Poison God's Heritage Chapter 911: Turning Tide

Don Ma rocketed upwards like a meteor, moving faster than both sight and sound, arriving in an instant toward the center of the three First Borns. His ascent lacked any semblance of grace.

There was no elegance to his movement whatsoever. His body carved through the lower clouds in a violent, straight trajectory, leaving behind a cone of torn air and superheated vapor. The ground where he launched from fractured in a wide circle, and multiple cultivators nearby were cast from their feet despite the considerable distance.

The injured First Born rotated, its reaction too slow, though its numerous mouths gaped as if sensing the imminent threat.

Don Ma arrived like a fleeting afterimage, halting abruptly with his palm pressed against the creature’s form.

The touch of the entity that corrupted the heavenly Dao caused Don Ma’s arm to sizzle, but the pain was insignificant compared to what was about to transpire.

Initially, there was no explosion, which was the most terrifying aspect. The force infiltrated the First Born and vanished within it, absorbed by that moon-sized body in a silence so brief and absolute that my poisoned mind measured the infinitesimal gap between impact and consequence. Then, the creature’s flesh began to writhe.

The entire body of the creature convulsed as if struck by a fist in a water balloon, churning internally where the forces of inertia and momentum had no outlet.

Waves coursed through it from the point of contact, immense ripples distorting its pallid body as if it were liquid confined within a sac of skin. Its forward momentum faltered. It wasn’t stopped, not truly, but its trajectory was disrupted just enough to impede its descent.

In certain areas, however, the flesh proved too fragile. The contortions and churnings of its body were too potent for it to halt or resist the powers surging within. Consequently, they erupted outwards – pus, blood, and other unidentifiable fluids spewed from the wounded First Born, accompanied by a scream from its unholy maw that could shatter a soul and tear apart an ascendant cultivator’s body. The power was such that I observed the planet’s very atmosphere waver momentarily.

The other two First Borns continued their downward plunge, but the afflicted one lagged behind as its colossal body struggled to regain stability.

This action provided little in the way of killing it. Nor did it inflict significant damage.

It served one singular purpose.

Slowing it down.

That was sufficient.

For I will conclude what was wrongly initiated.

"I AM DU SHEN!" I bellowed as the Soulsteel poison, erupting from the mangled and decaying appendages, obeyed my will and command.

The words tore from my throat with more ferocity than dignity, but dignity held no place on this battlefield. The Queen’s severed limbs, those gargantuan rotten appendages strewn across Solarous like the butchered fragments of a dead continent, began to rupture. The poison contained within responded to me. Rivers, then lakes, then oceans of gray-black Soulsteel liquid surged forth. It carried pieces of flesh, bone, and corrupted tissue before dissolving them into itself. The stench became overwhelming, a noxious blend of molten metal, decaying corpses, bitter toxins, and something so frigid it stung the lungs.

"RISE FOR ME!" I roared once more. And it ascended.

A quantity of poison sufficient to shame the clouds, enough to blanket a celestial body of this vastness, enough to eclipse the light of a sun upon a world, and all of it rose from every corner of Solarous towards the heavens, towards the three moon-sized monstrosities.

The entirety of the battlefield plunged into darkness beneath the rising tide. Shadows stretched as the poison ascended from the ground in colossal columns, thousands merging into a single, impossible upward surge. It flowed like an ocean that had casually dismissed gravity.

The cultivators below gazed upwards with a mixture of horror and awe, many momentarily forgetting the Rakshasa still intent on their demise. The Suns took notice as well. Even the Red Sun, in the midst of reducing entire swarms to burning embers, diverted its gaze toward the ascending mass and chuckled like a man witnessing the culmination of an excellent jest.

"Well done, Shen Bao! For someone not yet a Sun! EXCELLENT!" he roared, continuing his onslaught.

The target of the waves and columns of poison were not the healthier First Borns; no, those two halted abruptly when they perceived the immense quantity of poison they were about to encounter.

The two uninjured First Born were not foolish. Whatever passed for instinct within their grotesque forms recognized the peril. Their descent shifted erratically, their colossal bodies twisting aside with surprising agility for beings of such magnitude. The atmosphere shrieked around them as they altered their course, and the clouds below were shredded into vortexes by the pressure of their rapid movement.

