The soul beast race was already on the back foot under human encroachment. After this battle, who knew how many powerful clansmen would die in vain? It would only drive human fear and hatred of soul beasts to unprecedented heights, making the hope of peaceful coexistence in the future ever more remote.
At that thought, Gu Yuena's violet eyes grew several degrees colder, a dark tide of killing intent roiling within.
…
In the deepest reaches of the high-altitude cloudbank, the thick clouds rolled like a white ocean.
A colossal black dragon, vast enough to blot out the sky, hung motionless within.
Its mountain-sized head shifted ever so slightly. Lids armored in hard scales slowly rose, revealing a pair of immense golden dragon pupils.
Those eyes—belonging to the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King Di Tian, eyes that should have brimmed with majesty and power—now lacked their usual steadiness and dominance. Instead, a flicker of very human amusement and mockery crossed them, as if a lofty spectator were enjoying a show of their own devising.
"Heh… As expected, she's awake."
A languid, indulgent female voice with a unique magnetism reverberated at once through the clouds and across the spiritual plane. It belonged to the Lord Ravager, Phantylia.
She seemed entirely unsurprised by Gu Yuena's awakening. There was even a note of satisfied inevitability.
If possible, what she coveted most was that flawless silver dragon body sleeping at the bottom of the lake.
That vessel, bearing the purest Dragon God bloodline and limitless potential, was the ideal container worthy of an Lord Ravager like her.
But according to what she had scavenged from the black dragon's memories, the Silver Dragon King Gu Yuena was profoundly special by nature.
At her peak, Gu Yuena's power had reached what this world called the God King level—far beyond what Phantylia could easily touch or control in her current, limited, memory-avatar state.
No matter. Once her perfect plan advanced step by step, plunging this planet into destruction and chaos, so-called God Kings would one day be nothing but toys in her palm.
For now, the priority was to seize a body more suited to the current stage—one that could better exert her strength and would be easier to acquire.
Phantylia's consciousness cast a faintly disdainful eye over the black dragon's body she presently inhabited.
Compared to Di Tian's male body—steeped in darkness and raw power but somewhat rough—she actually preferred female vessels, like Bi Ji's, brimming with surging life force and a more elegant, beautiful form.
But to launch a super beast tide sufficient to sweep the continent, to pluck the most sensitive nerve of hatred between humans and soul beasts to its extreme and drive them to mutual annihilation, temporarily borrowing this beast-god body—supreme in prestige among soul beasts—was undeniably the most convenient and efficient option.
"What the hell are you?! Get out of my body—give it back to me."
Deepest in the vast ocean of the black dragon's spirit, Di Tian's own consciousness had been forcibly compressed and imprisoned in a corner.
He had assumed human form, robed in black, but was bound tight by countless strange chains woven of ghostly-blue starfire. Half his body was submerged in a cold ocean condensed from his own spiritual power—no longer under his control—leaving him unable to move.
He struggled with all his might, head thrown back, glaring up at the vast, bewitching figure floating in the sky of the spiritual world. His eyes seethed with indelible humiliation and boundless fury.
That figure was dangerously alluring.
She wore a dark green cheongsam with a high slit that perfectly traced curves both graceful and explosively powerful.
On her head perched a splendid ornament like a blooming lotus. Dark-gold plant-like patterns, writhing slowly as if alive, coiled over her exposed skin. Several enormous, slowly-rotating blood-red lotuses hovered around her, radiating an energy that made hearts quail.
A seemingly delicate round fan swayed in her hand. Every gesture exuded a mysterious, lethal allure wrapped in absolute arrogance and cold cruelty.
This was the Lord Ravager, Phantylia, revealed in her spiritual aspect.
"No problem, little lizard, I'll give it back to you—oh~"
With elegant poise, Phantylia raised the fan to hide the corner of her mouth, only her eyes visible, smiling unpredictably. Her airy tone was as though coaxing a clueless child.
"Of course, only after I… find a new 'outfit' more to my taste~"
She would return it, yes—but not the complete, powerful black dragon body it had been.
Once possessed and corroded by an Lord Ravager born of Heliobus like her, the soul and flesh would be branded with her unique seal of destruction. How could it remain the same as before?
By then, what she returned to Di Tian would likely be a body utterly remade by destruction—one even he himself could not control.
"Damn you, you accursed extraworld fiend."
