Sage Monarch (Sage Emperor)

Thanks to the Devil-Louse Godrot Banner, venomous pests flowed toward them like water as they proceeded through the forest. And thanks to the influx, the banners grew stronger and stronger.

Inside the banners, the pests were fighting and devouring each other, causing the banners to grow with increasingly boundless devil light. Within that devil light were the pests that survived the carnage inside, who had grown larger and fiercer as a result.

“Simply marvelous!” Savage Dragon exclaimed. “Captain, these treasures actually make the venomous insects stronger!”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said casually. “The banners are like a hell for venomous pests. Not only do they absorb the insects, but they can be used offensively by driving the pests crazy and making them stronger. And when the venomous insects devour each other, they can eventually produce godrot lice. That said, forget about the godrot lice for now. You’ll need to refine the banners for a few thousand years or so, continually adding venomous insects during that time. Godrot lice are terrifying. They were originally created by the suzerains of hell to fight the legion of gods. They can even eat their way into the kingdom of gods, that’s how fierce they are. With them, you could easily fight and kill someone three or four levels above you.”

Thanks to the will and memories of the primeval infernal deities that he had in the God Legion Seal, he had insight into all sorts of terrifying treasures and techniques from the suzerains of hell.

Some of them were devil treasures that could be considered consummate and invincible.

Unfortunately, some things like that required a huge amount of resources, and sometimes more than a hundred million years of work to complete.

As for the Devil-Louse Godrot Banners, they could release godrot lice after about a few thousand years. But to make an army of them would take over a hundred million years.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need anything like that. He could accomplish a lot more by just focusing on his own cultivation.

Deep in the Endless Forest, venomous pests abounded, and the cries of wild beasts echoed amongst the enormous, ancient trees. Some of the trees flickered with demon light, indicating that they had gained souls, and even contained their own spatial dimensions.

Yang Qi wasn’t surprised at all by this. After all, he was in an immortal world now.

The Endless Forest was filled with tree-like Demonfolk who, in the mortal world, would be considered completely invincible.

Thankfully, Yang Qi and the Obliterators had the Devil-Louse Godrot Banners, which were intimidating even to the trees with souls.

As for the venomous pests, they weren’t afraid of death and would stream toward them in endless numbers. There were gold-headed centipedes, striped yin-yang scorpions, ten-legged spiders, ribbed wasps, ghost-face flies, hypertoxic lizards, and more. Even third stage Thought-Demolishers would have a hard time traversing a place like this and coming out on the other end alive.

But for Yang Qi and the Obliterators, the pests were like gold.

Each one they absorbed caused their banners to shine with more powerful devil light and made the trident-wielding fiend-devils seem more lifelike.

“So strong!” Brutal Tiger said as his banner sucked in countless venomous insects. The pests devoured each other, with some coming out on top and transforming on a genetic level. The newly formed pests were the size of a thumb and had nine heads, each of them the size of a grain of rice. Each head had a symbol on it written in script from the dao of devils. They read: death, entombment, toxin, corpse, corrode, rot, waste, ghost, misery.

The nine-headed pests had a hundred legs each, and a hundred wings. Furthermore, they were surrounded by toxic true energy that could melt space and consume human hearts.

They were none other than the most basic form of the godrot louse, although they weren’t even in the larval stage yet. That said, even this very initial form of the godrot louse was still extremely strong. After all, godrot lice larvae were terrifyingly fierce and ordinary immortals couldn’t even fight them.

Although they only contained a tiny portion of the true nature of the godrot louse, the five members of the Obliterators knew that their own fighting ability had already doubled because of them.

As for Yang Qi, he wasn’t spending time working on a Devil-Louse Godrot Banner. As he strode through the Endless Forest, he did his best to avoid the stronger demonlings to ensure that the trip went quickly and smoothly.

His Lord's Eye was open, revealing everything around him in complete detail.

At a certain point, something up ahead caught his attention. He saw a ring of towering totem poles, all of which pulsed with demon energy. Heaps of demonling corpses were piled up in front of them, and the entire place was awash with blood. And in the middle of the totem poles was a huge altar made from bones, decorated with complex totems. Unexpectedly, the totems on this altar were just like the designs on the altar in the Heaven’s Net Consortium. The only difference between the two was that this one had no primal-chaos elder-snake.