They halted and propelled themselves sideways to evade it. It was a difficult feat, but they moved away successfully.

They were never my objective; otherwise, they would not have escaped.

The wounded First Born, still disoriented from Don Ma’s impact, could not react swiftly enough.

"NOW!" The poison took the form of a colossal serpent, rivaling even a small Primordial Serpent God in size, though even such a deity could easily consume a moon. And that is precisely what transpired as the poison enveloped and swallowed the creature whole within its gaping maw, leaving it utterly immobilized.

The serpent’s head materialized first, not with the flawless beauty of a true Primordial Serpent God, but disturbingly close in its outline, stirring something primal and offended within my very soul. Its jaws stretched across the heavens, vast enough to engulf continents, its fangs forged from condensed Soulsteel poison, so dense they resembled blackened stars. It loomed over the wounded First Born and then closed its maw upon it.

For a single, suspended heartbeat, the moon-sized abomination vanished entirely within the serpent’s jaws.

Then, the poison began its work.

The liquid Soulsteel poison contorted and wrapped around its target, yes, it was guided by Qi, propelled and orchestrated by it. However, the instant it made contact with the First Born, my connection would be severed, rendering me incapable of further guidance.

I felt the threads of connection fray and snap in multiple places the very moment the poison made contact with the First Born’s flesh. It was akin to severing nerves. Entire sections of the serpent became inert, no longer responding to my will. The creature’s essence resisted me, its very nature repelling my Qi and dismantling the command pathways I had painstakingly woven through the poison. The backlash of this strain struck with brutal force, causing blood to erupt from my mouth, and for a fleeting instant, the world itself seemed to spin.

Yet, this was not the entirety of my plan.

"Physics 101. Every object possessing mass exerts a gravitational pull," I declared.

The Dusking Sun regarded me as if I had uttered utter gibberish.

To be candid, I likely had. Explaining the fundamental laws of gravity to cultivators amidst an apocalypse was hardly a scenario I had anticipated for the day, but life had devolved into a chaotic tapestry woven from bloodshed and regrettable choices.

However, the outcome was undeniably evident.

A substantial portion of the poison, having formed the serpent and subsequently disconnected from my Qi, succumbed to the planet’s gravitational influence.

Solarous, being a gargantuan planet, possessed immense gravitational force, sufficient to draw all nearby matter towards it.

The detached mass of poison began its descent back towards the world in vast, flowing sheets, drawn by Solarous the moment my control dissolved. From below, the spectacle must have resembled the very sky melting and plummeting onto the world.

Rivers of gray-black liquid cascaded from the heavens, fragmenting into colossal streams that hissed audibly as they pierced the atmosphere. Some portions combusted upon reentry. Others solidified into sharp, metallic droplets. The majority simply fell, its sheer volume and density too great to remain suspended without my guiding will.

Still, a significant portion remained adhered to the First Born, the grievously wounded and weakened First Born. After all, it was a celestial body the size of a moon and possessed its own considerable gravity.

This was the crucial element upon which I had gambled.

The First Born’s own immense mass anchored the poison close, not entirely, not enough to eradicate it completely, but certainly enough. Thick layers clung tenaciously to its flesh, seeped into its wounds, flowed into fissures, and spread across the areas Don Ma’s devastating strike had destabilized and ruptured. The creature writhed, but each convulsive movement only served to press the poison deeper. It attempted to shed the afflicted areas, but the Soulsteel liquid had already infiltrated far too many breaches. It was no longer merely coating the First Born; it had become intrinsically part of it.

For a single, tense breath, nothing occurred.

The injured First Born hung suspended above Solarous, partially enshrouded by the falling poison, its immense body convulsing as if caught between recognizing the injury it had sustained and the profound insult it represented.

The two uninjured First Born recoiled violently from the descending streams, their piercing cries distorting the clouds far below. The inferno of battle raged on across the landscape beneath us, but for that brief interlude, every sentient being capable of comprehending the sheer magnitude of the events unfolding turned their gaze upward.

Then, the poison found a vital point.

Thus, what transpired next was precisely as I had anticipated.

The utterly exquisite, soul-shattering symphony of agony.