The shift from purple to gold was so abrupt that it felt as though the sky sphere had turned inside out.
One moment, the ten-thousand-li vortex was an inky swirl of black void-qi laced with royal purple star-fire. The next, the entire upper air ignited with the blinding, blazing bright radiance of a thousand midday suns. Across the eastern sector, the violet twilight vanished, replaced by an overwhelming golden glare that lit up every crag, every leaf. Every pebble for three hundred leagues in every direction.
This was not ordinary lightning. It wasn’t even the Yang-Thunder of the last waves.
This was the legendary Taiyi Divine Golden Thunder—the ultimate purifying solar fire of the sky high sky. In the most sacred, forbidden archives of the ancient sects, it was recorded that this divine golden fire had only dropped three times since the founding of the mortal world, each time to cleanse the realm of ancient fiendgods whose very existence threatened to burn the leylines of heaven and earth.
High in the stratosphere, the clouds parted to reveal two huge lances of pure, solid solar gold.
Each lance was three thousand meters long, perfectly straight. Then he forged from hyper-tightly packed solar Yang-fire. They didn’t crackle or roar. They hummed with a pure, high-hum ringing shaking that rang with the ancient hum of creation itself. The blasting heat pouring off the golden lances was so huge that high-sky ice clouds evaporated into dry empty pocket within seconds. The upper air currents began to shimmer like molten brass.
Ten miles away on Cloud-Piercing Pass, the thirty thousand fighters shielded their faces with their sleeves, groaning in physical pain from the blinding light.
“Taiyi Divine Golden Thunder...” Abbot Hui Lun whispered. His weathered voice shook with awe as he stepped forward to the edge of the granite ridge.
The venerable Buddhist monk lowered his nine-ringed prayer staff to the ground. He didn’t look through a scrying mirror. His Golden Buddha-Eye vision gazed directly into the heavens. He watched the two divine lances of golden fire prepare their descent.
“Abbot?” Elder Mo Qian stammered, his eyes watering behind his trembling hands. “What’s that light? It feels like the sun itself is falling upon the forest!”
“It’s the flame of total purification,” Hui Lun spoke softly, his palms pressed together in deep respect. “It doesn’t merely destroy physical form. It melts karmic sins, burns away spiritual dirt, and reduces even immortal souls to pure cosmic ash. If an ancient fiend were struck by this light, its malice would be burned away in a heartbeat.”
The abbot paused, his eyes reflecting the golden sky.
“And yet... Look at the spirit above.”
High in the center of the five-mile azure disc, Lin Xiao floated peacefully.
He didn’t look like an ancient demon trembling before the judgment of heaven. He looked like an eager guest at a banquet watching the dessert cart roll out of the kitchen.
“Ooooooh,” Lin Xiao whispered internally, his semi-clear jelly shimmering as the golden rays washed over his mantle. “Now that’s pretty. Look at that color, Dao Spirit! It’s not purple anymore! It looks like warm, spun honey! Or rich, melted caramel!”
“Energy composition confirmed, Host,” the Dao Spirit chimed with clean, cold and exact clarity. “Waves Six and Seven represent Taiyi Divine Golden Thunder. Purity index: ninety-nine point eight percent. Main energetic matrix consists of high-thickness solar Yang essence with zero entropic corruption. It’s the purest energetic currency recognized by the Great Dao.”
“Warm caramel,” Lin Xiao repeated firmly, his crescent eye-markings forming delighted curves. “I’m calling it caramel. It definitely smells like toasted brown sugar.”
“Warning: Incoming speed exceeds standard star-fire propagation rates. Direct solar lances dropping in three... Two... One...”
FWUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM!
The twin lances of Taiyi Divine Golden Thunder struck downward with the speed of pure light.
They didn’t arc. They fell as two spotless beams of solid golden fire. They struck directly into the center of Lin Xiao’s waiting maw.
The impact was silent. There was no explosion, no bone-shaking blast wave, and no shattering of bedrock. There was only a blinding pillar of golden soft glow that connected the highest reaches of the cosmos directly to the little blue slime.
For three seconds, Lin Xiao’s entire five-mile fluid domain was flooded with molten solar gold.
