Ye Liuyun had been lying in wait at his target location for nearly half a year, giving him ample time to familiarize himself with the terrain. Confident there were no threats, he made his move—heading straight for the altar to seize and secure it, preventing any reinforcements from the alien race.

To his surprise, however, a Golden-Armored Alien lay hidden there, accompanied by twenty Silver-Armored Aliens. A fierce battle erupted between them. Rather than summoning Mu Lai and other alien allies, Ye Liuyun chose to rely solely on his own companions, using the fight as a trial by fire.

He deliberately refrained from using his Golden Pupils or soul power, instead relying purely on spatial manipulation and the power of the natural world to engage the Golden-Armored Alien. Though his opponent frequently attacked by harnessing dimensional forces, Ye Liuyun deftly absorbed or evaded each strike with his own spatial mastery.

The Demon-Sealing Stele and the Demon Vine had grown formidable from devouring countless alien energies—so much so that they could effortlessly dispatch a Silver-Armored Alien. Their strength had surged, and their resilience was unmatched, likely due to absorbing the essence of alien scales. The Demon Vine’s tendrils had become harder than the aliens’ own armor, making them nearly impossible to sever. Similarly, the Demon-Sealing Stele remained unfazed even when struck by alien weapons or artifacts.

Among his allies, only the Vermilion Bird could combat Silver-Armored Aliens using soul power. Thunderclap and the Dragon Maiden relied on sheer physical prowess, while the Vespera, Xenocide, and Phantom Hand leveraged their stealth abilities to hold their own.

Liang Xue, Feng Hongxiu, the Songstress, and Little Lan’er had to work in tandem to take down a single Silver-Armored Alien. As for Wu Qingcheng, Su Miaoyin, and Fyeng Wanru, they fought in coordinated groups, covering one another while relying on enchanted artifacts—protected by doppelgängers and demonic beasts like the Hellfire Lion—to avoid being overwhelmed.

Meanwhile, the Vanguard Unit swept the battlefield, eliminating nearby aliens and encircling the Golden and Silver-Armored foes to prevent their escape.

Unbeknownst to himself, Ye Liuyun was rapidly growing stronger through combat—though he felt the progress was too slow. His spatial manipulation had reached near-perfect mastery, and with every battle, his connection to the natural world deepened.

His offensive power had grown increasingly formidable. It was only against those alien races harnessing the dimensional forces that he still seemed relatively weak.

Yet even a single strike from him could spell disaster for those aliens—unless they summoned dimensional defenses, they’d either perish or suffer grievous wounds.

At the outset of each battle, Ye Liuyun’s side often found themselves at a disadvantage. But once he, the Demon Vine, and the Demon-Sealing Stele eliminated their initial foes and turned to assist the others, the tide would swiftly turn in their favor, pressing the aliens back relentlessly.

Though injuries were inevitable in every clash, it was under such intense, real combat pressure that their strength grew at an astonishing pace. By the end of each fight, Ye Liuyun would capture a few aliens alive, keeping them as training dummies for his comrades.

Then, he would deploy the elite Blade Corps and the main army to sweep through the remaining alien forces and corpse demons, allowing the troops to seize cultivation resources for themselves. Meanwhile, Ye Liuyun led the others in gathering materials and extracting source energy to fuel their training.

They stormed three strongholds in succession, all following this pattern. Some outposts even had aliens with exceptional spatial mastery or three-eyed variants standing guard.

Ye Liuyun deduced that the aliens had reinforced their defenses at every base—and those defenses would only grow stronger.

In the northern warzone alone, the aliens held over a hundred strongholds. So far, they had only cleared thirty or forty. The battles ahead would be far fiercer.

Soon, even Ye Tiandao’s Blade Corps might need to join the fray. As for the captive aliens, under Mulai’s command, they were tasked with sealing the altars at the start of each engagement.

Mulai’s third eye had been refined from those of many three-eyed aliens, making him more than a match for ordinary variants. Backed by allies like Blue Armor—aliens with formidable spatial abilities—securing the altars was never an issue.

From then on, whenever Ye Liuyun encountered a three-eyed alien, he made sure to slay it and refine its third eye to enhance his own power.

As a result, both his white and black beams now possessed devastating penetration while consuming minimal energy. In a direct clash of beams, no ordinary three-eyed alien could hope to rival him.

But their smooth progress didn’t last. Trouble arose when they attacked the next stronghold.

They encountered the black-scaled beastman.

The moment Ye Liuyun laid eyes on him, he knew this creature was no ordinary foe. His golden pupils, capable of discerning souls, saw nothing within the beastman—proof that this thing wasn’t truly alive in the strictest sense.

Without hesitation, the beastman lunged at Ye Liuyun, claws slashing through the air with the raw power of an entire spatial realm behind them. Judging by the force of the attack, there had to be at least a whole planet’s worth of energy condensed within that monstrous body. Ye Liuyun countered by dissolving the strike with his own spatial power, then retaliated with a swing of his Demon-Slaying Blade. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Yet the beastman didn’t even bother blocking. It kept charging, forcing Ye Liuyun to weave through space, dodging while slashing relentlessly. His Demon-Slaying Blade and twenty-one spirit blades struck the beastman’s obsidian scales with metallic clangs, sending sparks flying. But only the Demon-Slaying Blade left the faintest scratch—the spirit blades couldn’t even mark it.

Frustrated, Ye Liuyun switched tactics, launching a soul attack to probe the beastman’s mind. To his shock, he found no trace of a soul—only a lethal poison designed to annihilate intruders. He barely managed to shield his own spirit with ghostly flames before retreating, relying on the Divine Command Token to purge the venom from his system.

Left with no choice, Ye Liuyun continued evading with spatial maneuvers. Fortunately, the beastman’s control over space was inferior, leaving it to chase helplessly from behind.

Next, Ye Liuyun hurled flames, unleashed freezing ice, and even tried poisoning the creature—but the beastman deflected everything with spatial barriers. The toxins, however, it ignored completely.

"Damn thing’s immune to poison too?" Ye Liuyun muttered under his breath. "Practically invincible!"

Even spatial fractures, capable of slicing through dimensions, proved useless. The beastman barreled through them with sheer brute force, its monstrous physique unscathed.

With no other choice, Ye Liuyun swiftly dodged behind the creature and launched an attack with a beam of white light. Yet even a fist-thick ray merely scraped off a layer of the alien’s scaly armor, failing to pierce through its body.

"Roar!"

The half-beast, sensing the threat, bellowed furiously and charged at Ye Liuyun once more.

"Seal Demon Stele! Demon Vine!" Ye Liuyun immediately summoned the two artifacts for assistance.

If he couldn’t destroy it, he’d drain it dry.

Simultaneously, his doppelgänger quickly gathered the others to safety, shielding them from the monster’s assault, while urgently questioning Mulai about the creature’s origins.