The battle against Vajra Living Buddha had severely drained the vitality of the Fairy Pavilion, and the Empress in particular had suffered grievous wounds that she had yet to fully recover from.
At this moment, they could no longer afford to contend with the Leg Hair Brotherhood and instead retreated rapidly toward the entrance of the Devil's Den. Fighting in their current condition offered no hope of victory and could easily lead to the annihilation of their entire force.
Yet every move they made was under Luosa's control. How could he possibly let them leave alive? He directly issued an order for the ferocious beasts and demonic monsters within the Devil's Den to surround and slaughter them.
The Empress soon realized something was amiss when a vast number of ferocious beasts appeared along their path of retreat. When they first entered, there had only been a scattering—at most a dozen or so—but now a rough estimate put the number at over two hundred.
After repeatedly changing directions, the Empress finally realized that they had fallen into an encirclement. Without a moment's hesitation, she shouted decisively, "Disciples of the Fairy Pavilion, hear my command! Form the sword array and break through the front! Attack!"
"Charge!"
Countless cries merged into a roaring torrent that swept across the sky. The terrifying sword array reformed into a meat grinder and plunged straight into the horde of beasts, instantly turning the battlefield into a bloody clash of flashing steel and piercing shrieks.
The Empress awakened the Phoenix bloodline within her body, blazing with fire as she engaged a dragon-shaped beast king. With a spread of her arms, flames scorched the heavens, but the beast king let out a furious roar, spitting black flames to counter her attack!
"Orders from the Demon Lord! Execute without exception!"
The beast king could actually speak human words. Possessing sentience alongside such formidable strength, it shocked the Empress to her core; she had never heard of the beasts in the Devil's Den possessing intelligence!
Battling an opponent with genuine intelligence was vastly different from fighting one driven purely by instinct. The Empress's pressure spiked instantly as she unleashed one divine ability after another against the beast king!
A giant golden hand, continuously burning with the divine fire of the phoenix, descended from thin air, grabbed the beast king by the body, and slammed it down. The earth-shattering roar was enough to demonstrate the immense might of that single strike!
Yet the Empress's expression remained grave. The beast king emerged completely unscathed, its ferocity only further ignited by the throw. Spouting black flames to scorch the void, its massive, indestructible body charged at the Empress once more!
The two mighty figures clashed fiercely in midair, locked in an intense struggle. Below them, however, the sword array proved unstoppable, cutting down numerous beasts like chopping vegetables—until another turtle-like beast king appeared, bringing down a massive claw to shatter the sword array in a single blow!
The five hundred disciples of the Fairy Pavilion instantly found themselves at a disadvantage, and the female disciples at the Golden Core realm were slaughtered wholesale. Their shrill screams drew the Empress's attention, revealing that yet another beast king had joined the fray.
Seeing the disciples of the Fairy Pavilion ruthlessly butchered by the beasts, the Empress felt her eyes split with rage. This trip to the Devil's Den had proven disastrously costly; before they had even crossed paths with the Leg Hair Brotherhood, they had already lost so many disciples.
"Phoenix Wings Soar!" Pushing her power to the absolute limit, the Empress unleashed a supreme divine ability of the Phoenix bloodline, driving back the dragon-shaped king before diving from the sky to assault the turtle-shaped king.
The mountain-like body of the turtle-shaped king moved slowly, but its defense was astonishingly high. The Phoenix Wings Soar strike only produced a shower of sparks against its shell, failing to leave even the slightest scratch.
This sight caused the Empress's eyes to widen in utter disbelief at the cruel reality. As a Heavenly Tribulation Mighty Figure, she rarely met an adversary in the Taixuan Realm, yet barely entering the Devil's Den, she had suffered setback after setback, nearly destabilizing her Dao heart and causing her realm to plummet.
"Empress! Save me!" A female disciple had been severed at the waist by a ferocious beast. Though her upper body still clung to life, she let out a piercing scream, reaching out to the Empress for a final glimmer of survival.
