This spell formation resulted in a Demonic Incarnation that could merge the cultivation bases of all of the Blood Demon Sect disciples. It had protected the Blood Demon Sect for countless years, and had ensured its long-lasting survival.

Inside the Demonic Incarnation, the five mountain peaks of the Blood Demon Sect glowed with brilliant light that transformed into five layers of ripples. Each layer was a different color, and as they spread out, they transformed into a five-layered restrictive spell shield.

Each layer of the shield was maintained by Spirit Severing experts, and was filled with the power of the entire mountain peak. The entire defense was incredibly tough and resilient.

Suddenly, Patriarch Blood Demon's voice echoed out through the Blood Demon Sect. "The first formation, the Demonic Incarnation, will have Meng Hao as the nucleus. He will lead 100,000 disciples, and will control the formation!"

Meng Hao currently stood in Blood Prince Gorge. When he heard Patriarch Blood Demon's voice, he looked up.

Next to him was Xu Qing. She didn't speak, but instead silently straightened his robe, and then wrapped her arms around him. After a moment passed, she released him and stepped back. Meng Hao looked at her.

"Wait for me. I'll be back."

Xu Qing nodded. Inside, she was getting incredibly nervous, but she didn't let Meng Hao see it for fear that it might distract him.

Meng Hao took a deep breath and then walked out of Blood Prince Gorge. The moment he emerged, the mad, burning eyes of the Blood Demon Sect disciples all came to focus on him.

When he saw their impassioned gazes, Meng Hao felt a deep guilt. All of this was because he had taken the true Immortal's soul. If he hadn't, this great catastrophe would not have descended on the Blood Demon Sect.

It was at this point that he suddenly heard Patriarch Blood Demon's calm voice speaking in his ear. "There's no need to feel guilty. Do you really think that the Solitary Sword Sect, the Golden Frost Sect, and the Li Clan are willing to start a war just because of the soul of a true Immortal?

"The true Immortal's soul was just an instigating factor. The true reason for their actions… is their fear of me. They believe me to be an existential threat, and have been looking for an opportunity to get rid of me.

"Even if the true Immortal's soul didn't come along, this war still would have happened. The Southern Domain has been at peace for too long."

Meng Hao didn't respond, but his eyes gleamed with decisiveness and the desire to slaughter. In this war, he would definitely be doing some killing!

In fact, he would do everything within his might to kill as many enemies as possible.

His body flashed as he flew up toward the first spell formation. Behind him, 100,000 Blood Demon Sect disciples soared through the air. All of them entered the spell formation and then sat down cross-legged.

There were 20,000 in the torso. The four limbs had 15,000 each. The head had 20,000. In total, there were 100,000 disciples. As for Meng Hao, his position was in the forehead of the Demonic Incarnation.

As soon as the 100,000 disciples entered the spell formation and sat down cross-legged, they unleashed their cultivation bases. As the power merged into the Demonic Incarnation, rumbling sounds filled their minds. The enormous Demonic Incarnation suddenly seemed to revert from a state of deathlike inactivity, to life. Flourishing life force exploded out inside of it.

Meng Hao sat cross-legged in the forehead position, monstrous killing intent visible in his eyes. He would protect this place, both for the Blood Demon Sect, and… for Xu Qing.

As long as he was alive, he would not permit anyone to harm even a hair on Xu Qing's head.

Even as he sat there cross-legged, he continuously produced Spirit Severing magical items, which he absorbed into his body. Even as the pain threatened to cross the threshold that he could tolerate, he clenched his jaw tightly and pressed on. With the absorption of each treasure, his fleshly body continued to grow stronger, bit by bit.

The strongest of all…. was his right arm. That was the first location into which he had absorbed the Spirit Severing treasures. After melding exactly a thousand such treasures into his right arm, he could sense a breakthrough in that specific area; it now radiated ripples similar to Dao Seeking.

"Almost there…." he thought. His expression was calm as he continued to fuse more items into his body.

Time passed. Several days later, the Blood Demon Sect was deathly silent. The atmosphere was one of suppression, suppression of the incredible energy that had built up to a peak and was just waiting to explode out.

Outside of the sect, the four great powers had finished setting up their spell formations. Hundreds of thousands of Southern Domain rogue cultivators had arrived.

From a distance, 700,000 cultivators could be seen surrounding the Blood Demon Sect, spread across the horizon as far as the eye could see. It was an incredible force, and looking at it would cause one's heart to tremble.

"Blood Demon Sect!"

"This war will end with the extermination of the Blood Demon Sect!"

"FIGHT!!"

It was noontime, but the sun was completely covered by the dark clouds. Lightning crackled through the sky as the vast crowds of the four great powers roared. 700,000 voices combined together, roaring with such intensity that the clouds were split open and rain began to pour down.

Rain. Thunder. Slaughter….

Battle!

The war was beginning!

The Solitary Sword Sect, the Golden Frost Sect, the Black Sieve Sect, and the Li Clan were not the first ones to make a move. The first to attack were naturally the rogue cultivators who had come hoping to earn rewards.

Hundreds of thousands of them surged forth with earthshaking power. The sky shook, and the rain was incapable of even falling to the ground, and was instead scattered about in all directions.

A great variety of cultivation bases could be seen among the rogue cultivators. The highest were in the great circle of the Nascent Soul stage; however, there were no Spirit Severing experts present. As they attacked, the spell formations around them burst out with blinding light. Lightning from above was pulled down, entering into the spell formations, which then produced numerous silver snakes composed of lightning bolts.

