Cultivation is just so scientific! Chapter 1686 - 889: Long-Range Assault (Part 2)

Five practitioners at the Nascent Soul Middle Stage soared toward the area, eager to investigate the incident.

Due to the earlier occurrences, they remained highly vigilant and on high alert.

It's really tragic that the Yuzhu Islands can't dispatch even a single Great Cultivator anymore.

Before those five Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioners neared the location, the ’Traceless Illusion Sword’ emerged from nothingness and slew them all in an instant.

The actions of the five Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioners caught the notice of people on the Yuzhu Islands. When their demise was spotted, the grand formation there blared its warning alarm.

Disturbed yet again, the half-step Great Power dispatched a strand of his consciousness to scan the exterior conditions.

Once more, he detected Li Shiming concealed ten miles distant. He wavered, uncertain if striking at Li Shiming was wise.

The Divine Foot Skill of Li Shiming proved exceedingly problematic. Should he launch an assault, failure to connect seemed almost certain.

Only if Li Shiming ventured into a specific proximity could he deploy the Cave Heaven to restrain him, blocking the Divine Foot Skill's use, and thus ensuring Li Shiming's certain death.

From Li Shiming’s behavior, however, it was clear he was sly and refused to draw near the Yuzhu Islands.

Moreover, Li Shiming executed the Divine Foot Skill at astonishing velocity. In the prior strike, even at speeds inescapable for a peak Great Cultivator, Li Shiming dodged with ease.

Yuzhu Islands cultivators observed their ancestor refraining from engaging the foe this time, permitting the three Great Cultivators and five Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioners to die beyond the island.

This baffled them greatly. Although the fall site of the Great Cultivators and Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioners lay somewhat removed from the Yuzhu Islands—a span vast for ordinary folk yet reachable for Great Cultivators—it remained inside a half-step Great Power's striking range.

Panic gripped them, and following yet another barrage, those cultivators who meant to remain opted to depart.

Business-operating cultivators loaded their wares aboard a Flying Boat and fled the island.

These were no suicidal fools. They flaunted emblems from diverse factions to reveal their affiliations.

Li Shiming failed to identify those faction emblems, yet he held back from assaulting such cultivators.

His sole task was to eliminate any cultivators harboring hostile aims.

No malice emanated from these escaping cultivators, as he perceived.

Once the initial batch of cultivators departed unscathed, a growing tide of cultivators started evacuating the Yuzhu Islands.

Numerous cultivators lacked the prowess for distant voyages, yet lingering on the Yuzhu Islands posed greater peril, compelling them to flee as well.

Sea-borne hazards could be confronted later, as they arose.

Watching the exodus of cultivators from the Yuzhu Islands swell, Li Shiming pondered briefly before drawing forth a ’Sun Shooting Bow’. He had crafted this bow-and-arrow magic weapon for late-stage Golden Corpses, drawing from the Sun-Shooting Sect’s ’Sun Shooting Technique’.

Ranking as a spiritual treasure, the ’Sun Shooting Bow’ needed no ownership bond for late-stage Golden Corpses to wield it.

Pulling back the ’Sun Shooting Bow’, the colossal might honed via the ’Heavenly Human Technique’—boasting matchless force—channeled into propelling arrows through the bow.

Those arrows consisted of energy-converged projectiles from the ’Sun Shooting Bow’, embodying a secret artifact-forging method detailed in the ’Sun Shooting Technique’.

A common Great Cultivator's strike over ten miles would surely falter, though an archery-savvy Great Cultivator stood as a glaring outlier.

Such extreme long-distance assault tactics were scarce in the Cultivation World, typically reserved for surprise raids; against wary foes, long-range hits rarely succeeded.

Li Shiming loosed the arrow, which streaked from the ’Sun Shooting Bow’.

In a flash, the arrow traversed ten miles. In principle, the Yuzhu Islands’ grand formation's shield ought to have halted it.

Yet Li Shiming’s profound analysis of the Yuzhu Islands’ grand formation allowed the launched arrow to inexplicably slip past the shield unblocked upon contact.

