Sage Monarch

'Wait, this emperor snake is an incarnated talisman?'

He had already determined that the snake's cultivation base was at the level of a Profound Demi-Immortal, which made it vastly stronger than even a Greater Demi-Immortal. That put its fighting capabilities far above his own. However, while he had taken it to be some diabolical monster native to this place, Sword Seventeen was saying that it was actually a talisman.

As Sword Seventeen was looking at it in surprise, Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked at the talisman itself. It was a strip of paper a meter long and about five fingers wide, covered with an extremely lifelike depiction of a snake.

It wasn't an ordinary snake, but rather a snake that could command all other snakes in existence.

This talisman had been created by an immortal from the ancient Snakefolk, and was mysterious and powerful to the extreme. It radiated an aura that seemed capable of consuming everything in existence. Clearly, this was a precious treasure, an immortal item that was neither defective, broken, shattered, or counterfeit. Neither was it a quasi-immortal item.

"So it's not a devilling, which should make it a lot easier to deal with. There are bound to be plenty of benefits to capturing this thing." Without any hesitation, Yang Qi used the Hand of the One God to power a Devil-God Seal.

His Blood of the One God boiled and the godworm in his God Legion Paradise howled.

Ancient genetic memories and information from the godworm flooded into Yang Qi's sea of consciousness as he thrust out both hands, causing a string of heaven motes to blast out with the power of the halls of heaven.

RUMBLE!

The blow blasted a huge hole in the emperor snake's stomach, allowing the God Legion Paradise to break out into the open. At the same time, the godworm turned into something like a wriggling earthworm that burrowed inside of Yang Qi, filling him with immense power. In the blink of an eye, it almost seemed like he had awakened all eight hundred forty million particles inside him.

The godworm's cultivation base was equivalent to a second order Greater Demi-Immortal, and considering that Yang Qi controlled it, it meant that he could wield that level of power.

Even when Yang Qi was only wielding the power of a Great Sage, he could still slaughter Demi-Immortals with ease. But now he had so much power flowing through him that he could easily resort to the fifth stance of the Hand of the One God.

"Night Flows Ceaselessly through the Aeons. When Day Comes, Life Force is Eternal. Aeon!"

As he stretched his hand out, the emperor snake's vital energy exploded and the Devil-God Seal slammed into it, causing it to shrink down into the form of a paper talisman.

"Get over here!" he shouted, and the talisman flew into his hand. As it struggled, it damaged his God Legion Battle Robe, yet it could not escape.

'This thing isn't a living creature. If it were a real devilling, or maybe a world-devil, it might have been more dangerous. After I get back to the Hanging Mountain, maybe I can use it to take control of the Snakefolk. According to the rumors I heard, they were second only to the Mammothfolk in ancient times, even producing Demi-Immortals. The current Chief Snake is actually stronger than Ape Heavenhelve of the Apefolk….'

Suddenly, the struggling imperial snakecharm managed to leap out of his hand, but before it could get anywhere he summoned the Hellfire Crucible, grabbed the talisman again, and threw it inside. There, it was bathed in intense sagefire as he forced his own aura into it.

Before long, he released it into his God Legion Paradise where it floated calmly above the surface of the ground.

To Yang Qi's delight, he had acquired another immortal item.

"Incredible!" Sword Seventeen said. "Truly incredible. No wonder the world junctions are so famous. The Snakefolk immortal who created the imperial snakecharms was King Heaven-Devourer, a sworn sibling of King Immortal-Slayer. He created a total of three thousand imperial snakecharms, and if you can collect them all, you can carry on his core teachings and doctrines and become a leader of the host of immortals. Think about it! Supposedly, those talismans can control Snakefolk. Do you know how many of them exist in the world? If you got all of the talismans, you would have an army on your hands. That would be a force to rival the Titan Emperor Collegium!"

"What did you just say? There are three thousand of these things? My god. What level could you reach if you collected all of them?" After doing some brief calculations, he came to the conclusion that having all three thousand talismans would be enough power to crush seventh or eighth order Demi-Immortals.

