An old Daoist was hovering in midair above the Green Cliff Mountain, a threatening look on his face. He had a head of gray hair, but one of his arms was missing, and a part of his leg was gone. Right from his left shoulder, his entire left arm was chopped away. A chunk of muscle, about the size of a human head, was ripped away from his right thigh by a heavenly thunder, and his leg was barely connected with a broken thigh bone. There was a transparent hole in his chest, flat and narrow. Obviously, it was a wound caused by a flying sword.
His injury was worse than Patriarch Yuan Hua. Without spending a few Periods of time in meticulous cultivation, or having some powerful immortal pills, it would not be so easy to have such injury fully healed. Nevertheless, all Heaven Immortals had very strong life forces, and the higher was their grade, the stronger were their life forces. Rumors had it that if a First Tier Heaven Immortal's soul was intact, even if he were left with only a head, he could still stay alive. Hence, although this old Daoist was severely wounded, he could still hover arrogantly above Green Cliff Mountain, provoking Yuan Hua Sect at the top of his voice.
"Yuan Hua, you old fogey! How dare you turn a deaf ear to Immortal Chuan's mediation efforts? How could you send someone to ambush my disciples? You've gone too far in bullying others!" The old Daoist, who was the founding Ancestral Master of Huiling Sect, Reverend Huilin, pointed his finger at Green Cliff Mountain as he bellowed, "Show yourself! Get the hell out here! Today will be the day that you and I fight and determine who is better! I'll not rest until either one of us is dead!"
Following closely behind Patriarch Yuan Hua, Wu Qi shot into the sky on a sword beam.
Reverend Huilin was the only person that came from Huiling Sect. On the other hand, led by tens of Heaven Immortals, group after group of Yuan Hua Sect's Nascent Divinity cultivators had already deployed a killing formation that trapped Reverend Huilin within. The formation had Green Cliff Mountain as its core, and there were currently three Yuan Hua Sect Elders with the cultivation base of Heaven Immortal realm sitting cross-legged on its peak, guarding six pale-red flying swords that were wheeling in the sky.
Reverend Huilin was trapped in the formation, and Patriarch Yuan Hua had already come before him. But, he showed no sign of fear. Instead, he had his hands clasped behind his back, tilting his head up as he looked into the sky. Seeing how he looked so composed and relaxed, Patriarch Yuan Hua could not help but give a cold harrumph and snap, "Huling, you old twerp! Why are you stirring up trouble for no reason? What do you want by provoking me right at my doorstep?"
Reverend Huilin gave Patriarch Yuan Hua an angry glare and bellowed, "Stirring up trouble for no reason? My disciple, Ke He, is seriously wounded by your disciple, Green Staff! I need an answer from you!"
Patriarch Yuan Hua rolled his eyes. He was too lazy to talk a load of garbage. He reached out his hand and waved in the air. Immediately, the passing clouds within ten thousand miles of distance produced some loud swooshing noises as they began to quickly gather towards his palm. In just a blink of an eye, a white thunder ball, about the size of a grain of rice, appeared right inside Patriarch Yuan Hua's hand. Without uttering a word, he threw the thunder ball towards Reverend Huilin.
Reverend Huilin gave a cold harrumph as well. He glared, then a puddle of spring water suddenly emerged right before him. From it, a lotus plant quickly grew out. In just a twinkle, many stems and leaves spread out while three pinkish lotus flowers sprouted amongst them. The roughly ten feet wide lotus flowers vibrated gently, blocking off the thunder ball that approached menacingly. A muffled rumble rang out, and the atmosphere vibrated, as the thunder ball and lotus flowers vanished at the same time.
Even as that happened, two sword cries echoed out. A white sword beam shot out from the top of Patriarch Yuan Hua's head, thrusting right towards Reverend Huilin's chest. At the same time, a yellow sword beam flew out from behind Reverend Huilin's back, transforming into a bright beam that was shaped like a great python with scales and claws, greeting upon Patriarch Yuan Hua's flying sword. Two sword beams collided and pushed each other like two crazy bulls, tangling together while grinding, twisting, stabbing, and slicing each other violently. An ear-splitting grinding noise struck pain in the ears of Wu Qi and the people that were watching the fight off in the distance, forcing them to seal off their eardrums.
