Blackened and devastated, the entire battlefield, combined with the gloomy sky, seemed to narrate a painting of tragedy and death.
Millions of Shadow Beasts and Shadow Soldiers, battling each other, seemed, in the end, to exist only to compose a chaotic battle serenade, adding the final touch to a tragic composition called: War.
And at the center of the northwestern zone of the camp, the Shadow King, only at the perfection of the Soul Formation, cautiously circled the gigantic rhinoceros king, who by its aura did not seem far from reaching the advanced stage of a sixth-level beast—an appalling difference in realms.
The rhinoceros king snorted through its bulbous nose as it lowered its head, pointing its nasal horn straight toward the enemy. Its crimson eyes stared deeply at the Shadow King.
If it were a being with consciousness, it would probably have its guard relatively low, underestimating an enemy one realm below. But as a corrupted beast, without consciousness, the only thing guiding it was instinct, and those instincts told it to take the enemy before it seriously.
But as for circling around and finding weaknesses in the small ant before it, it was not that kind of beast.
A loud roar echoed from the creature. Its legs, like hills, crushed the ground as it charged with extreme ferocity toward the Shadow King.
Its black horn shone with a gray light, making the surrounding void tremble, and then, with a violent swing of its head, another devastating slash was unleashed.
Prepared this time, the Shadow King dodged and immediately commanded his soldiers to do the same, even before the strike was released, resulting in far fewer casualties than before.
Even so, such a devastating blow was not easy to evade, and many soldiers perished. But most of the damage, in the end, was borne by the Shadow Beasts themselves that were in the path without being prepared to dodge, being instantly torn apart.
The Shadow King, controlled by Aotian with the highest concentration of minds, had already avoided the beast long ago, even having time to shift from evasion to attack, and immediately his spear sliced through the air, piercing straight toward the mountain-sized rhinoceros's eye.
Unfortunately, the enormous creature's reaction speed was extremely fast, and it managed to close its eyes in time, preventing the piercing by relying on its powerful steel-like skin.
Sparks once again flew into the sky, leaving only a shallow cut on the creature's eyelid.
Kicking the air after the failed attack, the Shadow King flew upward once more, avoiding the headbutt that was like a moving mountain charging at him with ferocity.
Dodging and landing atop the creature's head, which began to thrash about with him on it, the Shadow King raised his spear to pierce the opponent's skull—which, for some reason, did not shrink its gigantic body, making the fight harder for itself.
But just as he was about to attack, the Shadow King was startled and immediately leaped off the rhinoceros's back upon feeling powerful impurities beginning to devour his legs, where he had made contact with the beast.
His eyes narrowed seriously. As a shadow, he was incredibly resistant to impurities for some reason, but the impurities of a Void Refinement creature's body still seemed beyond his capacity.
Still in the air after the jump, the Shadow King calmly watched the rhinoceros turn toward him and swing its horn once more with unrestrained violence.
It was as if it had already expected him not to remain on its body and had already prepared to attack.
This made Aotian admire the creature. It might not have full consciousness, but guided by bestial instincts, it was still a monster in combat.
Unfortunately, because of this, it seemed that with this missed opportunity, the beast would not allow such an easy approach next time.
But Aotian had no time to think about that, for the attack was coming.
As the blow had been launched with such precise timing, it was about to strike the Shadow King, who had no time to dodge, since the beast's speed was countless times greater than his, even with its enormous size.
And at the exact moment the strike was about to be directed at his body, another even more terrible attack suddenly came from another direction.
A huge black arrow flew like a meteor, striking the rhinoceros king squarely on the head, causing it to veer to the side, even lifting its massive body off the ground by several meters.
The sudden attack caused the horn strike to be harmlessly thrown toward the sky, while the creature's body toppled to the side.
With the fall, thousands of Shadow Beasts below that failed to escape in time ended up being crushed under the weight of their king, before a great cloud of dust rose into the sky amid intense earth tremors.
But the beast did not remain fallen for even an instant, and soon violently shook itself, raising its enormous body that made the ground tremble, supported by legs that looked more like massive pillars. This prevented Aotian from continuing to attack the fallen creature.
When it rose, it was noticeable on its face that the rhinoceros king now bore a large black mark that crossed the entire side of its enormous nose. Although the color was the same as its body, the cut was deep, and blood continuously poured from the wound, falling to the ground in drops the size of buckets.
