Under the attraction of the Heaven Gate Key, Nie Tian slowly rose into the air.
OWWW! ROAAAR!
World-shaking howls echoed out of the enormous spacial rifts. It seemed that demons from some unknown land outside the realm were madly summoning their kind.
Even denser purple-black mist rolled out from the spacial rifts, and flowed into the Realm of Flame Heaven.
The demons that had been sealed in the Hell sect for countless years had never given up on escaping. Their originally shriveled bodies expanded rapidly after receiving the nourishment from the purple-black mist.
As Nie Tian was pulled into the air towards the Heaven Gate, he saw a demon that was originally only several dozen meters long rapidly expanded to about fifty meters long.
All of a sudden, that demon tore apart the long chains that had bound it, and broke free of the Hell sect’s imprisonment.
At the same time, a large number of enormous swords that were flickering with multicolored light instantly slashed down from midair!
CRACKLE!
The swollen demon was instantly cut into sizable pieces by the broad, long swords.
Nie Tian floated there aghast. “Are they dead?”
However, it was just a second before his eyes widened even more.
Not a single drop of blood spewed out of the demon’s torn body, and the chunks of flesh seemed to remain their vitality.
Each and every piece continued to squirm about, and rise into the sky, and eventually entered the spacial rifts where monstrous roars constantly echoed out.
Nie Tian was dumbstruck. “Even that didn’t kill it?!”
If it were a human Qi warrior like him, it would have died the moment its body was cut apart.
However, the demon maintained a vigorous life force, and even managed to escape after being cut into pieces.
Nie Tian’s expression turned incomparably serious and grim. “These demons…”
He suddenly began to feel a bit fearful towards those indigenous residents of the Realm of Flame Heaven.
As Li Fan’s former comments struck him, a strange expression suddenly appeared in Nie Tian’s eyes.
These strong and terrifying creatures had once dominated the Realm of Flame Heaven.
However, under the attacks of the human Qi warriors, these strong creatures had eventually lost, and been sealed within the Hell sect as prisoners for thousands of years.
What was the deeper meaning?
The truly strong human Qi warriors had never been blithely trampled upon by anyone, even outsider creatures that strong!
When Qiao Yang, master of the Hell sect, saw the demons breaking free from the constraints of the Demon Trapping Purgatory Formation, his face turned as cold as ice as he shouted, “From now on, all sects of the Realm of Flame Heaven shall prepare yourselves for possible counterattacks by the demons!”
The expressions of everyone who was being pulled towards the Heaven Gate turned grim as they all felt a great burden weighing on their mind.
From Qiao Yang’s words, they heard a frightening piece of information: the demons might return and attack the Realm of Flame Heaven in the near future!
According to Li Fan, the truly strong demons that had dominated the Heaven Leaving Domain in the past had long since been killed by the extremely strong Qi warriors.
The ones that had been imprisoned within the Hell sect were only the weak ones, which were nothing to be feared.
Now that thousands of years had passed, many changes had taken place and reshaped the Realm of Flame Heaven, leaving only the seven major sects, with the Hell sect being the strongest.
Most of the strong Qi warriors, who had previously descended to the Realm of Flame Heaven to fight the demons, had already passed away, and the remaining ones seemed to have long since left the realm.
With the current strength of the seven sects in the Realm of Flame Heaven, would they still have what it took to contend with the powerful demons from the other realms?
With these thoughts, Nie Tian looked over at Qiao Yang’s grim face, and couldn’t help but start to worry.
He worried about those who were currently in Black Cloud City, and he worried about Nie Donghai, Nie Qian, and the juniors who he felt connected to, such as Pan Tao and Nie Xian.
He constantly had the feeling that when he tempered himself through bloody battles in the Realm of Flame Heaven, Heaven-shaking, Earth-toppling changes would occur in the Realm of Flame Heaven.
Suddenly, Hua Mu’s words struck him.
Hua Mu had once said that omens would present themselves in the realms where a Heaven Gate would appear, such as the escape of the Earth Flame Beast.
Furthermore, even more huge changes would strike the Realm of Flame Heaven, one after another.
The invasion of the outer-realm demons might be a possible aftereffect that Hua Mu had spoken about…
CRUNCH!
The sound of bones shattering suddenly echoed out from the Heaven Gate entrance.
“What the hell are you doing?” Zheng Bin from the Mystic Mist sect suddenly let out a piercing shout.
Nie Tian snapped back from his reverie and stopped staring at the majestic city of the Hell sect and the demons that were breaking free from their shackles, but rather focused all his attention on the Heaven Gate that he was gradually approaching.
In front of the shining Heaven Gate entrance, a cunning smile appeared on the corner of a Greater Heaven stage outer-realm expert’s mouth.
They had already reached the entrance of the Heaven Gate, but it seemed that they weren’t in a hurry to enter the Heaven Gate. Instead, they suddenly started to attack other participants.
A Heaven stage Qi warrior from the Mystic Mist sect had his head chopped off by one of the foreign Qi warriors when he approached the entrance.
In the next moment, the headless corpse of the Mystic Mist sect disciple dropped to the ground.