Yet in such a perilous moment, the Empress could barely protect herself; how could she spare a thought for someone on the brink of death? Her only option was to rally the surviving disciples, act as the core of the formation to restart the sword array, break through the dragon-shaped king's blockade, and use their speed advantage to shake off the turtle-shaped king and flee.
Seeing the three hundred-odd members of the Fairy Pavilion escape with their lives, the dragon-shaped king flew into a rage. "You useless lump! You actually let them escape! How are we supposed to report back to the Demon Lord?"
The turtle-shaped king slowly raised its head and hummed with dissatisfaction. "Weren't you unable to stop them either? What are you barking for?"
Knowing how difficult it was to crack the turtle's shell, the dragon-shaped king let out a cold snort, then threw its head back and unleashed a dragon roar, ordering the beast horde to continue the pursuit.
Once the beast horde had run off into the distance, the dragon-shaped king asked, "We've lived in the Devil's Den for hundreds of thousands of years, so why has a Demon Lord suddenly popped up? Having one's life controlled by someone else feels utterly miserable."
"If you want to live longer, stop trying to pry into the Demon Lord. We owe our eternal existence to the Devil's Den, and we should be grateful," the turtle-shaped king said slowly before turning and leaving.
The dragon-shaped king felt thoroughly displeased by this, but was utterly helpless. Their rise within the Devil's Den meant they were destined to be its slaves; all it could do was silently pray that this mysterious Demon Lord possessed at least a sliver of mercy.
Having suffered successive heavy blows, the Fairy Pavilion remained battered and bruised, yet its sharp edge persisted. As a top-tier sect of the Taixuan Realm, aside from their own strength, they still possessed quite a few life-saving treasures.
After flying for a long stretch, the Empress finally found a secluded spot where fierce beasts and demonic monsters were rare. Overjoyed, she immediately led the remaining disciples inside to hide.
Meanwhile, the cultivators of the Leg Hair Brotherhood had also engaged in repeated battles with the beasts of the Devil's Den. The Heavenly Tribulation Mighty Figure leading them was named Tu Dao, whose fighting style was as bloodthirsty and combative as his name suggested. Yet even after being ganged up on by three beast kings, he wisely chose to run away.
"Hold on a little longer, brothers! I've found a hidden place up ahead, and then we can cultivate in peace!" Tu Dao roared, encouraging the two hundred-plus survivors to keep pushing forward.
Hearing this, the physically and mentally exhausted group rejoiced. Pouring their remaining mana into a final sprint, they followed Tu Dao into a secluded haven, though before they could even catch their breath, the atmosphere abruptly turned tense.
Tu Dao gripped the divine saber in his hand, veins bulging on his forehead. "Fairy Pavilion hussies! You actually ambushed us here!"
"You lot of vermin, were you trying to take advantage of us too?!" the Empress shouted sharply. The disciples of the Fairy Pavilion stood ready; they had rested for a while and recovered a good deal of their strength.
Just as the two factions squared off in a standoff, a dramatic shift occurred above the Blood Sea. A crimson lightning bolt crashed down, splitting the surface of the water, and out stepped a delicate-looking young man of about seventeen or eighteen, his face still bearing a trace of youthful innocence.
This was Luosa's external avatar, crafted using his own appearance from Earth as a template, with a slight touch of digital enhancement. At this moment, he looked as delicate as a pretty boy.
"Hmm~ Though it's just an external avatar, this feeling is still much better than occupying Han Feng's body." Luosa shook his head slightly; this sensation of controlling a body like one's own fingers was a long-lost feeling.
He turned his gaze toward the distant sky, a trace of confusion in his eyes. "Without realizing it, I've been here for twenty thousand years. I wonder how things are on Earth... Everyone I knew is probably gone by now..."
Several streaks of light flashed across the sky, transforming into more than a dozen figures that dropped down before Luosa. At the lead was a three-meter-tall giant whose muscles bulged like small mountains.
Luosa had expected Vajra Living Buddha to lead men here to pay homage, only to discover that the person the giant was holding in his hand was none other than Vajra Living Buddha himself.