Beastmaster of the Ages

Chapter 1980 - Empyrean Beam

The Primordial Demon's massacre was doing significant damage. Tianming stilled himself and decided to wait a little longer. "So far, it looks like both sides are holding up almost equally against one another," he observed.

The three Skywolf sovereigns seemed like they were finding the situation rather hard to believe. They were shocked by the prowess the sun emperor had shown and trying to figure out a way to deal with him. Grand Emperor Starvore's expression grew visibly sullen as the fight progressed.

All of a sudden, the Starvore fired. The pure white Empyrean Beam came blasting down from the sky at rapid speed like a lance of the gods being thrust down from the heavens above!

"Wait, its target is...." Tianming was taken aback. Empress Ying seemed to have changed her tactics and no longer focused her attacks on the sun emperor, but rather the blood-colored kunpeng. While totems were semi-ethereal and hard to hit, lifebound beasts were completely corporeal! Once Li Wudi lost his lifebound beast, the balance would be shaken and Grand Emperor Starvore would be under much less pressure. Killing Li Wudi was only a matter of time.

Grand Emperor Starvore finally broke his silence and roared, "Die!" Tianming was still quite far from the battle itself, so it would be too late for him to help out.

"Oh? Pulling a sneaky one, are we?" the sun emperor said, as if he had eyes on every corner. He acted like he still had everything under control. In almost an instant, the Flameyellow Coffin by his side suddenly expanded to a thousand meters in length. It looked like a gold and black stone pillar and went flying toward the bottom of the enemy ship!

The ship fired an Empyrean Beam at the coffin, the beam scattering all over the place when it came into contact. Every single drop of scattered power left thousand-meter-wide craters upon hitting the ground. But thanks to the Flameyellow Coffin blocking off the beam, Li Wudi's kunpeng wasn't injured; the coffin had actually managed to mostly mitigate the beam of the Starvore!

The sight of that made the three specter rulers feel stifled. They now understood how crucial that coffin was and their greed intensified even more. Skywolf was the world of hungry wolves, after all, and greed was a core aspect of their kind that drove their policy of kill first, harvest later when they invaded other worlds. They plundered everything they could, and even now they had neglected to report crucial information about the nature of the Flameyellow Imperial Star back to the mysterians. That very same greed drove the three of them to fight even more desperately, completely ridding themselves of any thoughts of retreat.

"Haha, is this all it takes to make you so desperate? Let me dangle even more tasty treats before you then," the sun emperor laughed as the coffin rapidly rose back up after being sent flying into the ground. It let out an explosive gold and crimson glow and rumbled incredibly loudly as it rose into a beam that shot toward the sky with enough force to rival a divine astralship. It seemed to accelerate with no end.

"Wait, that's...." Tianming saw a vortex appear in the Flameyellow Guard Formation above the Starvore, rapidly spinning and sucking the Flameyellow Coffin toward it. The coffin was the core of the Flameyellow Guard Formation to begin with, so that was hardly surprising, but the sheer force with which it accomplished that feat certainly was.

The last time Tianming had fought the sun emperor, the Flameyellow Guard Formation hadn't been active. If it were, Tianming might have truly died from being struck by the coffin. While he might be able to dodge it if he was alone, the Starvore was far too massive and wasn't that agile compared to other ships. Usually, the empresses were the ones that steered the ship, and they were of the more careful and deliberative sort. Not to mention, one of them could steer while the other focused on attacking. but now Empress Ying was doing both those tasks at once and couldn't react nearly as quickly.

The vortex of the formation spun more and more furiously, accelerating the coffin's ascent even faster. Empress Ying couldn't react at all, allowing the pillar of gold light to crash into the bottom of the ship! A deafening boom echoed out from the point of impact as the coffin crashed into the ship like a gigantic sword thrust up from the ground, breaking apart the metallic construction of the hull and pushing the ship around a hundred thousand meters higher. The ascent alone had taken up most of the momentum of the coffin, and a gaping hole was left behind that exposed even the divine astralship formation within. Many sections of the ship were utterly destroyed; it was like an egg that had been pricked through by a needle.

Empress Ying was greatly disoriented from the shock. She had been careless. Perhaps even Grand Emperor Starvore didn't expect a single divine artifact could possibly deal so much damage to the ship. Right after that, the ship expelled the coffin with a blast of energy from within. Empress Ying had to stop attacking to stabilize the ship, lest the Flameyellow Coffin manage to hit it again.

"Haha, isn't this exciting? My upward thrust is pretty potent, wouldn't you say? You're always welcome to try it out, you know," the sun emperor said, winking at Empress Yu as he recovered the coffin.

"You only managed to catch us off guard. That level of damage isn't enough to severely damage the Starvore! It'll still be able to eliminate you!" she snapped back, greedily glaring at the coffin. As she had said, Empress Ying managed to regain control of the ship and started attacking the kunpeng again.

"Let's see how many times you can come to its aid!" Her true goal was to hold the sun emperor back until Grand Emperor Starvore managed to deal with his enemy. After that, they would be able to take on the sun emperor together. Empress Ying began charging up another beam aimed at Li Wudi.

"Is that so.... That wouldn't be fun. Fine, go ahead and kill it. That little bird isn't that useful anyway, unlike mine," the sun emperor said, smiling fearlessly.

The three of them didn't humor him at all. Grand Emperor Starvore's attacks intensified, sending out even more flames into the surrounding area. His platinum-like body burst through the flames, directly wrestling with the totems and sowing destruction wherever its claws went. Li Wudi seemed to be under heavy pressure and danger, having had far too many close calls until now.

Tianming didn't know whether the sun emperor knew he was nearby and accounted for it, hence his confidence, or whether he really believed he could hold all three of them off alone with his clone. Seeing Li Wudi being attacked so furiously by Grand Emperor Starvore and his lifebound beast being targeted by the ship, Tianming knew that a huge change was going to tip the scales of battle soon, yet the sun emperor still seemed unfazed. Tianming had no choice but to step in.

However, he didn't join the fight with Li Wudi, for that might be a trap the sun emperor had set for him. Instead, he turned his attention to the Starvore. "There’s already a hole in the ship, and its divine astralship formation is damaged. Its structure must be compromised. If I can sneak in and take down Empress Ying, the other two would no doubt panic!"

It was a bold plan, to say the least, but he was still confident with his inheritance as one of the sky plunderers, as well as the power of the faithful. He had fought the sun emperor before and survived, after all. He snuck through the darker parts of the battlefield, slowly ascending toward the lower side of the Starvore.