Faces pale and ghastly, all the trial takers from the seven sects, who were floating increasingly close to the Heaven Gate, looked at those foreign Qi warriors with disbelief.
None of them expected that killings would break out even before they stepped into the Heaven Gate.
They were still in the Realm of Flame Heaven!
Those foreign Qi warriors had actually dared to defy the laws and principles in front of the hosts, without giving any face to Qiao Yang and the Hell sect.
“How dare you!!” Qiao Yang roared, fuming with wrath.
The murderer was a slender man who carried a longsword that was wreathed in green flames. He let out a low laugh and said, “Senior Qiao, the rebellion of the demons has just started. Soon, the demons, who have already received those demons, will be able to obtain the accurate location of the Realm of Flame Heaven. Coming next, demons that are even stronger than those ones will flood your realm.
“Their arrival will turn the Realm of Flame Heaven into a hell on earth.
“By the time we come out of the Heaven Gate, the seven sects of your realm might have already been annihilated.
“Perhaps even you won’t be around by that time, Senior Qiao. Do we need to give face to a dead man?”
With these words, he laughed loudly and stepped into the Heaven Gate, disappearing in the blink of an eye.
The other participants from the other domains also had their faces full of mockery, as if they felt that the rebellion of the demons would completely reshape the Realm of Flame Heaven, and by the time they had returned, not a single one of the seven sects would still be there.
The ones that would replace the seven sects and take over the Realm of Flame Heaven would either be the mad, bloodthirsty demons, or…the powerful cultivators who didn’t have a Heaven Gate open in their realm. Whichever happened, they would no longer need to be afraid of angering the Hell sect, or suffering from Qiao Yang’s wrath.
In front of the Heaven Gate, a fat Qi warrior from the Realm of Earth Sieve grinned and let out a loud laugh as he said, “Senior Qiao, I bet great experts from the Realm of Earth Sieve told you about the omens that would come along with the appearance of the Heaven Gate, but didn’t tell you that the opening of the Heaven Gate would cause the Demon Trapping Purgatory Formation to lose effect and cause those imprisoned demons to escape, did they?
“But we always knew that the opening of a Heaven Gate would cause such terrifying upheavals.
“Numerous outside forces have been drooling over the Realm of Flame Heaven and waiting for the right moment to make a move.
“You thought the opening of the Heaven Gate was a great fortune to your realm, but the truth is that it’s an opportunity for us that only comes around once in a thousand years.
“As soon as those demons from the outside realms wipe out the seven sects, we’ll take the Realm of Flame Heaven from their hands.
“Even if you were to win by chance, you would be too weak to stop us.
“One way or another, the Realm of Flame Heaven is going to see new masters. You had better be prepared for that.”
After he finished speaking, the fat Qi warrior turned around and prepared to enter the Heaven Gate.
Standing on the majestic city with an ashen face, Qiao Yang shouted, “Kill him!”
Upon hearing his order, every expert of the Hell sect close to the Heaven Gate, including Zhao Haifeng and Duan Yuan, lunged forward in an attempt to kill him.
“What’s the rush? All of you will die in the Heaven Gate.” The fat Qi warrior gave a cold harrumph, completely ignored their attacks, and disappeared into the Heaven Gate.
After he left, the remaining foreign cultivators stared coldly at the participants from the Realm of Flame Heaven, and said, “We’ll be waiting for you all in there.”
Every one of them grinned with vicious smiles and disappeared into the Heaven Gate, as if they didn’t attach any importance to the trial takers from the Realm of Flame Heaven.
Meanwhile, Li Fan and Liu Yan’s expressions turned especially grim.
The things that the foreign cultivators had said made them almost tremble with fear.
The Realm of Flame Heaven… would be attacked by dreadful demons from other realms or domains, while powerful Qi warriors from the realms where Heaven Gates didn’t appear would just sit back and wait for the right moment to take over the Realm of Flame Heaven?
By the time they returned from the Heaven Gate, what would the Realm of Flame Heaven be like?
They simply couldn’t believe it.
“We’re not leaving!” An expert from the Hell sect shouted. “We’ll stay and fight against the demons!”
“Fuck the Heaven Gate!
“We’re not going!”
After realizing what would happen to their realm, all the Heaven Gate key holders of the seven sects let out angry roars and used all their power to negate the pulling of the Heaven Gate Key.
They all decided to give up on entering the Heaven Gate.
With a cold snort, Qiao Yang blurted, “Get in there! And kill those bastards from the other realms! None of you have reached the Worldly realm, so it’ll do us no good if you stay here! You might as well make breakthroughs within the mysterious dimension in the Heaven Gate. When you return with cultivation bases that are higher than the three Heaven stages, you might be able to do your part to defend the Realm of Flame Heaven.
“Now get in there! All of you!”
BOOM!
At that very moment, an even stronger suction force came from the Heaven Gate.
It seemed that the Heaven Gate was tired of waiting.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH! WHOOSH!
Everyone who had been trying their best to resist the influence, including Nie Tian, was pulled into the Heaven Gate by an overwhelming force.