The instant Ye Liuyun released his spatial lock, the corpses and the severed flying boats began raining down, thudding against the ground in a deafening clatter.

Suddenly, a black-clad assassin appeared behind Ye Tiandao’s group—Ninth Heaven, First Reversion. A single slash took a Tang clansman’s head clean off; the blade was already sweeping toward a second disciple.

The killer moved so fast that, had Ye Liuyun not spotted him, the Tang disciples would have been wiped out in moments.

Ye Liuyun froze time at once. His soul shot into the assassin’s sea of consciousness and ransacked it. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

The killer belonged to the Fire Seal Dynasty’s death squad, secretly ordered to help the new bandit proxies wipe out Ye Tiandao and the demons. Three assassins had been dispatched; the other two were already hunting his two avatars.

But those avatars’ spatial power and strength were formidable, and the killers had yet to find an opening.

All three assassins were early Ninth Heaven, First Reversion, and none lacked spatial talent. Had Ye Liuyun not broken common sense by teleporting his foes outright, his own spatial force might not have subdued this one.

At the same time, the two avatars released their souls to comb the surroundings and quickly located the remaining killers.

The three of them struck in unison, branding all three assassins with slave seals. Only then did Ye Liuyun restore the flow of time, and the Second Avatar swept the three killers into his spatial world.

One Tang clansman dead, another wounded. Ye Liuyun never considered rewinding their fate with his power over time. Save for those closest to him, he would never reveal that ability to others. Their destinies were their own; he had no right to meddle.

Ye Tiandao and the rest snapped to full alert, recalling the three Ninth-Heaven guards to ring their group while the avatars hunted the bandits.

Ye Liuyun held back, pondering what the Fire Seal Dynasty would do next.

The killers had already transmitted their faces to the capital; the dynasty would never let them go. And since he had seized these three, the court must know. Even if the bandit chief kept feeding them false reports, Fire Seal would no longer believe them—delaying tactics were useless now.

Still, keeping the chief alive might yet test the dynasty’s attitude.

The bandit leader soon received Fire Seal’s inquiry. Ye Liuyun had him reply: the three assassins had perished, slain by three mid-Ninth-Heaven experts. The bandit troop had been almost wiped out in the counterattack; only he had escaped.

Fire Seal’s response was terse: keep watching Ye Tiandao’s group.

Though the order sounded casual, Ye Liuyun knew the dynasty had marked him.

He had stirred up the Desolate Sea, then stormed the dynasty’s frontier system; Fire Seal would surely hunt him from now on.

So he killed the bandit chief outright and sent word to the two demon legions: “Fire Seal will dispatch troops soon. Gather resources at once and be ready to withdraw. I’ll send more experts—split up and speed the advance.”

He had an avatar tuck Tang Xinyao and the women into a spatial world, then personally escorted three mid-Ninth-Heaven experts to the demon legions to accelerate their march.

After the avatars and beasts annihilated the local bandits, they split tasks: the First Avatar led the beasts and the Devil Vine to raze the remaining cities; the Second Avatar rode with the Devil Lion to other planets, letting the lion plunder resources while he watched the void for incoming Fire Seal fleets.

The First Avatar divided his beasts into three teams, stormed every guild hall and governor’s mansion, looted them clean, then bombarded the cities until nothing but rubble remained. Within two days every city on the planet had been swept away, and the entire world was sealed into the spatial realm.

Bandits who had slipped into space when the planet was taken were hunted down; the slower ones were drawn in with the world itself and then executed. Their corpses were stuffed into storage rings for the Devil Vine.

Inside the First Avatar’s world, the vine tunneled through each ruined city, devouring the bodies.

Without pausing to claim more planets, the First Avatar raced to rendezvous with the demon armies. Two days later the Second Avatar returned with the Devil Lion. The two legions accelerated, seized one last planet, and were likewise stowed in the spatial world.

Ye Liuyun changed his appearance, used the black teleportation tower to return to the Desolate Sea, released two Devil Flood Dragons to stand guard, and sank to the seabed to cultivate.

Days later, Fire Seal’s death squad reached the Ferrybridge system—only to find no trace of Ye Liuyun or the demon armies. Ten thousand praetorian sealed the entire system, yet uncovered nothing.

Tracking Ye Liuyun’s movements, Fire Seal deduced he possessed a long-range teleportation treasure and had already fled. After a futile search, they withdrew.

Meanwhile, Ninth Prince Jiang Yunhan—finally delivered to the capital by a planetary garrison—still seethed at the memory of Ye Liuyun robbing him. He ground his teeth in hatred, yet dared not admit his defeat, vowing to settle the score when the chance arose.

The Fire-Seal Dynasty, unable to locate Ye Liuyun, has lifted its blockade across the starry sky, yet it still stations numerous assassins on the planets surrounding the Desolate Sea and in the Ferry-Bridge Galaxy, secretly hunting for any trace of him.

Ye Liuyun, meanwhile, keeps everyone in seclusion for a full month, refining the late-stage fifth-tier divine essence within him until it is razor-sharp. Daily sparring with the three dynasties’ killers sharpens his mastery of spatial power even further.

Now, when he cloaks himself in spatial force, the concealment far surpasses what the invisibility cloak ever granted. Even hiding by merging with heaven and earth itself yields better results than the cloak.

“No treasure beats raw strength,” Ye Liuyun remarks with a sigh.

After the training, he does not rush everyone back into the open. Instead, he alters his appearance and heads for the Jinshi Planet, the He family’s stronghold. He already has ample alchemists and weapon-refining master, but materials remain scarce, so he plans to raid some of the He family’s mines and the Fan family’s medicinal fields.