On the primary island, a Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioner directing others in rubble clearance abruptly burst apart, his Nascent Soul bursting free.

In utter dread, the Nascent Soul gazed upon his ruined flesh, clueless to the cause until the impact struck.

Alarmed shrieks erupted from the main island, spreading to other isles, as cultivators descended into frenzied chaos.

Li Shiming paused for ten breaths before drawing the ’Sun Shooting Bow’ anew, picking out a fresh target—yet another Nascent Soul Middle Stage cultivator.

The arrow whistled forth, blasting apart the body of that Nascent Soul Middle Stage practitioner once more.

At long last, the half-step Great Power lurking inside the Cave Heaven could no longer stomach Li Shiming’s rampage. A formidable aura surged from the central island, chased by a blazing energy beam hurtling straight at Li Shiming.

This assault’s velocity rivaled the pace of Li Shiming’s arrows loosed from the ’Sun Shooting Bow’.

Regrettably, Li Shiming constantly held several brains primed for instant ’Leap Forward’ activation. Paired with his blistering reaction time, the moment he detected the intense energy erupting from the main island, he triggered ’Leap Forward’.

The horrifying energy beam sliced through the very spot where he had just blinked away. No matter its devastating might, an energy beam that struck nothing remained utterly futile.

Once the half-step Great Power’s strike concluded, Li Shiming materialized back at the ten-mile range and nocked the ’Sun Shooting Bow’ again.

Yuzhu Islands cultivators, witnessing their ancestor’s onslaught, broke into excited cheers.

But those cheers cut off sharply as the ancestor’s attack whiffed once more.

Next, an arrow skewered another Nascent Soul Middle Stage cultivator, his form erupting into a bloody fog, his Nascent Soul alone left to unleash a piercing shriek.

Though the Yuzhu Islands teemed with cultivators—including more than a hundred Nascent Soul Middle Stage experts—their total helplessness to counter or even block the strikes left them unable to hold out any longer.

They refused to show themselves out in the open anymore, all scurrying into buildings for cover.

From a distance, across the Yuzhu Islands’ thirty-six isles, not a single cultivator remained visible.

Li Shiming felt no rush. His following arrow locked onto a building.

The dread arrow vaporized the structure in a flash, and right at impact, he unleashed a ’Sun Shooting Technique’ secret art to diffuse the arrow’s force outward, shattering the entire building beneath colossal pressure.

One after another, he razed buildings, sending the cultivators within fleeing in terror to duck into others.

In the midst of this, the half-step Great Power fired off two more assaults, the final one clearly diminished in the energy beam’s potency.

After those two strikes, regardless of how Li Shiming hammered the buildings or picked off cultivators, the half-step Great Power launched no further attacks.

Unseen within the Cave Heaven, the half-step Great Power’s face drained to ashen pallor. The Cave Heaven’s void churned with ever-shifting colors, thunderous booms rumbling sporadically.

This Cave Heaven’s realm stretched enormously vast, its laws mostly intact. Exactly as Li Shiming had suspected, it proved an Inheritance Cave Heaven.

During one of his wanderings, the half-step Great Power had stumbled upon a concealed space gate on a barren island, opening the way to the Cave Heaven anchored to that empty isle.

By delving into the Cave Heaven, he unearthed its backstory. It had once been tied to a super sect, which lost a great power’s legacy, compounded by a ruthless enemy invasion,

In the end, the sect triggered its own mountain gate’s destruction, leaving just a core sliver of the bound Cave Heaven adrift in the wilds, its hidden Inheritance Cave Heaven unknown to the world.

This half-step Great Power concealed his Inheritance Cave Heaven treasure there, forging the Yuzhu Islands through his overwhelming might, and grew the tiny anchored island into today’s grand main island.

Absent Li Shiming’s arrival, backed by the half-step Great Power’s destiny, the Yuzhu Islands might have soon transformed into the Jade Pearl Sect—and with a great power in its midst, the Jade Pearl Sect could have skyrocketed to super force status in mere years.

The half-step Great Power tried calming the Cave Heaven Energy, yet this round’s violent turmoil proved too fierce, inflicting severe backlash upon him.