The scorching solar fire, hot enough to melt stars, poured straight into his internal Ancient Chaos Void. But Lin Xiao’s ancient nature, which predated the existence of fire, heat, and stars, didn’t burn. His boundless void cradled the golden deluge, neutralizing its destructive intent and instantly transmuting the raw solar star-fire into a rich, sweet, liquid spiritual nourishment.
His physical appearance underwent a breathtaking transformation.
His semi-clear sapphire-blue jelly didn’t remain blue. As the golden thunder flooded his molecules, his entire body shifted into an amazing, radiant gold-violet hue. It glowed from within like a huge, flawless amethyst lit up by an inner sun. Delicate filaments of golden light pulsed through his fluid mass like glowing blood vessels, harmonizing with the azure chaos-qi in perfect, eternal balance.
A system tracking data box materialized before his inner sight:
Mmmmmmmmmmm!
Lin Xiao let out a long, blissful mental hum that rang through his entire spiritual sea.
“Rich caramel,” Lin Xiao sighed, feeling a deep, streaming warmth spread through every single drop of his body. “With roasted almond flakes and a tiny pinch of sea salt. It’s like those warm custard tarts they used to sell at the bakery near the subway station on cold winter mornings. You take one bite, and your whole chest just feels cozy.”
Deep within his dantian, the miracle of breakthrough was speeding up toward its final phase.
Eighty-five percent of his Golden Core shell had now fully dissolved. It melted into a vast, calm ocean of ancient golden-azure broth. Floating peacefully in the center of this glowing ocean, sheltered by the leftover fragments of the golden shell, a tiny, semi-clear blue baby dark shape had fully formed.
The little embryo was roughly the size of a teacup. It was a tiny blue slime baby, perfectly round, perfectly semi-clear, with two tiny black glass-black eyes and two squishy little arms.
As the golden caramel broth poured around it, the little slime baby stirred. It stretched its tiny slime arm arms, opened its little mouth. Then it drank the golden nectar in joyful, enthusiastic gulps. A sweet, bubbling laugh echoed from the embryo, sending ripples of pure, pure life-force throughout Lin Xiao’s entire soul.
“Core shift at critical threshold,” the Dao Spirit reported, her cool voice carrying a clear warmth. “The Nascent Soul embryo has awakened. Spiritual mind has successfully rooted within the ancient ocean. Golden Core shell is eighty-five percent dissolved. Leftover requirement: Ingestion of Waves Eight and Nine.”
While Lin Xiao was basking in the warm glow of custard and almonds, Abbot Hui Lun slowly sank to both knees on the muddy ground of Cloud-Piercing Pass.
The aged monk pressed his forehead against the damp stone, tears of deep spiritual enlightenment slipping from his closed eyes.
“Abbot?” Elder Liu Chen cried out, alarmed. “What’s wrong? Why are you prostrating?!”
“He’s not a demon...” Hui Lun whispered, his voice shaking with overwhelming respect. “He never was a demon.”
The abbot lifted his head, his gaze locked on the golden-violet star glowing in the stratosphere.
“Taiyi Divine Golden Thunder is the sacred fire that purges all unrighteousness. If a single speck of evil, greed, or malice lived within that being’s heart, that golden flame would have ignited his soul and burned him from existence. But look at him... The fire entered his body, and it became light. It became peace. It became nourishment.”
Hui Lun took a deep, trembling breath, turning his austere gaze upon Grand Elder Xuan Ji.
“Grand Elder Xuan Ji, we were blind. We marched against an enlightened holy spirit who walks outside the three realms. We brought war to the doorstep of a living Bodhisattva.”
Xuan Ji flinched as if struck across the face with an iron rod.
“Bodhisattva?!” Xuan Ji spat, his voice a ragged screech of unhinged fury. “That... That puddle of demonic slime is a Bodhisattva?! You senile old monk, your mind has rotted! It’s a monster! Look at the clouds! The Eighth Wave is taking form! The Heavenly Dao won’t be mocked by a dessert-eating slug!”
High above in the heavens, the golden light didn’t fade.
Instead, the golden-violet clouds of the ten-thousand-li vortex began to churn with a terrifying, mythic fury. The Heavenly Dao, having exhausted its twin dragons and solar lances, was gathering the ultimate mythological manifestation of its eighth execution decree.
From the swirling cloud wall, nine huge heads of roaring purple star-fire began to emerge.