A glob of quintessence-blood floated in the air above the middle of this altar, quivering and pulsing with energy, looking like it might shoot up into the sky at any moment. Shockingly, the projected image of a megamammoth was visible within the blood.

A tremor passed through Yang Qi, and he thought, ‘That’s… one of the ancient Mammothfolk! That blood must be from some Demonfolk immortal. In fact, there’s even a slight Godmyth aura to it.’

With that, he drew as deeply as he could on his Lord's Eye.

There were cinnabar-garbed individuals surrounding the altar, and thanks to the Lord’s Eye, Yang Qi could not only see them clearly, he could also eavesdrop on their conversation.

“This quintessence-blood comes from the descendant of a godmammoth, one of the megamammoth patriarchs who reached the Godmyth level. After acquiring it, our lord used various magical techniques on it, all for the purpose of driving the demonlings of the Endless Forest completely mad.”

“Exactly. Megamammoths are one of the two main races that led the demon-devils of the past. They’re descendants of the godmammoth, who the legion of gods created to crush hells underfoot. The Sovereign Lord blessed them with immense power, so even a tiny drop of their blood can be used to command the horde of devils and the multitude of demons. Back when the Titan Emperor Heaven was founded, there was a set of ancient ruins in this location that the Endless Forest eventually overran. It’s been occupied by demonlings for years, so if we can whip them up into a frenzy and direct their fury, we could destroy countless cities in the vicinity. We might even be able to sow chaos in the Titan Emperor Heaven as a whole! Then, when the time is right, we’ll make our move and destroy this immortal world!”

“Yes. Certain ancient immortals set up warding magics in the Endless Forest to ensure that none of the demonlings born here could become intelligent, or band into organized groups. Instead, they would constantly be at each other’s throats, fighting and killing each other. We need to dismantle those immortal warding magics and allow the demonlings to gain intelligence. Then we can unleash them on the cities, and when the chaos spreads the headquarters of our Heaven’s Net Consortium can unleash Operation Devour Heaven.”

“Once Operation Devour Heaven is underway, we will have our chance to take the complete essence of this immortal world. And when the Titan Emperor Heaven is weak enough, our boundless lord will use the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour it, reaching the highest of cultivation levels.”

“By the way, I heard that some nobody in the imperial city has a few of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. What's the situation with that? Did we ever track him down?”

“Oh, it was an imperial clansman. Somehow, he found out that we have the snakecharms in the Heaven’s Net Consortium.”

“Well that’s nothing to take lightly. If the imperial clan finds out, it could completely ruin our plans.”

“Don’t worry, we have contingencies in place already. We sent some top experts to kill that brat and take his snakecharms. In fact, the end result will be that our plan will work even more effectively.”

“So, heaven is really helping us. Our lord has done everything very carefully, and although six hundred and sixty-six of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans should be enough, now we have some more being delivered right to our doorstep. How lucky!”

“Excellent. So, when will we perform the big sacrifice here? When will we drive the demonlings crazy and send them out to attack the immortal world?”

“It’s a dangerous undertaking. We need to make sure we’re fully prepared. What would happen if the demonlings turned on us?”

“Don’t worry about it. Our commander has an aura that will force everything from demonlings to the snakes, bugs, and rats to follow his commands. They won't attack us. In any case, we can’t activate the altar now. We need to wait until the wormhole opens and the lord sends us the god item we’re waiting for. That will be our ticket to destroying the warding magics protecting the Endless Forest.”

“Oh, we're waiting for a god item? It’s hard to believe that our lord would part with something like that. I wonder what it is.”

“It’s definitely a low-level god item. That said, I've heard it was forged by an expert from among the Mammothfolk, called the Protomammoth Flag. Our commander will use it to exert even more control over the demonlings after we destroy the warding magics. Wherever he points that flag is where they’ll attack.”

Yang Qi heard all of this discussion and more.

‘Awesome. Destroying this altar is going to be a windfall for me. I’ll get that quintessence-blood, which will be a huge boost to my energy arts, and will help purify my internal pellet. And who knows how incredible that Protomammoth Flag will be.’ Looking around at the surroundings, he issued orders to the Obliterators to get into places of concealment.

Unfortunately, because he was in an immortal world, he couldn’t summon armies of fiend-devils, which would have been the perfect strategy.

The magical laws protecting the immortal world were too strong, making it impossible to create passages to hell.