There were eight silver snakes in total, 300 meters wide and 30,000 meters long, that sucked the hundreds of thousands of rogue cultivators inside of them as they emerged. From a distance, tens of thousands of rogue cultivators could be seen inside each of the silver snakes, lending their power to the lightning. The snakes immediately shot directly toward the enormous Demonic Incarnation surrounding the Blood Demon Sect.

Inside the Demonic Incarnation, the 100,000 Blood Demon Sect disciples began to call out.

"Blood Prince, do we fight?!"

"Blood Prince, we're waiting for your command!!"

Their voices echoed about inside of the Demonic Incarnation, but could not be heard in the outside world.

"The time has not come yet," replied Meng Hao calmly. He slowly raised his right hand, and in response, the enormous, cross-legged Demonic Incarnation also raised its hand, then pounded the ground violently with a palm strike.

Boom!

A deafening sound could be heard as a blood-colored shield of light shot out from the palm of the Demonic Incarnation to sweep out in all directions.

As the eight incoming lightning snakes closed in on the Demonic Incarnation, they were blocked by the blood-colored shield at a distance of 3,000 meters. The shield twisted and distorted under the power of the repeated attacks levied against it, but did not collapse.

Inside the Demonic Incarnation, killing intent flashed brightly in the eyes of the 100,000 Blood Demon Sect disciples. Their bodies emanated bloody glows as they waited, fused completely with the Demonic Incarnation. As for Meng Hao, he sat in the forehead position, continuously feeding Spirit Severing treasures into the flesh of his right arm.

1,451. 1,452…. As the items continued to fuse into his arm, it grew more and more powerful. The Dao Seeking aura became more prominent, and Meng Hao knew that he was just a little bit away… from making his hand the first part of his fleshly body that was truly in Dao Seeking.

Eight silver lightning snakes attacked constantly, but the blood-colored shield continued to hold strong, despite the distortions that marred its surface. It even managed to make counterattacks, such that two of the silver snakes were beginning to show signs of breaking apart.

"Trash! Even with the help of our Li Clan spell formations, those good-for-nothing fools still can't break the Blood Demon Sect's first spell formation!" The Li Clan's 3rd Patriarch gave a cold snort.

"Fellow Daoist Six-Daos," said the red-haired Golden Frost Sect cultivator, his eyes coming to rest on Patriarch Six-Daos of the Black Sieve Sect. "It's about time for you to make your move."

The black-robed cultivator from the Solitary Sword Sect also looked over at him.

Six-Daos' face flickered and he snorted coldly. There was no way for him to refuse, so he raised his hand and pointed forward. The Black Sieve Sect discarnate souls and cultivators behind him gritted their teeth and charged forward. There was even one discarnate soul who emanated a Spirit Severing aura; including it, the Black Sieve Sect looked like an enormous sword, slicing through the air to stab toward the blood-colored shield that the eight lightning snakes were contending with.

A huge boom rattled out, and the blood-colored shield shuddered, seemingly growing weaker. The eight lightning snakes merged their power together. That, combined with the cultivation bases of the Black Sieve Sect, smashed into the weakest parts of the shield.

Cracking sounds could be heard as fissures spread out. The fissures quickly sealed back up, though, and even sent counterattacks back out. The two silver lightning snakes that had been weakened before suddenly exploded.

There were no miserable screams. The instant that the snake exploded, the tens of thousands of cultivators inside were instantly wiped out, dead in spirit and body.

The cultivators in the remaining six lightning snakes looked shocked. However, they had come here to seek good fortune and had been promised by the four great powers that they would get what they sought. It didn't matter that the battle was fierce; would they really give up so easily?

"Meng Hao!" the Spirit Severing discarnate soul cried out. "Are you going to keep hiding in the Blood Demon Sect the whole time? I dare you to come out and fight!" He assumed Meng Hao was somewhere in the Blood Demon Sect, not inside the Demonic Incarnation.

His voice reverberated as it passed through the blood-colored shield, all the way to the Demonic Incarnation, and into Meng Hao's ears.

Meng Hao's eyes flickered with killing intent, but he did nothing. Instead, he continued to feed Spirit Severing treasures into his right hand.

1,479. 1,480!

Meng Hao could clearly sense that his right arm was now almost completely beyond Spirit Severing, and had truly entered into Dao Seeking.

Booms echoed out from the outside as six lightning snakes, joined by the Black Sieve Sect cultivators under the leadership of the Spirit Severing discarnate soul, continued to attack the blood-colored shield. The shield began to distort and shrink, and portions even began to shatter.

"Meng Hao!" called the Spirit Severing discarnate soul. "I was the one who personally extracted Xu Qing's soul! The process of separating her body and soul wracked her with intense pain! The look on her face... I still remember it as if it were yesterday." He waved his hand, and the shield shook. He was obviously trying to bait Meng Hao into fighting.

The instant his voice rang out, Meng Hao looked up. Intense viciousness could be seen in his eyes, as well as explosive killing intent.

The 1,500th Spirit Severing treasure fused into his right arm, and it broke completely out of Spirit Severing and reached the Dao Seeking level.

An incomplete, fragmented natural law spread out, although it didn't affect Meng Hao. His right hand was now the most powerful part of his fleshly body!

"Blood Prince, let's fight!!"

"Blood Prince, we want to do battle!!"

"Yes," said Meng Hao. "FIGHT!" Even as the words left his mouth, he raised his right hand and made a violent grasping gesture. What everyone on the outside saw was the Demonic Incarnation raising its enormous right hand, which then shot out of the shield with indescribable speed to grab ahold of the Spirit Severing discarnate soul.

The hand clenched viciously, and a boom could be heard, as the discarnate soul was crushed into pieces. A lingering scream echoed out over the battlefield.

The Demonic Incarnation suddenly stood up. It was tens of thousands of meters tall, completely shocking in appearance.