Di Tian burned with rage, his soul trembling with extremity of anger. He would never believe a word from this monster.
She had leveraged his body to perfectly mimic his aura and soul fluctuations. Even Bi Ji, closest to him and most perceptive, had detected no anomaly, believing this to be something done with the lord's permission or direct order.
So Bi Ji had executed his "orders" without hesitation, rallying nearly all the core forces of the Star Dou Forest to launch this unprecedented terrifying beast tide against Shrek City.
The Emerald Swan Bi Ji, the Demonic Eye Tree Ten-Thousand Monster King, the Dark-Gold Dreadclaw Bear King, the Three-Headed Scarlet Demon Mastiff Red King, the Hell Demon Dragon King Zi Ji, and even that unfathomable Yaoling… plus Di Tian under Phantylia's control—seven great ferocious beasts had practically emptied their nest.
Each ferocious beast commanded not a few ten-thousand-year soul beasts under them.
Such power— even at his peak, Dragon God Douluo Mu En likely could not have withstood it head-on. This time, Shrek Academy… was doomed.
But the soul beast race would fare no better.
After this battle, who knew how many powerful clansmen would die in blood? The soul beasts' high-end combat strength would be devastated, perhaps unable to recover for tens of thousands of years.
Thus exploited—reduced to tools and cannon fodder for another's plan of destruction—Di Tian felt as if his lungs would explode with rage, his very soul weeping blood.
Yet he was powerless to resist, forced to watch it all unfold.
In the spiritual realm, Phantylia had utterly crushed him. Even in his own mindscape, his home turf, he was like a lamb nailed to the chopping block, with no strength to fight back.
"Hehehehe…"
Phantylia's light, delighted laughter tinkled like wind chimes. She admired Di Tian's futile, painful struggle, eyes full of lofty pleasure and satisfaction.
She indeed didn't think much of this black dragon body, but with some modification and empowerment—remaking it to better fit the aesthetics of destruction as a doomsday beast—it might not fail to reach what this world called true-god-level combat power. At that time, it could count as a decent high-level enforcer.
She idly fanned herself and gazed, as if through layers of cloud, straight toward the great city that would soon suffer the first wave of the beast tide—Shrek City. A cruel, anticipatory curve rose at her lips.
The show was only just beginning.
And despair would be the most exquisite overture.
The violent tremors stirred by the beast tide were like muffled war drums sounding from the earth's core, spreading across Shrek City in an instant.
The ground shuddered, the walls hummed, even the air seemed to congeal.
On the south wall, the first to sense this terrifying movement was Shrek City's Defense Commander, the Time Douluo, Shi Xing.
He stood atop the sixty-foot wall, gaze like lightning, fixed on the far horizon.
"This is… a beast tide?"
Shi Xing's brows knitted tight, his voice weighed down with incredulity.
"At this scale? Impossible!"
As Shrek City's highest authority, Shi Xing commanded over ten thousand city-defense troops and an elite corps of three thousand soul masters, and he was a linchpin of the Sea God Pavilion.
Though battle-worn, he had never seen anything like this.
The distant forest seemed crushed by a giant hand. A seething black mass of beasts surged like the sea. Wherever they passed, towering trees fell in swathes, dust billowed to the sky, forming a shroud that blotted the sun.
Woooo—Woooo—Woooo—
Shrill alarms ripped through the sky like a wailing horn, echoing above the three defensive lines, then throughout every corner of Shrek City.
The alarm was bone-deep, a memory of war passed down through generations.
As the human line's first bulwark against the Star Dou Forest, Shrek City had endured several large-scale beast tides over the ages.
Everyone here knew what a beast tide meant—the clash of steel and flesh, the sieve of life and death.
After every beast tide, the base of the walls would pile with the fallen. The moat would run red. Even Title Douluo had perished here.
Yet Shrek City did not panic.
On the streets, people quickly and orderly filed into the nearest shelters. Shopkeepers smoothly rolled down reinforced metal shutters. In the residential quarters, mothers with children ducked into underground bunkers; worry shadowed their faces, but not fear.
Through ten millennia, Shrek Academy had forged unshakable prestige with victory after victory.
History had never recorded a beast tide breaching Shrek City's defenses.
That bone-deep trust let the city-defense troops devote themselves fully to combat deployment without splitting attention to maintain order.
