It was you! You killed him!

"Three-Seven Soul Art!" Mo Yuan repeatedly repelled the incoming golden threads, took a few steps back, and shouted coldly as black Qi began to gather behind him.

No matter how powerful he had been in his lifetime, he was currently sealed, and only a small fraction of his power was contained within the seal. His strength was far below its peak, and relying now on the body of Baili Mo, who was at the Golden Core realm, he could barely muster the strength of the peak Nascent Soul realm. This made him slightly weaker than Jinxuanzi, who stood at the half-step Deity Transformation stage.

As Jinxuanzi had pointed out, Mo Yuan was indeed already dead; if not for his vast combat experience and long-mastered secret techniques, he might well have been subdued.

The gap between the peak Nascent Soul realm and the half-step Deity Transformation stage was far more than just half a step.

With Mo Yuan's cold shout, Jinxuanzi felt the surrounding temperature plummet once more. Thick frost visibly coated the ruins nearby, and the golden threads Jinxuanzi cast out began to slow down sluggishly, their speed drastically reduced.

"The Three-Seven Soul Art?" Jinxuanzi knitted his brows tightly, clearly wary and troubled by this technique.

"Oh? Are there still people in this era who recognize the Three-Seven Soul Art? I am truly honored," Mo Yuan laughed sinisterly.

"Ancient texts record that the Three-Seven Soul Art was the signature ultimate technique of the Venerable Mo Yuan. It is no exaggeration to say that his legendary renown was built upon it."

"Rumor even has it that Venerable Mo Yuan discovered the Black Death Book, one of the Six Books, and that the Three-Seven Soul Art was born from it!"

The materialized Nascent Soul behind Jinxuanzi suddenly blazed with brilliant golden light. In the hands of the giant Nascent Soul rested a massive golden horsetail whisk. As Jinxuanzi formed hand seals, the giant whisk erupted with dazzling radiance, sending forth countless brilliant golden threads that shot out left and right, high and low. The entire space was filled with intersecting lines of solid gold.

"Pity. With my current strength, I cannot sustain the Black Death Book. You do not have the honor of beholding it."

"Tell me, what do you think of my Three-Seven Soul Art?" Mo Yuan raised his head, watching his domain being dissolved by the golden light, and spoke with utter calm.

"If you were still at your peak, the true Three-Seven Soul Art would undoubtedly surpass Imperial-grade martial arts, even rivaling lesser immortal techniques! But in your present state, how much of its true power can you actually wield?"

"The nine characters: Rin, Piao, Toh, Sha, Kai, Jin, Retsu, Zai, Zen! Soldiers, arise!" Jinxuanzi shouted loudly, his hands continuously forming seals. The Nine-Word True Incantation known to Baili Mo was naturally mastered by Jinxuanzi as well, and to an even more profound degree.

The golden radiance emanating from the whisk in the materialized Nascent Soul's hand grew blindingly intense, further amplifying its power under the influence of the Nine-Word True Incantation.

The chaotic golden threads scattered across the air suddenly thickened. Originally as thin as strands of hair, relying merely on sharp cutting edges to inflict damage, each thread now expanded to a width of a zhang. They transformed into massive, grasping 'arms' that lashed out wildly across the space, kicking up billowing dust from the ruins that mingled with the light snow drifting from the sky.

The area was now scarred with deep chasms carved by the flailing giant arms, creating a chaotic web of patterns everywhere. Under Jinxuanzi's murmured chants, these chaotic lines flashed with golden light once more, as if some dormant array had suddenly been activated!

Forming arrays amidst combat!

Jinxuanzi rarely moved, but when he did, it was with the intent to crush his foe in a single strike!

"The nine characters: Rin, Piao, Toh, Sha, Kai, Jin, Retsu, Zai, Zen! Array, arise!" Jinxuanzi raised both hands toward the sky. High above, an unimaginably huge golden palm materialized, its palm prints clearly visible. Countless giant arms swept upward, intertwining around every single finger of the colossal hand.

As the fingers clenched, the hand formed a fist and smashed directly toward Mo Yuan. The momentum was earth-shattering. As the giant fist descended, everything in the vicinity of Jinxuanzi and Mo Yuan began to disintegrate into dust. The very fabric of space fractured under the crushing pressure, completely dispersing the darkness brought by Mo Yuan. The pillar of black Qi that had spanned tens of kilometers was pulverized in an instant by the giant fist.

The residual black Qi lingering in the space began to extinguish, while the remaining portion rapidly retreated into Mo Yuan's body. Mo Yuan bent his knees, his eyes burning like flickering ghost fires as they stared straight ahead. Beneath his mask, his expression remained unreadable.

"Hah, I truly cannot underestimate you, you old undead bastard." Mo Yuan trembled continuously beneath the golden giant fist. Under his feet, as the golden fist closed in, the ground cracked apart in massive sheets. Like duckweed in a storm, Mo Yuan teetered precariously beneath the descending blow.

"Three-Seven Soul Art! Four Souls! Devourer of Thieves!" Mo Yuan roared amidst the approaching pressure of the giant fist. The profound black Qi behind him condensed into a dense mass, swirling with cold, tyrannical power so thick it seemed as though black water might drip from it.

A black vortex slowly formed behind Mo Yuan—a vortex that seemed capable of devouring everything in existence. It expanded rapidly, forming a colossal black hole that met the giant fist from afar, locking them in a stalemate.

