Chapter 360: Suppression and Slaughter

Zhang Lan felt a chill run down his spine.

He knew the grand formation was powerful, but he hadn’t expected its killing force to be this terrifying.

Even though it was only a first-rank formation, it filled him—a Foundation Establishment cultivator—with an irresistible sense of despair.

“Is the grand formation… really this strong…”

Zhang Lan and Yang Jiyong both murmured in awe at the same time.

After speaking, both paused for a moment, then immediately looked at each other with a mix of disgust, as if they had just swallowed a fly.

Zhang Lan scoffed, “Your Yang family has grand formations too, right? Why are you acting like you’ve never seen the world before?”

Yang Jiyong retorted, “And your Zhang family doesn’t? You’re not any better!”

Zhang Lan replied, “Our Zhang family has a solid foundation; we don’t need to activate grand formations.”

Yang Jiyong said the same, “Our Yang family has fought across the lands, our name strikes awe, no petty intruder dares act against us. Naturally, we don’t need to open our grand formations either.”

Zhang Lan sneered, “All talk, but neither of you have actually seen a grand formation activated, right?”

“Exactly—you haven’t either.”

…

They argued for a long time, both equally matched; neither could ridicule the other.

Then they both turned to the Five-Element Demon-Slaying Grand Formation at the center and sighed slightly.

The grand formation, when activated, was indeed a rare sight…

Though the Zhang and Yang families each had grand formations, they rarely activated them.

Opening a grand formation consumed massive amounts of spirit stones. Even if their families had spirit mines, such waste was unacceptable.

Only when a formidable enemy attacked or the family faced annihilation would the grand formation be deployed to defend.

Both families were powerful, their influence vast, and no one dared provoke them, so their grand formations hadn’t been fully activated for hundreds of years.

Thus, Zhang Lan and Yang Jiyong had never truly witnessed a grand formation in full force until now.

The Five-Element Demon-Slaying Grand Formation painted by Mo Hua was the first time they had seen such a fully activated formation.

They had known the formation was powerful, but experiencing it firsthand revealed its terrifying magnitude.

Moreover, unlike their family’s protective formations—which were primarily defensive with some offensive capability—this one was purely designed for slaughter.

Its power exceeded even their imagination.

This time, neither spoke. After a long while, Yang Jiyong murmured,

“Formation masters are truly terrifying…”

Zhang Lan didn’t argue; he quietly agreed, “Indeed…”

Yang Jiyong looked at the surging spiritual energy and overwhelming killing aura, shocked in his heart:

“If such a grand formation could be built on the battlefield, it would subdue all, annihilating every powerful enemy! Even cultivators of one higher realm might not survive!”

He looked toward a distant mountain peak.

At that peak sat Mo Hua, young yet controlling the entire Five-Element Demon-Slaying Grand Formation.

Yang Jiyong had never felt Mo Hua’s unfathomable depth like this before.

A thirteen-year-old chief formation master, deploying a formation purely for killing.

“This boy will surely become a world-class weapon of death.”

“If he can build a formation to save millions, he can certainly build one to kill millions…”

Yang Jiyong shivered and watched with even greater seriousness.

At this moment, Mo Hua was completely focused on controlling the formation, directing the five-element arrays to trap and kill Feng Xi.

Meanwhile, Feng Xi had escaped the entrapment of the earth-element basic formations—the Quick-Sand Array and Golden Light Array—and fled along the stone wall into the water-element basic formation.

Mo Hua communicated with the formation core, cutting off the spiritual energy supply to the earth-element formation, then transferred the energy from the formation’s eyes to the water-element formation.

With the energy injection, the Overturned Water Array and Wood Poison Array activated, and the ground quickly became flooded.

Feng Xi struggled through the water, each step laborious.

From all around came waves of dark green wood-poison aura, gradually corroding Feng Xi’s skin, numbing him, and eating away at his blood.

Some poison seeped into the water, and by the law of five-element generation—water nurturing wood—the poison became even more potent.

As Feng Xi waded through the water, each step corroded his flesh and blood. Soon, only bones remained, and even the congealed blood was eroded…

Trapped in the Overturned Water Array for several hours, Feng Xi emerged visibly weakened.

Ahead lay the layers of arrays: the Golden Lock Array, Water Sword Array, Wood Prison Array, Fire Rain Array, Red Fire Array, and Earth Split Array.

If Feng Xi could not escape the grand formation, he would be trapped forever, ground down by thousands of formations until completely destroyed.

All witnessing cultivators were both shocked and hopeful:

Perhaps they really could use the formation to slay a great demon!

Excitement surged in their hearts.

The long process of suppression began.

The grand formation’s killing power was terrifying and effective against Feng Xi.

But his blood was thick; to fully suppress him, the formation had to run continuously, constantly driving, trapping, and draining his blood until death.

This could not be done overnight.

The suppression might last several days, even over ten days.

All cultivators had to remain vigilant; a single lapse could let Feng Xi escape, making it difficult to trap him again or strike him down.

Mo Hua remained at the formation core, controlling the entire grand formation.

Whenever Feng Xi tried to ram the walls, Mo Hua reinforced them with spiritual energy.

Wherever Feng Xi was trapped, the relevant arrays were activated, along with nearby killing arrays.