The battle of flying swords went on for two hours. Eventually, Patriarch Yuan Hua had proven himself to be more skillful in controlling a flying sword. A tiny sword beam was split from the main sword beam, bolting through the air like an electric arc as it shot towards Reverend Huilin. In the meanwhile, the glow of Reverend Huilin's yellow sword beam was dimmed from the suppression, no longer looking as mighty as before.
At the moment when the tiny sword beam was about to pierce Reverend Huilin's body, he snorted coldly. With both his hands, he performed a hand incantation gesture and shouted nonchalantly, "Restraining Order! Back off!" The air before him swayed a little as a thunderclap rang out. The tiny sword beam was instantly shattered to shreds, turning into countless bright specks that slowly faded away.
A loud ringing of weapon clashing echoed out. Although Reverend Huilin managed to crush the tiny sword beam, his flying sword was smashed by Patriarch Yuan Hua's white sword beam and lost all its glow, transforming into a dark-yellow flying sword with a strange shape as it flew tottering backward. A faint airflow burst out from the top of Reverend Huilin's head and caught the flying sword, pulling it back into his body. Patriarch Yuan Hua did not stop there. He pointed his finger forward, causing his flying sword to shine even brighter, transforming into a beam of white light that stretched one thousand feet long as it shot viciously towards Reverend Huilin.
Reverend Huilin gave a cold harrumph. He brought one of his fingers to his mouth and bit at the fingertip, using his pale-golden immortal blood to draw a fist-sized rune in midair. Wu Qi knew the rune, which was written in an ancient Immortal character, and meant 'deter'. It possessed a very strong power.
Even as he recited an incantation that echoed through the sky, Reverend Huilin shook his wrist and thrust the golden rune forward. A loud rumble echoed out as the rune detonated, sending forth a tremendous shockwave that was focused solely on Patriarch Yuan Hua's sword beam. The white sword beam dimmed down instantly, and was knocked tumbling back several tens of miles away, struggling for a while before eventually failing to get back up. Patriarch Yuan Hua's body trembled slightly, and was forced tens of steps back by an invisible force.
Two Ancestral Masters exchanged a glance, both grinning coldly at the same time. All of a sudden, various immortal spells were being cast, while all sorts of flying swords, magical treasures, talismans, and thunder spells were thrown out. At that moment, the void was fully filled with countless streams of bright light that flickered and blinked, along with deafening noises of explosion and thunderclaps that made one find it hard to maintain stability. Nobody could see where the two Ancestral Masters were amidst the storm of attacks.
At the level of Patriarch Yuan Hua and Reverend Huilin, every single attack unleashed by them had the power extremely condensed. The energies of the attacks were very focused, and not much of them would leak out. Therefore, although the void was filled with their attacks, it did not affect Wu Qi and the people around him. At most, their faces were caressed by gusts of strong wind, but that did not cause any actual damage to them.
The violent battle went on for some while. At last, both of them became so weary that they panted heavily as their bodies were drenched in sweat. They stopped attacking each other almost at the same time. Separated by a distance of several miles, they glared at each other furiously. Reverend Huilin did not show any intention of fleeing, while Patriarch Yuan Hua did not give the order of activating the formation and taking the home advantage to trap Reverend Huilin here.
After spending some time to catch their breaths, both of them began to cough violently. As they had yet to recover from a serious injury, and had exerted all their power to fight each other, the intense battle had depleted their immortal energies. Even worse, it brought a serious impact to their existing injuries, causing them to lose a huge amount of blood essence and Prime energy.
When they finally regulated their breaths, Patriarch Yuan Hua pointed his trembling finger at Reverend Huilin, then grinned coldly and said, "Huiling, a verbal battle can never determine who is right and who isn't. If you want to fight, we'll determine who the winner is in the match hosted by Immortal Monarch eighteen months later. We all know how Ke He conducts himself! Hmph!" Patriarch Yuan Hua turned away as he gave a cold harrumph, as if he was too lazy to argue on the matter of Immortal Ke He being attacked and wounded. As a matter of fact, he totally despised Immortal Ke He's character.
