Everyone discovered in this moment that Ashu’s eyes had turned a pure green. A beam of sheer, unadulterated greed shone out of his richly green pupils at the sight of what they’d encountered.

Lu Yun had never seen the holy lord like this before. It seemed that an obsession rooted in the deepest parts of his heart had been triggered, related to that of creation itself!

Without waiting for his companions to react, Ashu blurred into a streak of green light and chased after the kun fish that’d disappeared into the black sea.

……

“No, stop him!” Lu Yun’s expression shifted drastically and summoned a giant out of black seawater at almost the same time. Undulating ripples formed his head and his feet were planted on top of two dragons—the primordial water god Gonggong!

He’d first used Mastery of the Five Elements to summon connate water essence, then used that water essence to manipulate the connate kui water in the area, using that water of pure yin to manifest Gonggong’s body.

The primordial water god manifested with the strength that he’d possessed at his peak in olden times. One had to say, in a place where the power of the five elements gathered like this, the world was Lu Yun’s oyster. His nascent spirit was powerful enough to call upon connate elemental essence and he could do with it whatever he wanted to. The Gonggong that he manifested was pretty much the bonafide primordial water god!

“Stand guard over me!” Lu Yun roared and took a cross-legged position on the fortress ship, bending his mind to controlling his projection.

The Venerated Sacrosanct Demon Sovereign transformed into his skeletal form without a word and set himself on fire with Hadal Bonefire. Not daring to deploy the Fire Altar, the priest of flames kept a weather eye on their surroundings. She’d been here once before, but hadn’t been in possession of the true Fire Altar then, so she hadn’t prompted the ocean’s backlash. However, she was well aware of what terrors lurked in the deep.

“So strong… his dao method is stronger than the art of incantations and far more perfected!” murmured the priest of flames when she looked at Gonggong off in the distance. “But there’s still a flaw to this dao method—it’s not complete yet!”

“What kind of flaw?” Lu Yun suddenly opened his eyes in question.

The young priest’s face spasmed in fright at the response and she answered haltingly, “It’s not real enough! What you’re projecting is just an external copy and not the real thing. Or put another way, you’ve manifested just a replica of yourself.”

Lu Yun blinked and frowned in consternation. “But I’ve never met the real water god. If I had and gained a deep enough understanding of him, I’d be able to project the real deal.”

“No, you’re wrong!” the high priest cut him off. “Even if you’d met the real water god, you’d still be projecting a replica and wouldn’t be able to call upon his true strength.

“I can tell that your observation method borrows from the energy of heaven and earth to observe all things. All things, and not yourself, so you should forget your own existence and think of yourself as the real water god.

“The water god is a divine spirit of water, making water its true essence. The world is the heart of things, which makes that Gonggong just a replica of what you see with your heart.” She gave voice to a strange syllable as she spoke, igniting the flames on the Fire Altar to form a man wreathed in fire.

Though the man was coalesced through the art of incantation as deployed by the priest, there was nothing indicating his origins whether by presence or aura. He seemed to have nothing to do with the priest of flames.

He should’ve been a fire god, but right now he was a puppet, a plaything without sentience of his own. His every move and gesture was controlled by the priest’s art. But apart from that, he was much more real than Lu Yun’s water god.

The art of incarnations had been established before Emperors Fall and undergone the tempering of countless aeons. Perfected as it were, it was natural that it would be superior to Lu Yun’s nascent spirit observation method that was less than a year old. However, the theory behind Lu Yun’s method was far greater than the art of incantations.

“I see.” He took in a deep breath, finally seizing upon the core principles of his method in this moment. What he should observe was heaven and earth, and all of life, not himself. Forgetting that it was him making the observations was key.

Off to the side, the demon sovereign shook his head. He didn’t understand the meaning behind the priest’s words and just practiced the nascent spirit observation method as Lu Yun had taught him. But given that his Hadal Bonefire nascent spirit was complete and his nascent spirit had also been transmuted to Hadal Bonefire, none of this really mattered to him anymore.

“It looks like my method has another step of improvement to make. Observing dead things and living things are actually one and the same. I must be resolute and have absolute faith in myself, but also let go of the self at the same time! I need to observe the world and all living beings, but not be lost in what I see…” Lu Yun fell into deep contemplation.

“For the good of all!” Ge Long applauded heartily in hell, and even Carmine Eternal—newly returned from the yang tomb—cracked a smile.

“Moat Snake…” Carmine Eternal looked merrily at the thirteen-year-old girl wearing long yellow robes and tousled her head lovingly.

“Call me Carmine Arbiter!” The girl swung her head with dissatisfaction. She’d reformed her soul with the aid of a Hell Flower and cast off her previous form as a vicious ghost. Returning to life from death, it was as if she’d been reborn, and being reborn in hell made her a denizen of hell.

However, the core essence of a moat snake was simply too strong; it was even greater than that of the torch dragons. Though she’d been reborn and was traveling the path of cultivation all over again, her starting point was exceedingly high and she was already very strong.

“What happened to you, why did someone refine you into the Xuan Yuan Tomb?” Carmine Eternal asked hastily.

“I don’t know, I’ve forgotten!” She swung her head again, a lost look surfacing in her eyes. “But… it seems to have had something to do with God.”

……

Above the boundless sea, Lu Yun’s projection underwent a significant change. The ripple of identity belonging to him vanished without a trace, and the final strand of estrangement between it and the world dispersed as well. Even more connate water essence and kui water energy gathered upon Gonggong.

“I see, I see at last!” Gonggong’s eyes lit up. “The combat arts of the water god! As I’m the real water god now, I command the water god’s talents!”

He’d once projected both Zhurong and Gonggong, but the combat arts they’d used had still been his or simple fire and water attacks. Now that he’d forgotten himself and fully thrown himself into Gonggong, he was the real water god despite never having met the entity or gaining an understanding of it!

The combat arts of a primordial water god were at his beck and call!

Boom!

Gonggong’s body leapt forward as a tidal wave and swept across the black sea, catching up to Ashu and the kun fish in the blink of an eye.