Unnecessary arrays had their energy cut off to conserve spirit stones.

Mo Hua’s Divine Sense was constantly consumed.

If Feng Xi was trapped, Mo Hua meditated to recover some Divine Sense.

If Feng Xi escaped, Mo Hua spent Divine Sense to control the formation core, activating nearby arrays to restrain him.

Feng Xi was constantly trapped in the five-element killing arrays, restrained while attacked.

Feng Xi never stopped; Mo Hua never rested.

Master Luo watching nearby was astonished.

The depth of Divine Sense foundation and rapid recovery required… to control the grand formation alone, not surprising.

But to control it like an extension of his own limbs, without sleep or fatigue, while Divine Sense remained abundant—that’s beyond ordinary Qi-Refining cultivators…

If Master Luo tried, he would be exhausted within hours.

He had thought he could help if Mo Hua got tired.

But Mo Hua showed no fatigue; watching him made Luo feel drained instead.

The formation core looked complex but controlling it was even more so; one had to understand every array perfectly to open, close, and transfer power smoothly.

Luo realized he had overestimated himself.

This task could only be handled by the chief formation master—Mo Hua.

Luo marveled: “Truly, there are masters beyond the heavens…”

Mo Hua continued focused, controlling the formation.

The grand formation was vast; even with precise control, errors could occur: energy flow misalignments, incompatibilities, array carrier failures, or formation pattern wear and breakage.

There could be moments when spiritual energy was insufficient, and formations failed.

At such times, Foundation Establishment cultivators and stationed Dao Soldiers inside the formation would act to restrain Feng Xi, preventing escape.

Feng Xi was enraged by the confinement.

Restraining him at such times was extremely dangerous.

Zhang Lan, Yang Jiyong, and Elder Yu remained fully alert, cautious in every move. Each struck only once, then retreated, letting another take over.

This restrained Feng Xi while preventing long battles that could expose weaknesses, risk death, or restore his blood.

The pressure on Zhang Lan and the others was immense; every strike had to be careful.

Fortunately, Mo Hua soon adjusted the formation core, reactivating the grand formation, trapping Feng Xi again, activating arrays to shred him in succession…

The process was excruciatingly long…

Outside the formation, in Tōngxiān City, all cultivators’ emotions shifted from shock and excitement to anxiety and torment.

They didn’t know how long it would take to kill the great demon or if they could succeed, trapped in a long wait…

For over ten days, day and night, the five-colored light in the deep mountains never ceased, and powerful fluctuations of spiritual energy continued.

Feng Xi’s roars never stopped.

His blood faded, but his ferocity intensified, staining the sky above the mountains red, like a gate to a purgatory slowly opening.

The Five-Element Demon-Slaying Grand Formation acted as a five-colored lock, tightly holding that purgatorial gate.

Finally, after more than twenty days, Feng Xi’s roars weakened and gradually stopped.

The blood-red sky dimmed.

Evening sunlight bathed the Great Black Mountain in gold, giving everyone a glimmer of hope.

Inside the grand formation, after more than twenty days of tireless battle, all cultivators were exhausted, and their collected spirit stones nearly depleted.

Together, they finally drained Feng Xi’s blood entirely!

Feng Xi’s blood dissipated, leaving him grey and lifeless, collapsing slowly to the ground.

Elder Yu and the others were pale, gasping, teeth clenched, having endured over twenty days.

At Feng Xi’s collapse, everyone felt numb, and only after a long while did they comprehend in disbelief:

“Dead?”

“Killed?”

“The great demon is dead… it’s been slain…”

Joy surged like a tide, and cheers erupted.

Mo Hua exhaled deeply, collapsing to the ground.

But before he could celebrate, a sudden chill ran through him.

He hurriedly looked down, pupils shrinking.

Feng Xi, fallen and silent, slowly rose again…

Just as the pig demon had once died before, it quietly stood up and silently devoured the Qian family patriarch.

The cheers stopped abruptly. Everyone witnessed this and was shocked:

“This great demon… isn’t dead?”

“Impossible! Its blood was completely drained…”

“What do we do?”

Meanwhile, Feng Xi’s aura changed; no longer crimson blood, but suffused with black-gray death energy.

Its pig face twisted, deformed, reconstructed, becoming a massive human face.

The face resembled a strange Daoist.

It opened its mouth, lipless and toothless, speaking in a voice indistinct in gender.

It sounded like one person speaking, yet many voices together—strange and noisy:

“Who? Ruin my plans!”

“Ruin my plans!”

“Who dares?”

“Ruin… my plans!”

The chaotic voices mingled, sounding both in their ears and in their minds.

Zhang Lan and the others’ faces changed:

“What is this thing?!”

“This pig… is a human?”

At the sight of the human face, Mo Hua had a flash of insight and understood why the pig demon had resurrected.

Inside it was another Divine Sense.

The strange Daoist’s Divine Sense!

Feng Xi’s demonic consciousness had already perished; its resurrection was driven by that Daoist’s Divine Sense.

The same Daoist whom Mister Zhuang forbade him to question, think of, or mention… the strange Daoist!

Feng Xi resurrected, human face emerging, resentment entangled, death energy dense.

Mister Zhuang in his mountain residence looked grave, murmuring:

“Dao heart seed demon…”