The southern sky was completely darkened by flying soul beasts. They formed a terrifying array, a moving storm cloud, closing on the wall at astonishing speed.
The air reeked of the soul beasts' rank musk and violent soul fluctuations, the pressure so palpable it weighed on every heart, making it hard to breathe.
On the battlements, Shrek's garrison raced against time.
"First soul-guided artillery array charged."
"Defensive barrier strength up to seventy percent."
"Long-range soul master regiment in position."
Orders, footsteps, and the hum of machinery wove a taut symphony of war.
Defensive soul tools etched with complex runes flared to life. Pale blue shields layered over the wall like inverted bowls covering the city.
Three hundred twenty-eight long-range soul-guided cannons raised their barrels in unison, cold metal glinting in the gloom, trained on the surging tide.
These soldiers were elite—one in a thousand.
Though the southern pressure had drained the color from many young faces and made hands tremble on their weapons, they clenched their jaws and executed every order with steady precision.
Fear is human, but to master it and stand on the front line of a soul beast onslaught—each of them deserved the title of hero.
Shrek's garrison numbered over ten thousand. Its finest three thousand were soul masters—mostly graduates of the outer court.
Though they had not advanced to the inner court, they stayed to join this honorable garrison.
Here, ordinary soldiers received triple an empire soldier's pay; soul masters, fivefold.
More importantly, as Shrek's garrison, they could access some of the Academy's cultivation resources and occasionally receive guidance from Title Douluo—an opportunity outside soul masters dreamed of.
Thus the Shrek garrison was not only renowned across the continent but possessed a power unmatched by other empires' elites.
Now, this legendary army stood ready to defend their home with flesh and blood.
In the brutal war against the Sun-Moon Continent four thousand years ago, Shrek's garrison shattered thirty thousand enemies with only three thousand elites—an unrepeatable miracle in military history.
That glory entered the continent's textbooks and made the garrison's name resound across Douluo.
For many outer-court graduates, donning the dark green uniform wasn't just an honor, but a shortcut to success.
Three years' service in the garrison would be the brightest line on their résumé.
Whether joining the armies of the three great empires or entering other forces, they would receive priority.
Those with outstanding performance could be promoted directly into Shrek's mid-level administration, even the City Lord's office—truly entering the core power of this legendary city.
Given Shrek's autonomous status and scale, maintaining a ten-thousand-strong standing force was already the limit.
Any more would provoke needless suspicion from the three empires and strain the Academy's resources.
Though Shrek boasted the largest soul beast materials market, it lacked an imperial tax base and resource reserves.
Each soldier cost three hundred gold soul coins per year; each soul master, eight thousand. This consumed nearly thirty percent of the city's annual income.
On the south wall, the last Grade-6 fixed soul-guided cannon finished charging. Its three-meter barrel glowed a dangerous red as the complex runes along its frame lit in sequence.
The three-thousand-strong soul master formation stood arrayed. Rings of every color rose and blazed at their feet, weaving a sea of light that turned the entire stretch of wall bright as day.
All eyes locked on the distance—the black flood bore down at great speed. The earth's tremors grew more violent.
Meanwhile, within Shrek Academy, seven scarlet emergency flares shot skyward.
Inner-court disciples, led by teachers, swiftly assembled and streaked toward the south wall.
In the communications center, a dozen large soul-guided transmitters roared at full output, sending top-priority calls for aid to the Heaven Dou, Star Luo, and Dou Ling Empires.
A beast tide had never been Shrek's crisis alone; it was a threat to the survival of the human world.
Of course, the Sun-Moon Empire was pointedly omitted from the list.
Even if the Sun-Moon were willing to help, the three empires would never let their army pass through.
The rifts and scars from the war four millennia ago would not dissolve at the whim of a single beast tide.
Because the Star Dou Forest lay directly south of Shrek City, the south wall was the primary front.
But the other walls did not relax.
Outer-court students, under instructor command, rapidly reinforced the east, west, and north walls.
Most were fifteen or sixteen, faces still youthful, yet already skilled at operating various defensive soul tools.
Thanks to Haiyuan City's recent breakthroughs in soul tool technology and widespread simulation training, even two-ring soul masters could now wield considerable combat power through equipment.
On the south wall, Shi Xing's hands pressed on cold obsidian merlons as he peered far out.
