In the sect's center, Darian and several important figures watched footage of what was happening in the cities through the big inscription that connected everything inside their domain.

Countless enemies were furiously attacking the cities' protective barriers. The barriers began to give way fast, and in no time, the places were turned to wasteland.

"Wait! We'll kill every last one of you!" many roared in fury as they watched their ancestral homes get destroyed.

All the barriers were at maximum strength, but they were completely destroyed in minutes. In other words: the enemies always had the power to invade the cities and raze them quickly — for some reason, until now they hadn't.

People in the sect broke out in a cold sweat, facing that truth. The earlier attacks had just been raids by training troops and weak armies. Now they were showing a bit of their real power.

They didn't know, but Darian and Remira already understood why all this was happening.

The Radiant King didn't actually want to destroy the sect outright — instead, he was pressuring them the right way so they'd produce more and more powerful people.

It was working. The sect had never had so many people at level nine of the second realm before. Why? The enemy had the same core-assimilation technique as Darian. He was building a farm, fattening people up as much as possible, and then devouring them.

Sure, destroying the weaker cities was easy, but invading the sect's core wouldn't be simple. To avoid unnecessary risk, he planted traitors and was preparing for the right day to attack with everything.

But now, because of the big recent changes inside the sect, they chose to press a bit harder with this attack.

Thankfully, because of Darian's orders, the weak cities had already been evacuated, so there were no casualties.

Even empty, though, the barriers were kept deliberately active.

Seeing historic cities being wiped out, everyone felt a deep pain: they were witnessing their own helplessness. Still, they admired Darian's foresight. No one knew the enemy's true power — but he acted in time and avoided a bigger disaster.

"Damn it, Boss, let's massacre them!" Remira said flatly.

"If anyone goes, they won't come back," Darian said, shaking his head.

"What? They have other tricks?" she asked, tense.

"Don't let your emotions take over — always observe coldly. Some of these enemies move strangely, stiffly. They're people with slave seals, like puppets. Inside them, there's a hidden present," Darian explained.

Remira and the others focused on the footage and were shocked. They did see the odd movements.

It was a trap. They attacked dozens of cities at once and destroyed the barriers quickly. The plan was to force the sect to move to defend the key spots — after all, they couldn't ignore millions of commoners under their protection being slaughtered.

When the sect's members arrived to save them, the surprise inside the enemy bodies would detonate.

This was probably the Darkness Law. Darian knew it was possible to insert runes into someone's primordial core. Activating them would be like a bomb that ended the person's life and affected everything nearby.

"How did you know?" Remira asked, serious.

"If I can break a defensive barrier without much effort, why can't they? If I can manipulate the system's law creatively, why couldn't they?" Darian said with a snort. "I already fell into that bastard King's trap before. He's not an idiot, and his servants aren't either. So I'll never underestimate them again — I must always act calmly so I'm not deceived."

Everyone around sighed; the melancholy and pain radiating from Darian were obvious. He never talked about what happened, but everyone imagined he'd suffered an irreparable loss that ate him from the inside.

After a few minutes, the images began to blur, and the connection was quickly lost.

Faces went grim. That happened because the enemy had started stealing the inscriptions' runes — an incomparable treasure forged with countless resources and effort.

"Good. It's time. I ordered them to keep the barriers fully charged and semi-active so that, when the attack began, they could be remotely triggered at max. They'll have to remove the rune energy rune by rune — it'll take hours," Darian said calmly.

"All one hundred thousand elite soldiers: grab your weapons. Today is the day of our first attack."

***

Near the center of the Heavenly World was a colossal city — the famous Radiant City, the third largest under Radiant King Dohans' domain and the closest to the sect.

Back in the day, this city was called Yin Star, and it had been one of the thirteen main cities of the Divine Seven-Star Sect. But now only three cities of similar level remained under the sect's control.

After the city was taken, its internal structure hadn't been changed. All the main buildings and systems were already top-tier — impossible to replace with something better.

Murral had confirmed that to Darian, because he'd secretly bought info from locals. With the city's records preserved in the sect, Darian knew everything about the place.

Even better: the person who'd helped found and build that city's inscription was the sect's legendary first vice-leader... Remira herself.

Right then, the Radiant City's great inscription was semi-active. To save energy, defensive inscriptions had a mechanism that only woke them fully when they detected an actual attack.

This place normally had a huge standing army, but that day, almost two-thirds of its flying ships and soldiers were out on a campaign. Since it was the closest to the sect, it had also sent the most troops in the current raid.

Suddenly...

High above the city, the space shuddered and the world changed color.

The barrier detected the environmental change and cranked its runes to full power. But...

A black figure dove from the sky. Its whole body pulsed with thousands of Earth-element runes. Like a meteor, it carried a terrifying weight, pushing that element to the extreme.

With a dagger in hand, Darian struck the barrier directly.

**KBOOOM!**

The barrier shattered instantly, and the figure plunged into Radiant City.

His eyes flared, and an endless sea of black runes covered the city's skies, pouring down over it.

Nobody even had time to react as the Darkness Law touched them, invading their bodies. Everything happened so fast that there was no chance to respond.

Gazes froze on the distant horizon, and bodies locked up. Even level-nine figures — extremely powerful people — were overwhelmed.

The hundred thousand elite soldiers swooped in from the sky.

"Attack!"

Remira shouted, charging toward the city's inscription core as the others turned on the local enemies.

"Kill! Loot! Take everything — even their clothes!"

The battalion leaders roared, and the army crashed into the city like a furious tsunami. In the blink of an eye, they were in the city's heart, plunging it into chaos.

Radiant City was the mustering point for the armies marching against the sect. There were no civilians or weaklings left there, though much of the main force had been away.

No one in that place was innocent. They'd all chosen to fight and follow the enemy's orders. So there was no reason to give mercy or a chance. These arrogant people had never even imagined a situation like this.

Darian had planned everything patiently. He'd forced the clans to announce that the sect would strike with full force. Traitors who didn't surrender voluntarily surely revealed themselves to the enemy.

Then he ordered the cities evacuated in secret and waited.

The enemies never imagined the sect could resist, much less attack one of their own cities; so they left that big nearby city undefended.

During the raid, when they realized the sect's cities were empty, they understood they'd been tricked. But after pillaging the inscription runes, they felt they'd already profited enough — so they didn't care.

While they wasted time... Radiant City got hit brutally.

The moment Darian broke in, he unleashed the full Darkness Law: an absurd amount of runes accumulated over the years. It paralyzed the enemies completely, preventing any alerts.

The Yin of death and blood spread.

A hundred thousand elite soldiers slaughtered almost five hundred thousand defenders like crushing ants — they didn't even need to use full power.

Within minutes...

"I've got it!"

Suddenly, the city's inscription trembled, and the runes atop the barrier pulsed. A crushing pressure warped heaven and earth. Even buildings started collapsing.

Remira had taken control of the city's inscription. She'd helped create it back then, and since the enemies hadn't made big changes, retaking control was simple.

Following Darian's orders, she pushed the formation to max and even sent sect resources to nourish the inscription.

Once it reached that apocalyptic level, nothing could stop it. It would only end when all stored energy was consumed. Now, no one could enter or leave.

Darian moved quickly to the main building. He knew exactly where the most protected place was — underground. In the past, the sect had made a separate inscription to protect a vault where they kept the most valuable items.

At the door, he stabbed through the runes with his dagger, destroying them without hesitation.

Inside, he found countless chests containing secret Jade Slips. He began checking them quickly.

A few minutes later, he grinned, "Found it. Excellent."

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