"Come." Huang Qi gestured to a seventy-thousand-meter-tall bee-headed man, the chieftain of the bee-head tribe. He held deep, natural reverence for Huang Qi, his ancient ancestor, so starting with him made the most sense.

"Press your hand on his forehead," Huang Qi instructed Tianming.

Tianming showed no fear as he descended to face the bee-headed man. Now nearly twenty thousand meters tall himself, Tianming wasn't much smaller. However, the hand resting between the man's two compound eyes was admittedly still quite small. Right after, Huang Qi positioned herself behind him, her outstretched finger making contact with his back.

"Don't resist me with the skypole stars. I must utilize my own power to activate the Order Relic, absorb the Aeternal Life Curse from his body, and help him transform it." Huang Qi gave a cold reply, arching an eyebrow to question Tianming, "You're not scared, are you?"

"Like I'd be scared of you." The moment Tianming finished speaking, three wisps of white mist shot out from his body, slipped into Huang Qi, and reentered the Sourcepath Shackles. It was the three Sixths. They rested within her body, primed to hit hard at any second. Tianming wasn't about to make a reckless mistake and give her an opening, so he had to act with absolute caution.

Huang Qi gritted her teeth in fury, glaring murderously as she cursed, "Such a coward, terrified of dying!" But she had no choice. Pressing her finger against Tianming's back, she unleashed a massive torrent of aeternal source into his body. The power plunged directly into the bottomless pit of his middlekin astrons, forcing his body to rotate like a millstone.

The rotation wrung a pained cry from the bee-headed man. His body trembled, bursting with a blinding light as the aeternal source whipped into an endless vortex within him. His power underwent a profound transformation driven by the Order Relic. Above all, Tianming sensed a jet-black mark migrating toward the bottomless pit in his body until it was consumed entirely.

"Done." Huang Qi lowered her hand.

Tianming pulled his hand back as well. Heaving for air, the bee-headed man rolled aside, his body still wrapped in a churning vortex as his power underwent a massive transformation. Not the least bit tired, Tianming stretched, looked over at Huang Qi, and said, "Next."

"Slow down." Huang Qi inhaled deeply, her chest rising and falling unsteadily right before Tianming’s eyes.

"Can't you guys at least cover up a little?" Tianming rolled his eyes.

"How hateful!" A finely detailed, gold-and-black long dress materialized around Huang Qi. The striped gown, woven entirely from her own power, clung tightly to her form and beautifully accentuated her exquisite curves.

"You look even more like a bee now," said Tianming.

"Why do you care? It's not like you're going to do me," Huang Qi retorted. Obviously, she was right back to her old self.

"I feel nothing for insects." Tianming glanced at her. "Alright, enough nonsense, next one."

"Hmph!"

In the blink of an eye, half a day passed. All forty-nine undying aeternal chieftains stood transformed before Tianming. Feeling the profound changes still rippling through their bodies, their anticipation for the upcoming journey to the Upper Star Ruin grew ever stronger.

"Do we have to transform every single one of them if I want to bring all the undying aeternals to the Upper Star Ruin for support?" Tianming asked.

Huang Qi laughed, but didn't answer.

"What are you so smug about? I have plenty of time to deal with you." With that, Tianming picked up Zizhen once more. Lingfeng led the way, taking him, Huang Qi, and the forty-nine chieftains to the Xenoworld to venture forth into this bizarre world.

***

Darkjade Haven was a black fortuna-class world in the Upper Star Ruin that was incredibly close to the starforge's main star, Ghoulpurge Virtue Star. The main star served as the base for a branch of the Virtue Pantheon, who claimed the entire Ghoulpurge Starforge as their territory.

While the royal lineage controlled the maniverse-class world, the mixed-blood Virtue Pantheon specters governed the fortuna-class nova sources. The elites were definitely all in the maniverse-class world!

However, after the flameyellow descendants broke free, they grew in strength, inexplicably taking down one fortuna-class world after another. Even Darkjade Haven, sitting closest to Ghoulpurge Virtue Star, had fallen along with nearly a hundred other fortuna-class worlds.

As one of the Eightpart Pantheons, how could they tolerate this? They didn't have to wait long before orders arrived from the imperial-class star, commanding all forces within the Upper Star Ruin's maniverse-class world to launch a coordinated assault on the fortuna-class worlds, crush the slave rebellion, and seize back control of the cosmos!

Even though the slave rebels had seized the cores of those fortuna-class worlds, there were still backup cores in the maniverse-class world. Thus, wave after wave of the cosmic god armies advanced upon the fortuna-class worlds with backup cores. Given its close proximity to Ghoulpurge Virtue Star, Darkjade Haven naturally took the brunt of their attack.

Across the surface of this deep, dark star, ten times the size of a standard star, a bleak, icy storm whipped up by the astralguard formation raged violently. Now active, the astralguard formation would ruthlessly repel the invading specters.

At this moment, over ten thousand cosmic gods from Ghoulpurge Virtue Star appeared above Darkjade Haven. The aura radiating from these cosmic gods, each standing hundreds of meters tall, was undeniably oppressive. But rather than launch a direct attack, they gathered together to glare coldly at the fortuna-class world below.

"First, we'll activate the backup formation core to dismantle the formation's power, then wipe out these lowly slaves!" The cold voice of a Virtue Pantheon specter declared.