"Patriarch, save me!!" One of the old Ji Clan cultivators screamed as he went all-out trying to fight against the spell formation hand. However, all his magical techniques fell to pieces, and he was torn to shreds, causing blood to rain down into the clouds below.

The illusory hand burst with the power of extermination. Lightning crashed and exploded, becoming the only sound in Heaven and Earth.

A middle-aged Ji Clan cultivator, eyes bloodshot, performed an incantation gesture that caused numerous magical items to fly out of his bag of holding. However, the hand shattered them all. Blood sprayed from the man's mouth, splattering back onto his face. He screamed as he was destroyed, completely shredded into nothing.

Two more Ji Clan cultivators performed incantation gestures, summoning magical techniques and Karma Threads. In the blink of an eye, their Karma was destroyed, and then the hand completely wiped them out.

"Patriarch, save us!!" Miserable screams echoed out, filled with astonishment and dread. Unfortunately for them, the screams were completely drowned out by the lightning.

Everything happened very quickly. Although it takes some time to describe, Meng Hao's single explosive attack with the South Heaven Death Formation… instantly killed almost all of the dozen or so Ji Clan cultivators.

A moment later, only two were left. One was the young man, and the other was the Elder who had been in the leadership position of this group that had come to Planet South Heaven. They immediately fell back, avoiding death for the moment. However, the hand continued to rumble toward them with unbelievable speed.

"Meng Hao," the old man roared, "is your Fang Clan trying to start a war with the Ji Clan!?!?" He waved his hand, causing cultivation base power to erupt into a windstorm that rumbled so loudly it vied with the thunder.

Meng Hao's face was icy cold as he shoved his hand down. More rumbling could be heard as the spell formation's hand crushed down through the clouds toward the two remaining cultivators.

Blood sprayed out of the old man's mouth, and a look of despair covered his face as he began to collapse. In the moment before he shattered, the young man flickered into place behind him and pushed down onto his back.

"Since you're going to die... you might as well help me!" the young man murmured.

RUMBLE!

The enormous hand continued to surge through the clouds, causing them to seethe and churn. By now, the sound had reached the ears of the cultivators down below, who heard a shocking rumbling.

They could also see the clouds shaking. Massive amounts of lightning crackled about as if they had been squeezed out of the sponge-like clouds, falling from the clouds like silver dragons.

Given that even the lightning had been forcibly expelled, huge bean-sized drops of rain also began to pour down onto the lands beneath.

However, what no one noticed was that some of that rain was the color of blood. That was because... it wasn't rain at all, but blood, the blood of the Ji Clan! However, there was no life within that blood, and the amount was miniscule, as if the vast majority of it had been swallowed up by the clouds themselves.

What nobody down below could see was that, somewhere within the dark clouds, a blood-colored figure sat cross-legged in meditation, surrounded by a cloud of the blood that had disappeared, which it was constantly consuming.

If you looked closely, that blood-colored figure was emanating the Karmic aura of the Ji Clan, as well as a faint, murderous aura.

This was Meng Hao's Blood Clone!

It had been years since Meng Hao's cultivation base had grown so powerful that the Blood Clone was essentially useless, and had remained tucked away in his bag of holding. He had even given up on the idea of turning it into a Blood Divinity.1

Then Ji Tian had gone and tried to kill his father, which stoked Meng Hao's killing intent and rage to the point where he decided to collect more generations of Ji Clan blood and continue his plan to build his Blood Divinity, which would have the power of Ancestral Awakening.

Thus, less blood fell down among the rain than would be expected, and what fell was in fact diluted to the point that no one could see it. In fact, only a single drop landed on the face of one of the cultivators down below, who looked up in shock after wiping it away.

Back up in the clouds and lightning, Meng Hao extended his right hand, causing the spell formation's hand to gradually disperse, leaving behind a huge handprint within the clouds.

One palm had killed the Ji Clan cultivators as if they were ants!

Although that power did not come from Meng Hao himself, at this moment he felt a sort of mightiness that could only come after one possessed the power to control Heaven and Earth, the kind of domineering feeling that came from being matchless in all of creation.

As the hand faded away, two people became visible within the handprint that was left behind. It was none other than the two people who hadn't been killed!

Of course, it would be most correct to say that it was one person, not two!

The old man's aura was no longer present. A huge hole was now visible in his back, and it was possible to see that no organs existed inside of his body. He was an empty husk, inside of which the young man was concealed!

Clearly, he hadn't simply hidden inside the man, but used some sort of sinister secret magic to avoid being killed by the enormous net.

