Sage Monarch

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"Boundless Hell Portals, come forth!"

A tremor passed through Yang Qi as countless Hell Portals sprang up all around him in layer after layer. They seemed to go on without end, and a hell was visible in the depths of each portal. They were all different. Some were filled with bleached bones, some were scorching hot, some oozed with blood, and some were filled with destruction and darkness.

There seemed to be as many portals as the number of hells, like the eternal sands of the universe.

Yang Qi was planning to summon countless experts from hell and transform them into angels. In turn, those angels would be his Army of Radiance and Light. Right now, there was a major redistribution of resources in the Dao Defense League and everyone was scrambling to look out for their own interests. That included Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, the nine dharmarajas, and the twenty-four god-generals. All of them were trying to recruit elders into their forces, thus building their own power and influence.

Yang Qi was different. He didn't need to recruit a single elder to build his army.

Now that he was in the fifth division, his true energy was strong enough to shatter just about anything in existence, and his summoning power had improved as well. He could now call out to fiend-devils that were ninth division Chaos Gods.

In other words, his Army of Radiance and Light would be made entirely of Chaos Gods.

Although Chaos Gods had not yet begun to climb the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, they were still completely domineering figures. In the Dao Defense League, such people would be figures of incredible influence and power, the kind that no one would dare to underestimate.

Even the dharmarajas would have trouble getting tens of thousands of Chaos Gods to work for them. After all, each Chaos God would be an old-timer with a very powerful organization backing them. Besides, any old-timer who would consider joining a single person would definitely have requirements and demands of their own.

It was not an easy task to recruit forces for an army, and would usually require a lot of hard work. But not for Yang Qi. The fiend-devils he could summon would be completely and utterly loyal, no matter what. Their fighting prowess was top notch, they offered faithful service, and they made no demands.

He decided to start out with a force of about a million. That many Chaos Gods could shake the entire Dao Defense League, and if they joined forces in a spell formation they would be virtually unstoppable and impossible to injure.

Although there were far more than a million Chaos Gods within the Dao Defense League as a whole, there was no way that any single person could command their loyalty.

RUMBLE!

As the Hell Portals burned with power, wild howls echoed out from inside of them as Infernalfolk appeared. These were not the dark golden type of infernals, but something higher than that. They were pale white, with skin covered by complex, vein-like patterns. They also emanated something of a holy aura, as if they were starting to revert to their most primitive, original state.

They were clearly on their way to becoming angels, with traces of platinum sageblood running in their veins.

"Infernalfolk, you were originally angels who were corrupted and degraded by hell. Now, you will return to the glory of the Lord. I will thoroughly cleanse you, and make you stronger. After all, you are currently far beneath the compare of the ancient angels."

Halos suddenly appeared as Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

Now that he was a fifth division Nirvanic God, all of his energy arts had risen to a higher level, including the Eternal Heavenly Aria. As soon as its power entered the infernals, black blood began steaming out of their pores as their devilishness was expunged. That steam would in turn be sucked into the God Legion Seal, where it was transformed into pure true energy.

Soon, Yang Qi realized that every time he purified an infernal, it would improve his own cultivation base and help him build his power. In fact, it was helping him progress even faster than if he were practicing his own cultivation, pushing him closer and closer to the level of a Revisionist God.

'What's going on here?' he thought. 'When I did this before, it would drain my true energy. But this time it's improving it? Did my God Legion Seal change on a fundamental level?' Looking more closely, he realized that the God Legion Seal now had markings on it that seemed to be manifestations of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

'That must be it!' he thought, shaken. 'Yes, it is. The Sovereign Lord created godmammoths to crush hells. However, they were also designed to save fallen gods! And the Infernalfolk are just that—fallen 'gods', the descendants of corrupted angels. As I save them, their devilishness comes to me and I acquire some of their previous foundation. It's accomplishing a mission assigned by the Sovereign Lord, and it advances my energy arts.'

All of a sudden, Yang Qi had a new understanding of both the God Legion Seal and deathless devilishness.

Devilishness and godliness were essentially the same, except inverted. One could be converted into the other, a process which would release incredible power. When godliness became devilishness, it would absorb the essence of universal primal-chaos. And the greater the original level of power, the greater the hellish power that would result. The reverse was also true. The higher the level of devilishness, the greater power would be released when it was converted into godliness.

Having come to this realization, he focused more fully on saving the infernals.

After some time passed, he had a throng of angels standing in ranks in front of him. There were more than a million, each of them former Infernalfolk who were Chaos God experts. There were even a few who were just on the verge of stepping onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Those were already at about the same level of strength as some of the top old-timers in the Dao Defense League. After all, infernals had constitutions that surpassed ordinary humans in every way.

The army of angels pulsed with purity, cleanliness, radiance, light, and holiness. As they prayed and sang hymns, boundless faith power surged forth to reach the immortal-slaying clone, who was currently far away in the Dao Defense League.

The clone had been in the middle of conferring with some old-timers who had come seeking treatment. The old-timers saw him shiver, then sensed the aura of heavenly tribulation forming above him, indicating that he was about to step onto the Stair of Valor.

"What's going on here? His cultivation base is rising so rapidly! He wasn't even a Godmyth back in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. He was only a third division Incarnated God. Now he's a Chaos God? And he's stepping onto the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway?"

Being unaware that Yang Qi had a clone like this, these old-timers could only marvel at how enigmatic he was.

"Don't worry, ladies and gentlemen," the clone said. "This heavenly tribulation won't be any trouble for me." A vortex appeared above him, which sucked in the power of the tribulation. Then he shivered and rose to his feet, pulsing with the most domineering and powerful of auras. As he stepped onto the Stair of Valor, he felt boundless preheaven Valor flowing through him, entering his soul and filling him with boldness and ferocity. This Valor was like the boundless will of the ancient god world, a most wonderful of qualities. Reaching this first of the minor stairs didn't just provide an increase in cultivation base, but would also help resolve many previously problematic areas in certain daoist techniques.

"Emissary of Radiance and Light, when do you plan to form your Army of Radiance and Light? Those of us who've been graced by your benevolence wish to stick closely to you. The Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, the nine dharmarajas, and the twenty-four god-generals are all vying for resources and trying to recruit as many elders as possible to form their own armies. And that's especially true of the league-lord, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. He already has thirty thousand elders in his Deathless Corps and he doesn't seem to be slowing down recruitment at all. And Devil Empress Wave Charm has recruited a lot of cultivators from the dao of evil. It's likely that she'll soon have a force of ten thousand, all of them extremely strong."

"Sir, as Emissary of Radiance and Light, you have only one superior and should have many subordinates. You can't just wield power by yourself. You'll have to deal with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and the other important people, so you really shouldn't just sit around on your laurels."

"Oh, the army? It's actually been formed already. Take a look!"

RUMBLE!

The clone rose to his feet and pointed up at the sky.

The old-timers also stood and looked up. Suddenly, boundless, blinding sagelight spilled down, becoming like a path made of radiance and light. Marching along the path were countless angels, formed into well-ordered ranks.

They were obviously top experts, with weapons in their hands and wings swaying behind them. Their skin almost looked like porcelain, causing them to appear as if they were gods.

Looking at the shocked old-timers, the clone smiled and said, "This is my Army of Radiance and Light. Each soldier is a Chaos God with fighting prowess equivalent to someone on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. And there are more than a million of them. Can the league-lord compare to that?"