"Yeah, there are three thousand imperial snakecharms, although some are stronger than others. I'm going to guess that they're all hoarded here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Only a few have been acquired and taken away. For example, I heard that the society chief of the Beastmaster Society back in the Titan Emperor Collegium acquired a dozen or so from here, about fifty thousand years ago. Obviously his collection is a lot more powerful than that single talisman of yours. Sorry, Junior Brother, but you obviously got one of the relatively weak versions. That said, once we get out of here you could probably work out a deal with the Beastmaster Society. Their society chief would probably pay a good price to get another imperial snakecharm. Each one that you add to the collection makes you exponentially stronger. It's not like you just add the power together linearly."

At this point, Sword Seventeen looked around in the hopes of finding more good fortune.

The world junctions of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were legendary locations that had been talked about for hundreds of thousands of years in the cultivation world. Everyone in the know was aware that they were packed with all sorts of treasures, therefore there was no way that Sword Seventeen could agree to leave empty-handed.

"Elder Brother, watch out. There's a-"

WHIZZZ!

Sword Seventeen turned to look in the same direction as Yang Qi, and when he did, his jaw dropped. Up ahead in the darkness and gloom were several dozen shadowy figures lurking in a deep plane.

Shockingly, those shadowy figures were all emperor snakes.

It looked like a nest, and as soon as they caught sight of Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen they began flying toward them.

They were all different sizes, but all of them were larger than the snake Yang Qi had just captured.

"Run!" Yang Qi said. Although all of these talismans counted as a massively valuable hoard of treasure, there was no way he would try to take it.

Not even his mother could handle so many emperor snakes.

The only choice they had right now was either flee or die.

Turning, he blurred into motion and joined Sword Seventeen to shoot with meteoric speed through the world junction.

Unfortunately, the other imperial snakecharms could sense that Yang Qi had some of their aura on him and gave chase. Even with his Angel Wings, and even using space-time wormholes, he still couldn't shake them.

As he fled, he looked over his shoulder and counted how many there were. "One, two, three…."

In total, there were twenty-seven. Counting the one he had captured, that meant that they were a nest of twenty-eight. And clearly, the twenty-seven were not going to just let him take one of their number without a fight.

"Dammit, look!" Sword Seventeen said. "Some world-devils are blocking our way up ahead!"

He was just as nervous as Yang Qi, aware that if they got trapped by the emperor snakes they would definitely be killed, and in a very painful fashion. And now the situation was made worse by a group of world-devils.

They looked like ancient giants, with razor-sharp claws and complicated tattoos. They lurked on a shattered plane, and as soon as they saw Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen, they let out deafening roars and shot forth aggressively.

Sword Seventeen immediately called upon a host of swords that slashed the world-devils to bits and absorbed their power.

Yang Qi followed suit, unleashing streams of energy to drag the world-devils into the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, where the instantly became power.

Unfortunately, this brief delay allowed the emperor snakes to get even closer.

"We're done for," Sword Seventeen said, a look of despair on his face. "Damn. I can't believe I'm going to meet my end like this."

"Hold on, we can turn things around," Yang Qi said coolly. "Shrink!" Instantly, his God Legion Paradise shrank down to the size of a grain of sand.

"Shrinking it down won't help," Sword Seventeen said. "The imperial snakecharms can create a Heaven-Devouring Spell Formation that can destroy anything, big or small."

Even as the words left his mouth, the situation proved him correct, as an immense spell formation surrounded the shrunken God Legion Paradise.

Yang Qi exerted himself to resist it, but was already trembling from the effort.

It was at this point that someone clicked their tongue disapprovingly.

"Some amazing treasures here. So the one hundred and eighth opening of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart really has changed things. The imperial snakecharms have appeared, the legacy of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. With twenty-seven of them, I'll be invincible!"

RUMBLE!

A lightning-like streak slammed into the snakes, shattering their formation. Without any hesitation, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen took advantage of the opportunity to flee to safety.

Turning back around, they caught sight of a black-garbed cultivator fighting the twenty-seven talismans. He had a long beard and wielded a jade-colored horsetail whisk with silver strands. Each movement of that whisk would rip holes in the sky.