"Hahaha! Jinxuanzi! When you die by the hands of your most beloved disciple later, do not blame me!" Mo Yuan spread his arms wide, the black hole behind him growing ever larger, emitting a suction force of terrifying magnitude.

"You are merely a demon occupying my disciple's body, yet you dare utter such arrogant nonsense!" Jinxuanzi cast all caution to the wind, willing to completely destroy the Wangchuan Gorge if it came to that!

The golden giant fist crashed down with crushing force. The battle armor on Mo Yuan's body began to shatter, and the ferocious mask on his face dissolved into powder within a few breaths, revealing the slightly startled face beneath.

Even Mo Yuan had not anticipated that Jinxuanzi's strike would reach such terrifying proportions. Mo Yuan's vision was filled entirely with gold. The spiritual fluctuation and overwhelming pressure radiating from the giant fist forced him downward, causing the already fractured earth to cave in and gradually form a massive stone crater.

"Jinxuanzi!!!" Mo Yuan roared. One after another, black chains shot out from the black hole behind him. The spiritual Qi emanating from these chains shared the same origin as the previous black Qi, but was far purer and more solid. The black chains continuously lashed and wound around the golden giant fist, driven by an unyielding momentum to devour it completely.

A ferocious wave of air whipped up shattered stones and accumulated snow, surging into the distance. At the center of the battlefield, the massive golden fist was reeled in by the black chains and forcefully dragged straight into the black hole. The black hole vortex shook violently, appearing as though it might collapse at any moment, which would trigger a cataclysmic explosion from the collision of the golden fist and the black hole.

"Jinxuanzi! You cannot defeat me! For a mere mortal to fight me—an Immortal Emperor in my past life—to this extent, you have every right to be proud!" Mo Yuan roared, his raised hands desperately supporting the vortex of the black hole above his head, as half of the giant golden fist, bound in black chains, was sucked into the abyss.

"I will save him!" Jinxuanzi sat cross-legged atop the palm of the giant Nascent Soul behind him, his hands forming continuous seals as he exerted his utmost strength to control the giant fist. His long beard was already stained with blood, yet his eyes remained fixed unblinkingly on Mo Yuan. He was going to shatter that black hole!

"Jinxuanzi! Stop putting on a hypocritical facade! What you want is not to save your disciple at all! What you truly want is merely to salve your own guilt!"

"When he was knocked down time and time again! When he struggled back to his feet over and over! When he finally sank into despair! When he carried his heavy burden forward through the abyss!"

"Where were you, his master? You were not by his side! The one who stayed by his side, helped him, saved him, and bestowed upon him new strength was always me!!!"

"You knew full well that sending him here meant certain death, yet you sent him anyway! You knew he was longing for you to come! Longing for your appearance! Longing for you to be his hero and save them both!"

"And then? What did you do? You hesitated! Between this gradually twisting Great Xia and your most beloved disciple, you hesitated! You betrayed his expectations!"

"Without you, this Great Xia still has countless other Jinxuanzi! But what about your disciple? To him, you were the most revered and adored master, whom he treated almost like a biological father! Yet you abandoned him!"

"Jinxuanzi! He had only you! Aside from you, he had nothing left to hope for!"

"You are unworthy of being his master! It was your own hands that pushed him into the abyss of death!"

"It was you who killed him!"

The hands with which Mo Yuan propped up the black hole began to tremble violently as the giant golden fist slammed deeper into it. The moment either Jinxuanzi or Mo Yuan relented, the battle would be decided. Victory or defeat, life or death—neither of them had any path of retreat left!

"Ahhh!!! Mo Yuan! Shut your mouth! My mistakes, I will bear myself! Matters between him and me are not for an outsider to meddle in!"

"It is I who failed him! It is I who betrayed his trust! But so what? When I came here, I never intended to return alive!"

"More than half of the responsibility for everything that has happened today rests upon me, and I will never shirk it!"

"Yet even if my body and soul are pulverized today, I will drag that disciple back! That abyss is no place for him to stay!!!"

"He still has a home!"

Jinxuanzi struck a direct palm blow against his own Nascent Soul. The giant Nascent Soul behind him roared and lunged forward toward Mo Yuan, golden light overflowing from its body as its left hand seized the golden giant fist and pushed relentlessly ahead.

Bolstered by Jinxuanzi's Nascent Soul, the giant fist gained a surge of fresh momentum. The trembling black hole began to fracture, with cracks spreading simultaneously across both the fist and the void. But this was already enough for Jinxuanzi. The right hand of the Nascent Soul behind him clenched into a fist and smashed straight toward Mo Yuan.

"Jinxuanzi!!!"

Following that, a pillar of explosive light shot straight into the heavens. An earth-shattering explosion, shaking a radius of hundreds of miles, erupted as the collision between the giant fist and the black hole produced a blast far exceeding the combined power of their individual forces.

The central region of Wangchuan Gorge could no longer be described merely as collapsed; a circular crater several miles wide was now carved into the earth at the center of their battle. Unless vast amounts of human labor and resources were expended, this section of Wangchuan Gorge would forever remain a dead end.

A towering mushroom cloud of mist rose high into the clouds, while the air filled with lingering smoke and dust. In that space, the fabric of reality shattered repeatedly before naturally repairing itself, cycling through cycles of destruction and mending for several breathless moments, accompanied by a succession of harsh, piercing screeches.