devil Realm Continent.
His theory was that these two land masses actually contained no living people!
If these were the living descendents of the two ancient Transcendors, then none of what was happening would make sense. After all, the two Transcendors were the enemies of Allheaven!
This was a conclusion he had reached after his experience touching the three destroyed pillars outside the Vast Expanse.

These two continents were most likely destroyed many years ago by Allheaven, just like he destroyed the land masses belonging to Patriarch Vast Expanse.
Meng Hao frowned. That was the conclusion he had reached, the only hitch being that all of the cultivators around him actually possessed flesh and blood bodies.

The only explanation is that they’re puppets,
he thought.
And yet there is something at play that makes them not puppets.
He began to walk forward. Hordes of cultivators threw themselves at him, but not a one could get close. The wave of a hand destroyed them instantly.
He was followed by the Vast Expanse School army, which unleashed destruction onto the Immortal God Continent that caused the entire starry sky to shake.
Meng Hao had only moved forward about a hundred paces when suddenly one of the twisting rivers on the land mass suddenly began to flicker with light. Unexpectedly… the entire river rose up into the air.
Closer inspection revealed that the river was actually formed into the shape of a bow!
Almost as soon as the river-like bow rose up into the air, a young man appeared. As soon as Meng Hao laid eyes on him, he looked familiar. He is appearance was very similar to Slaughter, and also like the statue in the middle of the Immortal God Continent.

A descendent of this place’s ancient Transcendor….

: Puppets!
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IMPORTANT NOTE: The grand finale contest is coming in about two weeks. In order to participate you MUST register for an account to comment on wuxiaworld prior to the contest (wordpress is fine). I’m not sure what the exact cutoff date will be, perhaps 5-7 days before the contest starts. Make sure to register for a username and password ahead of time, otherwise you might miss out!
Contest prizes: Some of the prizes are ISSTH merchandise provided by Er Gen, but some of them are provided by me. I’m excited to announce that one of the prize items will be a poster-sized print of Meng Hao, depicted by League of Legends character concept artist Robin Ruan.
1. The nine suns have been talked about in ISSTH quite a few times. It wasn’t until recently that I discovered that there are nine high-level characters in Renegade Immortal who are described as having/being suns. Presumably these are those same characters