Aspiring to the Immortal Path
chapter-664

Tang Jie was right. The Mother Cloud combat puppet alone couldn't handle all of the ghosts. Innumerable ghosts had come in through the Nether Gate and were piled up in the space behind the stone wall. They were constantly getting through the various obstacles in their way and entering the battle, in ceaseless wave after wave.

Even the power of the puppet gradually started to run out in the face of this vast sea of ghosts. It had to be understood that the puppet had already taken down tens of thousands of ghosts in this time, including more than a hundred ghost generals and one ghost king.

Tang Jie had the puppet go back to recover while the Pale Cloud Flame took its place.

A sea of flames swept through the area, obliterating almost every ghost that rushed in.

Even so, ghosts continued to pour out from behind the stone wall.

Sinister winds howled in, bringing with them a frigid chill.

This frigid energy gathered together and charged at the Pale Cloud Flame, neutralizing it as water would fire. Even though the Pale Cloud Flame would extinguish the cold energy every time, more cold energy came in. Gradually, the Pale Cloud Flame began to falter, its flame weakening.

Upon seeing this, Tang Jie called back the Pale Cloud Flame and unleashed the Flesh Millstone.

Blood fog ignored the chill, creating a crimson world in this place. Any ghost that charged into this fog would be ground to powder by the Flesh Millstone.

But the Flesh Millstone had to deal with the problem that the ghosts didn't have any blood or flesh to devour, so there was nothing to absorb so that it could recharge. Tang Jie found it more and more tiring to use it.

Gradually, the Flesh Millstone reached its limit, so it was Yiyi's turn.

The little girl's Silkheaven Net and Black Sin became the main force against the ghosts, but the Silkheaven Net's offensive power was clearly lacking against this horde of ghosts. As for Black Sin, it lacked interest toward the ghosts.

Once Yiyi hit her limit, Tang Jie personally took action.

But just like before, in the face of this vast sea of ghosts, tough flesh and close combat prowess didn't matter much. No matter how strong a fist was, a punch was still only killing one person. No matter how tough one's body was, it couldn't protect the soul from damage. In the end, he relied on his avatar's law cultivator power, and in the face of all these ghosts, the spell arts also gradually began to lose ground.

Fortunately, after five rounds, the combat puppet had recovered enough of its power to rejoin the fray.

The battle proceeded in this bizarre fashion for some time. Initially, Tang Jie felt there wouldn't be enough ghosts, but after round after round of frenzied killing, there were still ghosts pouring in. Tang Jie began to wonder how he hadn't killed all the ghosts yet.

The more the killing went on, the more Tang Jie sensed that something was wrong.

This was starting to get strange. The space behind the wall shouldn't have been big enough to fit this many ghosts. So why were there still so many coming in?

Could it be…

The answer appeared in Tang Jie's mind: the Nether Gate wasn't closed.

This was perhaps the real reason for the endless ghosts.

Although Liu Yunshan had said that the Nether Gate couldn't last for long, it was clear that they had guessed wrongly.

Something must have happened that allowed the Nether Gate to persist until now.

It was fortunate that he had discovered this. If the ghosts had been allowed to gather together and rushed out onto the surface, all of the Verdant Cloud Domain would have suffered a heavy blow.

Since he was guessing that the truth was hidden behind the stone wall, Tang Jie decided to stop relying on it for positional advantage. After one round of fighting, he used his original body's formidable strength to blast it down with a single punch.

A large hole was blasted through the wall, the impact sending sounds bouncing off the walls and debris raining down.

Upon stepping into the world beyond the wall, he saw that it was packed with ghosts.

Above him, that gate of white bone floated in the air.

Just as Tang Jie had predicted, it hadn't been destroyed. It was still there, and ghosts were flooding out of it.

Large numbers of black-green vines had grown around the gate.

The vines coiled around the gate, their roots splaying out in the air as if they were rooted in the void, firmly keeping the Nether Gate in place.

Upon seeing those vines, Tang Jie knew why the Nether Gate hadn't disappeared.

This was the Withering Yin Vine, the upgraded version of the Withering Yin Grass.

As a plant that existed between illusion and reality, its greatest attribute was its ability to stabilize space, which made it a necessity for extreme-distance teleportation formations. Withering Yin Vines had even greater effects and wider uses than the Grass. As they had spatial attributes all on their own, they could even be used to study and grasp the power of Space. This was why the gate was able to stay long past its expiration date.

Tang Jie had only been planning to find some Withering Yin Grass, but he had instead come across a large growth of Withering Yin Vines.

"I knew my luck was good," Tang Jie muttered.

Since he had found what he wanted, Tang Jie stopped holding back. The Pale Cloud Flame and puppet charged in and began to clear out the ghosts.

Tang Jie himself charged up, reaching toward the Withering Yin Vines.

The ghosts weren't completely mindless. They realized what Tang Jie was trying to do, and numerous ghost generals flew up to intercept him. But Tang Jie wasn't something they could stop, and he rammed straight through them.

As he neared the Nether Gate, two ghost kings suddenly appeared.

Tang Jie knew that these ghost kings were even stronger than the fiend kings, so he immediately brought his hands together, summoning a long saber that he swung at the leading ghost king.

The Ten Extinctions Blade!