The bitter wind whipped his dark cloak and teased a few gray strands at his temples.
This Time Douluo, famed for his steadiness, wore an unhideable hint of bitterness.
How many years had it been since Shrek City faced a real war?
He thought back. At least through the last two city lords' century-long tenures, no comparable crisis had appeared.
He had been in office less than a decade, and he was greeted with a beast tide of this scale—likely more terrifying than any recorded in the annals.
At the horizon, the first ten-thousand-year Armored Scaled Beast broke through the dust. Ash-gray scales gleamed metallic in the dim light, and corrosive drool dripped from its fangs, sizzling pits in the ground.
More alarming still, several particularly massive silhouettes loomed within the black tide—undoubtedly ten-thousand-year apex existences.
A breeze carried the soul beasts' stench—earth rot mixed with blood—that made many young soldiers on the wall hold their breath instinctively.
Though Shi Xing, a 95+ Super Douluo, stood among the world's top powers, his throat still went dry at the full sight of the tide, and he couldn't help but draw a sharp breath.
The beast tide, though vast, was anything but chaotic.
Ground forces split into three clear echelons: defense-type beasts in front, agility-types on the wings, power-types in the center.
In the sky, flying soul beasts flew tight attack formations—like a well-drilled army.
Such orderliness clearly meant a superlatively intelligent commander.
What had happened to the soul beasts of the Star Dou Forest? Shi Xing frowned deeply, riddled with doubt.
The forest had been strangely calm in recent years, with no reported hunts of ten-thousand-year beasts or large-scale conflicts.
After the beast tide centuries ago triggered by the Body Sect incident, the Star Dou Forest had signed a non-aggression pact with Shrek Academy. There had been no trouble since.
What had driven them to tear up the pact and launch an assault of this scale?
"What on earth happened…"
Shi Xing's gaze cut like a blade through ranks of beasts and the rushing ten-thousand-year creatures, straight to the horizon at the rear of the tide.
There, several terrifying auras pulsed faintly.
The pressure was a mountain made real, weighing heavy on every soul—even he, a 95-level Super Douluo, felt unprecedented suffocation.
For him to feel threatened, it could not be mere ten-thousand-year beasts.
"Even the ferocious beasts have moved…!"
Shi Xing swallowed with difficulty, the motion of his Adam's apple starkly audible in the hush atop the wall.
His fingertips dug unconsciously into the obsidian, quietly cracking the hard stone.
"This is real trouble."
He couldn't precisely sense how many ferocious beasts had come and silently prayed the worst had not arrived.
If all seven ferocious beasts of the Star Dou Forest were here, a single Super Douluo—indeed, even if the entire Sea God Pavilion elder council gathered—might not hold.
Each one was a being beyond the Super Douluo level, with the power to level a city.
A strange silence settled over the battlements.
Only the wind moaned through gun barrels like a dirge of the dead, braiding with the distant thunder of pounding paws to play a prelude of despair between heaven and earth.
Every soldier heard their heart hammering, as if it would burst free of their chest.
The soul beast army advanced like a black tide with practiced cadence, the ground quaking beneath.
Overhead, the "storm cloud" spread with the tide.
It was a weather-change born of ferocious beast aura—dense soul power twisting the light, slicing sunlight into broken shards. An omen of the end.
It was clearly psychological warfare.
By a relentless approach and pressure, they were grinding down the garrison's will.
The ferocious beasts knew war. They intended to break the defenders' resolve before the first blow.
As the distance closed, the tide grew ever more terrifying.
Even battle-hardened soul master elites turned pale.
Some swallowed unconsciously, hands trembling around their weapons, knuckles whitening with strain.
Ordinayry soldiers—non–soul masters—breathed fast. Sweat beaded on their brows.
If not for muscle memory honed by years of ruthless training, some would have already broken and fled.
For sheer mental fortitude—holding the line under such pressure—Shrek's garrison surpassed any regular army on the continent.
These were no ordinary wild beasts but tens of thousands of soul beasts—the weakest with a century of cultivation, able to face a human Grandmaster head-on.
Millennium beasts were legion; ten-thousand-year beasts not few.
Without fifty-meter walls and arrays of powerful soul tools, these ordinary soldiers would have no right to stand here at all.
For without soul power, even fully armed, one might fall to a mere decade-old soul beast.