A cold, mad hatred shone in its crimson eyes, staring not at the Shadow King, but at the three hundred thousand shadow soldiers who had just arrived and spread out in all directions, surrounding it.
In particular, it focused on the three thousand who remained together in the direction from which the attack had come.
From each of them, it sensed a threat not much smaller than that of the Shadow King. Especially when they were together, the danger was even greater.
And indeed, those three thousand shadow soldiers, of different levels and cultivation realms, were directly controlled by Aotian, with the black arrow being a magic they used together to injure the beast.
'It's a pity that my shadow soldiers, created by my necromancy, can't use elemental magic like the shadows that the inner elders can control.'
Aotian sighed as he stared unblinkingly at the threatening rhinoceros king.
Yes, the shadows could not manipulate elements within their own bodies, since they did not possess dantians, spiritual roots, or elemental affinities like a real body would.
But they possessed a special manipulable energy that, when used to fuel non-elemental spells, created shadow-element techniques, such as the shadow arrow used to injure the beast.
Other spells could also be used, since the very air of the world was filled with elements that could be manipulated both by spiritual energy and by this special energy.
But whether for shadows or normal cultivators, manipulating the elements present in the air to create spells was far more laborious and slow than using the elements of one's own elemental affinity.
Not only was the spell's power reduced, but its casting speed was also roughly halved. If an element opposite to one's natural affinity were used, the penalty would be even greater.
This was, in fact, one of the first lessons about the cultivation world that Rihai taught Aotian at the beginning of their relationship.
As for the shadow element, Aotian was still studying it, and so far had not discovered how to create and fully master it. But he had already learned some of its characteristics, such as the fact that it seemingly suffered restriction from the fire element and, especially, from its derivative, the lightning element.
Thus, when he directly controlled the shadow soldiers, he focused on using physical techniques and non-elemental spells, which ended up becoming shadow-element techniques in their hands.
This, combined with the special rules he still did not understand that dictated how the Shadow Soldiers functioned, made it so he could not control their bodies and the special energy within them with full efficiency.
Fortunately, this energy seemed to share the principles of spiritual energy, and because of that he could still manifest his spells with limited power.
It was because of all these reasons that Aotian said he could not apply even 50% of his strength in each shadow he controlled… but for now, it was enough.
The Shadow King suddenly rushed toward the Rhinoceros King and brandished his fiery spear, unleashed through spear intent that was unaffected by the special energy of his body, against the beast's already-penetrated hide.
But the rhinoceros king snorted and violently shook its head, preventing the insect from approaching its wound.
Its horn lit up, and it released a massive slash of energy, forcing the Shadow King to retreat, while the attack also fell upon those three thousand soldiers, who were busy gathering another combined attack.
In that same instant, the two attacks met, and the rhinoceros king's slash ended up overpowering the attack that was still being accumulated, only slowing slightly—just enough for most of the shadows to dodge—before cleaving it in half and continuing forward unimpeded.
Even so, nearly two hundred shadows were destroyed in that brief moment. A sixth-level beast would normally require more than one Void Refinement cultivator of the same level to be taken down. And now, the shadows were not even in that realm, nor at that level, which was further worsened by the fact that Aotian could not exert his full power.
Yet, as soon as the two hundred shadow soldiers were destroyed, another two hundred, among the three hundred thousand waiting, arrived.
Aotian did not intend to have the outer soldiers, who were not directly manipulated by one of his minds, attack. He would simply let them wait until one of those he controlled was destroyed, and then take control of another to return to the fight.
'Well, it's a bit low of me to do this, but desperate times call for desperate measures.'
Deep down, he thought that, but this was not the time to reflect on justice with a corrupted beast.
Spinning his spear, the Shadow King attacked again, aiming at the rhinoceros king's wound.
However, the beast was extremely strong, managing to protect itself most of the time, never allowing the Shadow King to approach or stay atop its body, and still finding opportunities to attack the soldiers at a distance.
Thus, the battle went on, and the number of fallen soldiers kept rising. Two hundred… five hundred… one thousand… five thousand… ten thousand… twenty thousand… one hundred thousand.
At times, Aotian would even directly abandon the three thousand soldiers he was controlling to take control of another three thousand coming from a different angle and unleash an attack, but after the first time, the rhinoceros king became more cautious of attacks coming from different directions.