This Ten Extinctions Blade was used with the two-heads, four-arms Divine Connection, and it wasn't empowered by the Pale Cloud Flame, but even so, when that blade radiating gray and black energy clashed against the ghost king's heavy sword, it still sliced straight through, striking the ghost king and chopping through it as if it was made of butter. There was a frenzied rush of energy and a boom, and the soul fire within the ghost king's body was obliterated, dissipating into black smoke with a screech.

He had killed one ghost king with a single strike, and this was without using the sword spirit or the Devil Crushing Fist. It was all Tang Jie's own power.

This blow certified that Tang Jie was invincible below Violet Palace.

The remaining ghost king was cowed by this strike and didn't dare to come forward.

Tang Jie ignored it and flew up to the Nether Gate, grabbing at the Withering Yin Vines. As he did, lengths of vine emerged from the void, as if he was pulling out radishes. Black liquid was dripping from the roots of these Withering Yin Vines, each drop producing ripples in space.

"The Yellow Nether Spring!" Tang Jie crowed in delight.

The Yellow Nether Spring was the Nether River. It was said that this river was the mother river of the Nether Domain, linked to the underworld. Whenever someone died, they would travel through this river to the Nether Domain. For this reason, the Nether River was a river that transcended the power of Space, and Withering Yin Vines had such powerful spatial abilities because they grew within the Nether River.

The Withering Yin Vines that Tang Jie had grabbed seemed to be binding the Nether Gate to this space, but in reality, they were still rooted in the Nether River. The Yellow Nether Spring was the soil that they grew in, and Tang Jie had pulled some out with the vines.

This water was of the same source as the Yellow Spring Water he gained from killing ghost generals, but it lost its spatial attribute after turning into ghost generals, so it could only be kept as a substance of extreme Yin energy. This sort of water that had not been transformed was the real divine substance.

Thus, Tang Jie hastily took out a jade bottle to gather these drops, and he quickly filled it up.

Without the Withering Yin Vines, the Nether Gate began to flash and shudder.

At the same time, an enraged roar came from behind the gate.

So terrifying was the being behind the gate that its roar alone made Tang Jie dizzy.

Tang Jie instantly knew he was in trouble. If the roar alone could do this to him, that thing behind the gate was definitely nothing to be taken lightly. It might have even been the reason for those vines being here, and he had inadvertently ruined that being's plans.

The realization made Tang Jie feel extremely uneasy, and he quickly retreated.

A light erupted from the Nether Gate, and a ghost hand seething with sinister energy emerged from the gate and reached for Tang Jie.

Tang Jie roared, his four arms gripping his saber and swinging, unleashing another Ten Extinctions Blade.

This blow that could even injure an Infant Tending Violet Palace cultivator fell upon that ghost hand as if it had slammed into ancient unmeltable ice, sparks flying everywhere. In the end, Tang Jie's full-strength strike managed to only leave a mark on that hand. All of the additional effects had been useless, the Sovereign Blade no longer as sharp and the power of Destruction unable to destroy.

Tang Jie was stunned. Just how powerful was the owner of this ghost hand?

Even so, the strike still made the owner of the hand let out a howl of shock.

The howl resounded in Tang Jie's mind, causing him to throw up blood as he jumped away.

The ghost hand shot forward to grab him.

Just when the ghost hand was about to catch up, the hands on Tang Jie's back grabbed a ghost king and tossed him back.

The ghost king was caught off guard and ended up being caught in the clutches of the ghost hand.

The ghost hand squeezed, and the ghost king exploded.

Sensing that this wasn't its target, the ghost hand continued to chase after Tang Jie.

Tang Jie continued to retreat, his hands throwing ghost soldiers and generals out to serve as his meatshields. That ghost hand was obscenely powerful, crushing everything thrown to it and getting faster and faster.

In this limited space, Tang Jie was finding it harder and harder to evade the ghost hand.

"Return the Withering Yin Vine to me!" A thought resounded in Tang Jie's mind, suffused with a biting cold energy.

Tang Jie knew that this was the will of that existence behind the gate, but he ignored it and continued to dodge.

The existence behind the gate grew more enraged, and the ghost hand swept over as that will resounded in Tang Jie's mind, "You must die for ruining my plan!"

The palm slammed down, sending out a shockwave.

All of the ghosts were obliterated by the shockwave, saving Tang Jie from having to kill them. Yiyi was also sent flying by the shockwave, but thankfully, the puppet flew in and used its body to protect Yiyi.

At the same time, the terrifying shockwave had paralyzed Tang Jie.

The ghost hand reached over once more. "Die!"

In this dire moment, Tang Jie simply smiled. "You think I will? Doesn't look like it to me!"

He activated the Chaoswind Step and blinked away, avoiding the grab and appearing right above the Nether Gate.

He swung the saber down and roared, "Break!"

Another Ten Extinctions Blade.

This time, it was aimed at the Nether Gate.

Having lost the Withering Yin Vines, the Nether Gate was already unstable, and after suffering Tang Jie's attack, it erupted with light.

"NOOOO!" The existence behind the gate angrily roared and tried to pull back its arm.

But it was too slow.

In a blast of dazzling flame, the Nether Gate collapsed.

As the Nether Gate collapsed, the spatial passage it maintained began to rapidly constrict, imploding on itself. In the blink of an eye, it was gone, but as for that ghost hand, only half of its arm had managed to retreat through the passage. As the passage collapsed, the rest of the arm was cut off.

A massive skeletal hand fell from the air.