Chapter 139: Devouring the Demigods
The silence that had fallen over the basaltic plain was heavier than the rumbling of the surrounding rivers of lava. Xuan BaiShe stood upright, arms crossed behind his back, observing the three Great Ancestors of the Azure Kingdom with an almost clinical curiosity. The three Demigods, once so proud, were now nailed to the ground by immense blades of black ice that pierced their shoulders and thighs, brutally anchoring them into the volcanic rock.
The golden blood, a sign of their divine rank, flowed slowly along the stone channels, evaporating in small hisses upon contact with the heat of the ground.
Long Huang wiped away with a disdainful gesture a trail of divine blood that stained her porcelain cheek. Her dark membrane wings slowly folded back against her back.
The leader of the Demigods raised a trembling head. His bloodshot eyes fixed BaiShe with helpless hatred.
"You monster..." he gasped, foamy blood lining his lips. "The Dao Temple... they will know what you have done. You will not be able to hide this crime forever..."
BaiShe slowly adjusted his monocle, his silver pupils already beginning to tint with violet.
"The dead do not tell tales, Lord Ancestor," he replied in a monotone voice that carried no trace of anger or remorse. "Your existence has ceased to be a relevant variable in the equation of this world. Therefore, it is time for you to serve a much higher cause: my own ascension."
Suddenly, BaiShe closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His Omega Heart began to beat with titanic force, pumping waves of Khao through his meridians. The atmosphere around him changed instantly. The sky of the Seed World, already dark, turned to a deep violet, as if reality itself was reacting to the call of a primordial predator.
"< Arts: Abyss of the Thousand Hungry Hands >" pronounced BaiShe.
The space behind him seemed to fragment like a broken mirror. Wide black fissures tore through the fabric of the dimension, and from the darkness emerged hundreds of emaciated, monstrous hands, whose gray and parchment-like skin seemed to bear the stigmata of a thousand eons of famine. Each palm was equipped with a gaping mouth with sharp teeth, and eyeballs rolled erratically along the forearms, fixing the victims with insatiable hunger.