Sage Monarch

There was no way Yang Qi would ever trust anything Proud Heaven said.

It would have been impossible for Proud Heaven to have a worse reputation than he did. That said, he wasn't lying about the difficulties of moving the Great Necropolis. It would definitely need King Immortal-Slayer's will and the completed God Legion Seal to do it. By using their combined powers, it would be possible to break into the deepest sealed part of the Great Necropolis, suppress its will, and take control of it.

Right now, he definitely couldn't control the Great Necropolis on his own.

Even worse, part of the process rested on King Immortal-Slayer's will, which meant that, at the moment, it would only work with two people taking part in the plan.

In the mortal world, there were only two people who qualified: Yang Qi and Proud Heaven. Not even the Executors of the Ancient Road would help; they were eventually going to be defeated anyway.

Of course, it was all predicated on the assumption that Proud Heaven and Yang Qi actually cooperated.

Yang Qi wasn't confident enough to enter such a cooperation, even if it was with the knowledge that Proud Heaven would eventually betray him. For all he knew, Proud Heaven might take advantage of a critical moment in dealing with King Immortal-Slayer to kill Yang Qi and his clone. Then he would have the God Legion Seal, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the Great Necropolis. He would be the ultimate ruler of the mortal world, and would have access to any resources he wanted to. At that point, he would be able to enter the god world with full confidence in his ability to become a top figure there.

In the end, Yang Qi simply couldn't work with Proud Heaven. The only way to deal with him was to kill him.

Pointing at Yang Qi, Proud Heaven said, "Well, Yang Qi? Are you really refusing to work with me?"

Yang Qi chuckled. "How about we work together after I kill you and take the God Legion Seal? Come on, Proud Heaven, quit being so naive. There's no way I'll ever trust you."

"In that case, son, I don't see any reason to keep you around." He smiled viciously. "No, I'm going to have to kill you and extract your God Legion Seal. I'm here as my true self, so nobody can stop me, not even you."

"I know you're here as your true self. That's why I've wasted so much time chatting. If you weren't here as your true self, you'd already be dead. I know you've thrown caution to the wind in your attempt to kill me, but that only means that your moment of death has come. For your true self." Yang Qi was trying to buy as much time as possible to get his powers to their peak level and make sure all of his trump cards were ready to go.

Proud Heaven was definitely the strongest opponent he had ever faced. Not even the sealed head of Brahma had been as strong as Proud Heaven was now. Given how strong Yang Qi was, he could actually suppress Brahma if he had to.

Never had Yang Qi been less confident in his ability to defeat an enemy. This man had been pestering him from before he had even been born, ensuring that the karma connecting them was very troublesome.

If he didn't die, then Yang Qi would have a very hard time severing that karma.

But if he did die, then Yang Qi was certain he could use the momentum of the victory to reach immense heights, even godly ascension.

"If that's your final word, I guess there's no reason to keep discussing the matter." Proud Heaven clasped his hands behind his back and sighed. "Your God Legion Seal was always going to end up in my hands. And I can get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The time has come to acquire the rest of the God Legion Seal!"

WHOOSH!

He moved as he spoke the final words, which caught everyone off guard. Doom merely saw a blur as Proud Heaven appeared right in front of him, where he unleashed a palm strike that shook heaven and earth, even rocking the souls of those present.

Shouting, Doom immediately unleashed all nine stances of the Hand of the One God to protect himself.

When those nine stances were used at once, the successful transformations were unrivaled.

However, it wasn't as if Proud Heaven was using a simple move. A brilliant white light flared as his palm descended, and although no one present knew exactly what martial art this was, it was obviously something that could shake all creation.

The terrifying nature of the attack defied description. Anyone who stood in the path of an attack like it would be like an ordinary mortal facing down a falling asteroid. They would definitely be wiped out of existence.

When the Hand of the One God met Proud Heaven's attack, all of Doom's projected attacks were crushed and he staggered backward, face ashen as he coughed up blood. He had been defeated in one move! Obviously, he wasn't close to being a match. Expression filled with terror, he said, "You actually finished cultivating that technique, Proud Heaven?!"

"Get over here!" Proud Heaven growled, making a grasping claw gesture as he attempted to pull Doom's God Legion Seal right out from inside of him.

However, before anything else could happen, Yang Qi appeared next to Doom and made his move. Thrusting his palm out, he unleashed an empyrean wind that flowed like the tide, instantly negating Proud Heaven's claw attack.

Backing up three paces, Yang Qi said, "I'm your opponent, Proud Heaven."

As of this moment, he was convinced that Proud Heaven's cultivation base surpassed his own. That much was evident from the brief contact moments ago, which had left his nascent divinity feeling profoundly shaken.