Reverend Huilin gnashed his teeth in anger and said, "Could Green Staff of Yuan Hua Sect be a modest and courteous noble? A man who courted away his own Uncle-Master's spouse? Hahaha, since the universe was created, this is something that has never been heard of before!"
What Reverend Huilin said had made Daoist Min's face turn blue with anger, making a threatening gesture, as if he were about to put up a desperate fight. In the meanwhile, Daoist Mo Luan and a few Elders of Heaven Immortal realm cast their hostile glances over at Wu Qi's direction, fixing their gaze on Immortal Green Staff.
Daoist Chi glared and stuck out his chest as he roared in a low, muffled voice, "What are you trying to do? Do you want a fight now?"
Daoist Min panted heavily, clenching his jaw and pressing down the flame of anger and resentment in his heart. Bowing his head slightly, he beckoned at Daoist Mo Luan and the few Elders. Seeing the gesture, Daoist Mo Luan and his companions bowed their heads as well, not saying a word again.
Immortal Green Staff gave Daoist Mo Luan and the few Elders a gaze from the corner of his eyes. He lowered his voice and said, "Remember those guys. They are Mo Luan, Qing Peng, Yu He, and Bo Lao, four disciples of Uncle-Master Min. The people from their fraction are using spirit birds as their titles. Do not engage them if you meet them in the future. Likewise, if you meet any of their disciples who are weaker than you, do not hesitate to bully them. You have Grand Ancestral-Master and me supporting you from the back!"
Upon hearing Immortal Green Staff's words, Wu Qi could not help but have his mouth twitched a little. With such a distinct conflict between different fractions in the sect, were they not afraid that it would cause the sect to break apart? Also, it seemed like Patriarch Yuan Hua was turning a deaf ear to something like this. Could there be some reason behind this?
Suddenly, Patriarch Yuan Hua burst into laughter and said, "You are such an old twerp, Huiling! Why are you intentionally sowing dissent among my disciples? Sure enough, all the people from Huiling Sect are of the same cloth, earning your living with just your lips and tongues! Heh, I know you are here today to get justice for your disciple. If you bring any of your disciples here, I'll definitely kill them! But, too bad you are here alone, and I feel ashamed to attack you with all my disciples!"
After a moment of silence, Patriarch Yuan Hua sneered and said, "Eighteen months later, once the match between our disciples is done, you and I will have a match. The wager will be our base. What say you? If I lose, Green Cliff Planet will be yours, and if you lose, your Huang Qiao Planet will be mine!"
Rolling his eyes, Reverend Huilin said coldly, "Yuan Hua, do you really think you can defeat me?"
Patriarch Yuan Hua responded disapprovingly, "We'll find out then. Why waste time talking now?"
Reverend Huilin sneered and said, "Fine. Please be our witness, Immortal Chuan, as we'll sign an official paper now. Using our base as the wager? That's just what I was thinking!"
A beam of golden light fell from the sky. Clad in a purple robe, Immortal Chuan came before them smilingly, his hand carrying a scroll. "Since both fellow Immortals have the same idea, it couldn't be better. It is really a huge gamble by having your own base as the wager... Tsk..."
Patriarch Yuan Hua was taken aback. He stared at Reverend Huilin and asked with a smile, "Apparently, this is the reason why you are here?"
Immortal Chuan nodded smilingly and said, "Patriarch Yuan Hua, I've spent half a day waiting for you two up there. Haha, you are correct. It is Reverend Huilin who requested me to be the witness of your bet here!"
Patriarch Yuan Hua and Reverend Huilin exchanged a glance, both breaking out into a loud laughter at the same time, their voices cold.
With Immortal Chuan as the witness, Patriarch Yuan Hua and Reverend Huilin signed an official paper with the increased wager.
Eighteen months later, the match between the disciples of two sects would determine the ultimate ownership of the planet with energy stones veins.
Eighteen months later, the two Ancestral Masters would have a one on one match, which would then determine the ultimate ownership of either side's base.
Spurred by some people with unknown purposes, the news of the increase in the wager had quickly spread across the entire Puluo Heavenly Realm.