Cracking sounds could be heard as the husk of the old man fell into pieces. The young man staggered back, coughing up blood. At the same time, countless Karma Threads exploded out of him, filling the area and transforming into what looked like a teleportation spell formation.

The blood spraying from his mouth fell down through the clouds to be sucked towards and voraciously consumed by the Blood Clone which was hidden there.

Of course, the young man had no idea about the Blood Clone. Even as his body began to fade, Meng Hao gave a cold harrumph.

"You're not going anywhere!" he said, advancing, hand clenching into a fist. He punched out, causing the air to distort. However, as he closed in on the young man, Meng Hao suddenly felt a sense of crisis, and it was in that moment that the young man smiled eerily.

"You... finally got close," he murmured. Instead of dodging out of the way of Meng Hao's fist, he actually charged directly forward to meet it.

Rumbling could be heard as the young man's body was shattered, causing blood and gore to spray out in all directions. However, his laughter continued to echo out in the air.

"Meng Hao, our Karma has been tied. Next time we meet... what's yours will be mine. Remember our shared name. We are called... Ji Dongyang!" Wild laughter echoed out as the young man's body faded away.

Meng Hao hovered there, frowning. Finally, he looked down thoughtfully at his fist and sighed.

"I wanted to kill him, but apparently, that was part of his plan....

"What a clever fellow, this Ji Dongyang. All of the Ji Clan cultivators he brought with him were being used as a smokescreen.

"And the entire reason why he dared to come to Planet South Heaven was to use a Ji Clan secret magic to bind me with Karma, and in turn unleash some sort of mysterious Daoist magic.

"I was luring him into a trap, and he was doing the same to me.... He didn't want to be killed by the South Heaven Death Formation, he wanted to be killed by me personally...." Even as he hovered there thinking, the Blood Clone which had been hiding in the clouds below slowly floated up. It was now very different than before, more powerful, and emanating a powerful aura of Ji Clan Karma.

In fact, it even seemed to be poised on the verge of a breakthrough. With a little more progress, it would finally break through and take a step closer to being a Blood Divinity capable of Ancestral Awakening.

"If the Ancestral Awakening occurs, I wonder if... whatever appears will be as powerful as Ji Tian himself!?"

Eyes flickering, he ceased worrying about the matter of Ji Dongyang. All he could do now was be on guard against this new powerful adversary!

After putting his Blood Clone into his bag of holding, he shot back down through the clouds.

Meanwhile, in the Ji Clan on the Ninth Mountain, there was a restricted area that was a graveyard. Nine coffins were lined up there, all of them bronze and carved with complicated magical symbols.

Seven of those coffins had no lids, and were empty. Only the eighth and ninth coffins were closed tightly.

Suddenly, powerful rumbling like that of thunder could be heard, and the lid of the eighth coffin opened with a bang. A powerful aura immediately surged out from within.

A hand stretched up from inside the eighth coffin. At first, it was trembling, but then it grew steady and grabbed the side of the coffin. A person slowly sat up, then stood. His body was shriveled, like a corpse, so desiccated that it was difficult to make out his facial features.

A mark could be seen on his forehead, and despite the withered nature of his body, that mark was clearly visible. Unexpectedly, it was... an Echelon mark!!

Shockingly, this man... was an Echelon cultivator!

He took a breath, sucking in all the energy of Heaven and Earth in the area. As he did, his body rapidly regenerated. His blood and flesh wriggled, and life flooded back into him as he rapidly transformed back into a young man!

His facial features slowly filled back in, and in the end... a face appeared which no one had ever seen before!

"I still... prefer the appearance of my seventh life," he said in a raspy voice. "He was my favorite among the Junior generation." Then the face rapidly changed, transforming into... Ji Dongyang!

"The Karma has been bound, and my eighth life body has been awakened. I've also secured the host for my ninth life. Meng Hao..... Once we share the same body... then you will be my ninth life!" Ji Dongyang began to laugh, a strange and sinister laughter filled with an ancient air.

He looked up, and shockingly, a huge eye appeared up above him, within which sat an old man. The two of them looked at each other.

The most eerie thing was that if there were a third person present to observe the scene, they would find that the look in the old man's eyes, and the look in Ji Dongyang's eyes...

Were exactly the same!!

I didn't have time to link to all the previous relevant chapters with the Blood Clone. If I recall correctly, the last time it appeared was in the battle for the Southern Domain. I did pull up a chapter where the Blood Divinity was mentioned, chapter 265