The beast even tried to destroy the reserve soldiers that were not being controlled, but when it began to do so, it realized it would receive a devastating blow from its attackers, who only needed a bit of time to condense an attack.
But it was not the rhinoceros king who was gaining the advantage, for its body was already covered in bloody wounds, and enormous craters tore through its flesh from different directions.
Yet even as it snorted in exhaustion and pain, the rhinoceros king still remained standing, and even its wounds were slowly regenerating.
The Shadow King, meanwhile, remained upright, spear in hand, not even panting, as if he did not know fatigue. And he did not.
As a being truly made of shadows, the Shadow King did not feel exhaustion, but in exchange, he could not cultivate or grow stronger like other living beings. At least, Aotian had not yet discovered a way to strengthen them.
He had tried many things, such as cultivation, shadow fusion, pouring energy from one into another, and even using the equivalent exchange ability on them, but nothing worked.
Spinning the spear skillfully in his hand, the Shadow King's eyes narrowed.
It was time to end this.
Charging forward, his steps left the ground, and he threw himself toward the exhausted beast, which still had no intention of retreating.
The rhinoceros king snorted in anger, as the Shadow King was the most annoying fly there. At no point in the battle had he caused real damage, but that was only because the rhinoceros king did not allow it, as its instincts still screamed at it to be cautious of him.
Thus, in the face of his attack, the beast's great horn, still unscathed, shone once more, and just as it was about to unleash the blow as it had countless times before, something changed.
Tearing through the black clouds of the sky, another gigantic and oppressive beast appeared, and immediately descended in an instant, flying straight down and coiling around the rhinoceros king with flexibility and agility, like a black serpent.
One moment it was in the sky, the next it was already completely wrapped around the beast, finally revealing its identity—a massive shadow dragon.
Its front claws then tightly grabbed the rhinoceros king's head, catching it by surprise. Its draconic head lowered, staring into those red eyes with its completely black ones, its mouth widening, and then…
Roaaar!!
A terrifying roar, like echoing thunder, erupted from the dragon's jaws, striking the rhinoceros king point-blank with its deafening sound waves.
The skies shook, and the rhinoceros king's pupils shrank like needles, its body freezing completely as the gathered attack on its horn dissipated under the oppressive force of the king of beasts' roar.
At that same instant, the Shadow King also arrived and, without caring about the dragon, pierced straight into the wound on the rhinoceros king's face, created at the beginning of the battle and now almost closed.
But the size was still sufficient for the relatively small body of the Shadow King to enter, and without delay, his spear carved a path as his body disappeared into the interior of the beast, which was far softer than its powerful hide.
However, when the rhinoceros king felt the pain of something piercing and invading the inside of its body, it immediately awoke from the shock caused by the roar, terrified, and began to struggle furiously to break free from the dragon's grip.
Even shaken, wounded, and exhausted, its strength was still greater than the dragon's, and cracks began to appear on the body of the creature imprisoning it.
Fortunately, it was at this moment that reinforcements arrived.
Black tentacles suddenly emerged from the ground, rising and coiling around the rhinoceros's massive legs, strangling its entire body in place with tremendous force, even greater than the dragon's, preventing it from thrashing too much.
But even this would not last long, as they too were being broken rapidly… but in the end, they did not need to last.
The beast struggled for only a few moments before freezing with its eyes wide open, becoming completely motionless.
As if confirming something, the shadow dragon immediately let go of the rhinoceros beast and roared in victory, its roar shaking the battlefield.
It then flew into the skies, returning to swim among the clouds. On its body, however, it was possible to see burns caused by impurities, as well as cracks created by the rhinoceros king's brute force while fighting against confinement.
Even though it had participated for such a short time, its body was still heavily damaged.
The black tentacles also released moments later, and as soon as they did, the motionless rhinoceros king seemed to lose its support, toppling forward like a collapsing mountain, smashing into the ground with an intense tremor that reverberated for several seconds even at a distance, raising an enormous cloud of dust.
Silence fell over the area devastated by ravines stretching for kilometers and craters where small cities could be built.
And from the beast's body, which slowly revealed itself as the dust settled, there was no further movement, neither from outside… nor from within.
The Shadow King, after destroying the rhinoceros king's brain with his last strength, also perished, consumed by the intense impurities within the Shadow Beast.
At last, his shadow body fragmented—disappearing into nothing.