Beastmaster of the Ages

"Do you have a brain tumor or something?! Now do you finally see his power?!" Jiang Qingliu slapped Qing Zi on the head, causing her to fall and bleed from her nose. Though she was angered, she could only endure. "Fuck off back to the sect and stop embarrassing yourself. Do you think I, of all people, wouldn't know the power of my own disciple?!"

Qing Zi had been completely humiliated. The others around her were angered, but dared not voice their complaints.

"Listen up! Yu Ziqian deserves everything he gets! Backstabbing him because of your own envy isn't what a disciple of the head instructor should do! And to think you were even trying to knock down my reputation as well... hehe...."

Faced with his angry glare, the disciples of the head instructor could only hold their heads low. Yu Ziqian's counter was the perfect move to play, leaving Qing Zi no choice but to head back to the sect.

"Let's hope that he's able to do half of what he was able to today at the Voidsky Realm. Otherwise we'll become everyone's laughingstock," Qing Zi said, glaring at Yu Ziqian before leaving.

"Get out of my sight," Yu Ziqian said. After this clash, his reputation had soared even more.

"The chief disciple could potentially join the Sky Palace! He won't split hairs with people like that."

"Qing Zi's envy is too strong. I bet there's many others in the sect that are pining for the Sky Palace as well."

"A genius with a famous master is sure to inspire envy!"

"Let's hope that the chief disciple will school them when the time comes."

......

After the commotion, Yu Ziqian looked a little worn out.

"What's up?" Tianming asked with a hushed voice.

"You want to hear the truth?" Yu Ziqian said.

"Yes."

"To protect myself and my reputation, I ruined my pill gate by utilizing the energy early. That means my power will start to weaken when the Voidsky Realm opens. If I perform too badly, both my master and I will be in trouble with the sect. These years, I've asked for far too much from the sect and many people are waiting for me to fail."

"Alright. When the time comes, I'll protect you."

"It's pointless. The sect's expectations of me are too high."

"Well... you kinda deserved it," Tianming said.

"Damn! All I can do now is to soothe my troubles with my junior's warmth and beauty!"

"Ugh... scram!"

......

Even now, Tianming was still reeling from the vastness of Orderia. The space around here was also much more stable than in the lower levels of the cosmic aether. This kind of stability slowed the speed of all living beings, so it took another ten or so days for the qilin to finally reach the Voidsky Realm.

"I was planning to bid these people farewell when we arrived, but we ended up being Azuresoul Palace disciples instead."

Now, they were in the same boat. Tianming looked toward the horizon from the top of the qilin's body. After passing through countless mountains and valleys, the mysterious Voidsky Realm was finally in sight.

The sky of Orderia was covered in flaming clouds about ten thousand meters thick. In most places, they were rather stable; however, the flaming clouds above the Voidsky Realm formed into a gigantic flaming vortex. At the center of the vortex was a flaming tornado about a million meters tall. It was a pillar of flame that pierced straight through the Voidsky Realm. Perhaps that was the reason for the place's name. The flaming pillar connected the sky and earth of Orderia. The hole left by the flaming clouds sucked in by the vortex made it seem like the 'sky' was nowhere to be seen there.

"This is the legendary Voidsky Flame Pillar!"

"That's right. Is this your first time seeing it, Junior?"

"Yes. If we traveled here ourselves, it would've taken far too long."

"The Voidsky Flame Pillar is the source of the nova source. It's the place where the fundamental cosmic force of the sun is most concentrated. Every moment, divine patterns and nova source spring forth from there and fill the flaming clouds in the sky, which then spread to the rest of the world."

"During the previous nova source pulses, this pillar doubled in size. That's no doubt the most beautiful sight in all of Orderia."

"Look! The Voidsky Realm is below the Voidsky Flame Pillar. The Sky Palace is somewhere in there!"

"The competition is about to start soon!"

The disciples looked at the pillar in awe. The light from the pillar illuminated the burning passion in their eyes.

"There's so many people next to the pillar!"

"Of course. There's at least a billion participants, and ten times the number of spectators."

"Look at all those lifebound beasts!"

"Wow, there's one with more than seven thousand stars. Who does it belong to?"

"No idea. There are too many powerful people."

Even disciples that had spent their life in Orderia were stunned by the sheer scale, let alone Tianming and the rest who were seeing this for the first time. The Voidsky Flame Pillar continued spinning, letting out a strong gust that droned out a lot of noise.

Tianming came to understand how the pillar was formed as he listened to the disciples talk. If this was the place with the densest nova source, that meant the Sky Palace enjoyed the privilege of cultivating in the best location on the sun! On the opposite side of the sun, there must be another such pillar in the territory of the celestial orderians.

The Voidsky Flame Pillar was far too impactful a sight to see. However, Tianming was more impressed by the countless other races surrounding the pillar. As the celestial orderians wouldn't come to this place, it was filled with beastmasters. Given how vast the sun was, lifebound beasts here didn't have the habit of staying within their lifebound spaces, so they filled the entire area. There were beasts of all kinds of shapes and sizes, some larger than the azuresky qilin and others as small as Ying Huo. Even mythical beasts like phoenixes, qilins, dragons, and black tortoises were all over. There were also many beasts of calamity, like taoties, taowus, hydras, and bifangs. There were many feline, fishlike, and insectoid beasts, as well as plant-type beasts.