Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

"Those chains... " Ramon gulped, unable to breathe properly.

The Martial Gods were among the most powerful nine powers of the Ninth Heaven. This was a truth everyone knew. However, Ramon knew better. They weren't just one of them, they were the most powerful entity. For whatever reason, they chose to keep the facade of their equality with the other eight.

The entire race was an anomaly. They called themselves the Deity Race, but even this was something they had made up. The so-called Deity Race... were just humans, humans who had reached the extremities of cultivation and became so powerful that they no longer deigned to call themselves human. Instead, they called themselves Gods.

The Martial Gods were a power that none but maybe their Dao Gods could understand properly. They had countless Bloodline branches within them, each one seemingly having no relation to the other, and each one capable of reaching the pinnacle of cultivation.

The four branches that had come to Sacrum were only considered minor Bloodline branches of the Martial Gods, and yet if the strongest of them decided to descend back to the Eighth Heaven, it would only take a handful of years for them to form a hegemony.

And yet to the Martial Gods, they were mere minor branches not worth thinking too much about, small rabble that could be used to bolster their strength in the outer regions of the universe, and even worth little enough to have their potential sacrificed to a weak Middle World like Sacrum.

Outside of their minor branches, there were still their elite branches, and then there was still their main branches, which were further split up into minor, elite and the true Deities.

The Martial Gods had no less than dozens of powerful Bloodlines, and by the time one reached the main branches, each one could form a powerful force of their own on the Ninth Heaven that could survive on its own. A single Bloodline of their True Deity Bloodlines could easily split off from the family and form the Tenth Power.

This was how powerful the Martial Gods were, how infallible they hegemony was.

At the very top, though, of these countless Bloodlines, only three reigned supreme.

The Divine Wing Bloodline.

The Divine Hegemony Bloodline.

And the most powerful of them all.

The Divine Chain Bloodline.

And those chains, those chains that bound Ryu, were most definitely from the Divine Chain Bloodline.

The power of this Bloodline could be described in a single phrase...

To Chain the Heavens and Restrict it to the Earth.

Ramon felt as though he had been struck by lightning just thinking these words. The corner of his lip drizzled with scarlet blood so bright it looked as though it had been cut free from a gorgeous ruby...

His Essence Blood.

Just thinking these words in passing, not even focusing on them, had caused such harm to his spirit that he had lost a segment of his Blood Essence, a segment he would take months, at the very least, to recover.

This was the destruction of the Martial Gods and their strongest Bloodline.

And for whatever reason, a Dao God of the Divine Chain Branch had chosen to target Ryu. Not only had he targeted him, but he even sealed away Ryu's Fate Star, restricting him from ever advancing to the Sky God Realms in his lifetime.

Looking at the wild, bloody grin on Ryu's face, something else birthed within Ramon.

Fear.

It wasn't a fear toward the Martial Gods. It was a fear toward Ryu.

How could he stand with those chains wrapped around him? How could he smile? How could he say such arrogant words?

CRACK.

Ramon's eyes rolled back as he collapsed.

"Ramon!"

It was Adlael's voice, Ramon barely heard it. But even though he just managed to, how could he focus on it?

HIs Dao Heart had shattered. He was as good as dead.

Adlael's expression turned red. Maybe even Ramon himself would be shocked to see such a thing. Since when had this senior brother of his cared so much? But maybe that was simply the predicament of siblings...

The younger didn't understand the offerings of the older until it was too late.

Adlael's aura leaked and his fury towered. An illusory white flame danced in his long hair and golden Fundamental Rune appeared around him, causing space to crack and fragment as though his fury alone was enough to rewrite reality.

He grit his teeth, hard.

'Martial Gods! I swear I'll slaughter you to the last man!"

Even in his fury, he didn't dare to think of the names of those he wanted to slaughter... even in his fury, he didn't dare to think of the name of the Divine Chain Branch.

Ramon's pillar trembled and it began to sink into the ground until it vanished entirely. He seemed to be holding onto a last breath, but to the task at hand... it simply no longer mattered.

Ryu sent a glance over, as did many others. The strength that Adlael just revealed made them all grow cold. Even so, Ryu was focused on something else, and maybe that was because Adlael's gaze was focused on him.

He could see a familiar fury in the eyes of the young man who had always had a serene smile on his face. The only difference was that Ryu had dealt with that emotion by becoming cold and detached. As for Adlael, he had dealt with it with a pretense of politeness and agreeableness.

Maybe this was the gap that separated a man born at the top of his world... and a man born at the bottom of his.

Killing intent suffused Adlael's gaze. He couldn't kill the Martial Gods now, but he most definitely could kill Ryu. If one part of the blame for Ramon's fall was those overlords of the Ninth Heaven, then the other half fell onto Ryu.

It was a preposterous shift of blame, one that made Adlael seem far weaker than he was. But seeing that familiar gaze, Ryu's bloody grin only became wider.

His aura blazed.