"Oh?" Proud Heaven flitted to a position only nine meters away in seemingly weightless fashion. Looking Yang Qi up and down, he said, "Not bad, Yang Qi. But you see, I've successfully cultivated a new technique of my own invention. The Ten Universes. Take a look at what it's like!"

"Ten Universes?" Yang Qi licked his lips. He had known all along that if Proud Heaven had reached this point in his cultivation, he would have identified his own dao. This Ten Universes technique would definitely be able to shake heaven and earth, and would be the result of enlightenment of countless consummate abilities and techniques.

"First stance. Agitation of Nature!"

Proud Heaven appeared right in front of Yang Qi, moving so unpredictably that he was almost like a flickering shadow.

However, Yang Qi wasn't afraid of such tactics. He quickly called on the Purrfect God Art and the abilities of the thirty-six masks. All of a sudden, a mask appeared on his face, neither joyful nor sorrowful. It had no features, and was in fact completely empty, annulled and pure.

At the same time, a huge bubble popped into being around him, pulsing with the power of tribulations and kalpas.

Proud Heaven vanished almost as soon as he had appeared, but he left behind an enormous manifestation of heaven and earth, crushing down on Yang Qi with immense force. In response, Yang Qi threw out his hand, sending hundreds of tribulations flying out, countless characters which were the ultimate manifestation of the Unspoiled Body.

"Excellent! You actually survived the first stance, Agitation of Nature. Sadly for you, my Ten Universes features ten stances, which all complement each other. Let's see how many you can survive. Second stance. Pulse of the Void!"

A vibration rolled out that was vastly more powerful than the tribulations and kalpas, smashing the hundred characters of tribulation that Yang Qi had just unleashed.

Yang Qi immediately sensed immense danger, so he used the Purrfect God Art to shrink himself down with rapid speed. Even as he was shrinking, the pulsing ripple suddenly transformed into an intense manifestation of sword energy that shot right above his head.

"Nice. You actually lived through the second stance, and the third, Sword of the Cosmos." Yang Qi looked around and realized that Proud Heaven had complete control over all of heaven and earth around them, including all the magical laws. Right now, he was slowly walking a circle around Yang Qi, his speed seemingly slow, but in reality incredibly fast. Anyone other than Yang Qi who found themselves in this position, even the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road, would meet a grisly end.

The only reason he was holding his own was the Unspoiled Body, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Purrfect God Art, the abilities of the masks, and his psychic scale of over three hundred.

At the moment, he wasn't worried about Proud Heaven suddenly launching a surprise attack on Doom and taking his God Legion Seal. The moment Proud Heaven made his first move, Yang Qi used the Annulled Grand Magic to lock on to Proud Heaven's psyche.

The essence of the Annulled Grand Magic was about creating things out of the void. And the creator of the main mask among the thirty-six masks had gained enlightenment of emotions from the Annulled level. Therefore, despite not having fully fused with all of the masks, they still gave Yang Qi additional details regarding the profundities of the Annulled Grand Magic.

Having locked on to Proud Heaven with the Annulled Grand Magic, it was as if he were deeply connected to him; the man wouldn't be able to do anything that Yang Qi wasn't aware of.

Proud Heaven realized this and was finally starting to understand how dangerous Yang Qi was; he was even beginning to regret not killing him sooner.

But it didn't do any good to worry about regrets. Therefore, he wasn't holding back at all, and used his own techniques to duplicate what Yang Qi had done, tightly locking on to him.

Both of them were locked on to each other, and both of them knew it. Right now, both of them were coming to understand each other better than anyone else in existence.

They were almost like twins now, except only one of them would be able to survive the encounter.

This was an apex battle, the likes of which no one else could participate in.

"So, Yang Qi, you've cultivated the Annulled Grand Magic to that level? In that case, allow me to put you to death! Fourth stance. Rot of Nihility! Fifth stance. Sacrifice of Chaos! Sixth stance. Restoration of the Epoch! Seventh stance. Crippling of Civilization! Eighth stance. Enemy of the World! Ninth stance. Destruction of the Macrocosm! Tenth stance. Nirvana of the Universe!"

RUMBLE!

Proud Heaven had unleashed all ten moves of his self-created technique, the Ten Universes!

1. There is some wordplay here that doesn't come across. The full word for kalpa (which contains the character for tribulation) also contains a character that means "wave, ripple, pulse, vibration, etc." And obviously, the full word for "fluctuation, ripple, wave" contains that same character. So this passage includes a line that reads something like "fighting ripples with ripples" or something. It makes perfect visual sense in Chinese, but I don't think it would be possible to maintain that connection without adding tons of extraneous words.