Chapter 670: The Burning Altar and the Hydra’s Frenzy

It was as if flames had erupted atop the Secret Realm Altar, surging higher as the peak Eighth-Tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demon poured out every ounce of power. All around, waves of primordial Law Power streamed toward the altar from every direction.

The source Laws of this Secret Realm were the truest expression of its rules. As more and more Law Power gathered, those native Laws gradually began to coalesce atop the altar. The faint, flickering embers seen by the Torch Captains above weren’t just illusions—the nascent Laws atop the altar really were about to ignite.

The moment they imagined what complete ignition would bring, all hesitation vanished from the Torch Captains watching this unfold. Each ship erupted with torrents of dark energy and Law Power, battering desperately against the suffocating forces that pressed in all around.

But their efforts fell short. The overlapping Eight-Armed Serpent Prison, unleashed by a pack of Eighth-Tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demons, wasn’t something any Torch Battleship could break through at will.

It didn’t matter if every Torch Battleship here was manned by the finest of the elite—it wasn’t enough.

Shackled, blocked, slowed, and withered under layer upon layer of suppression from the Serpent Prison, barely any Torch Battleships managed to break free. In fact, only five of them fought their way out.

Among those was the current Ninth Prince of the Xian Qin Divine Dynasty, a core Meng Clan Dreadnought, and of course, one of them was Song Chi’s Heavenly Ruin Mirror Warship.

So, what gave them the edge?

The other four ships might not know, but Song Chi did—he relied on his replicated Starlight Flash Spirit Stone Talisman module.

This golden flash-displacement module came with a feature called ‘Starlight Flash Spirit Shift.’ It let the ship ignore almost all control effects like spatial locks, ship restraints, anti-magic fields, even time stop, letting any vessel it was installed on phase freely through space.

With that ability, the Mirror Warship and the other four shot out of the Serpent Prison together, tearing through its clinging coils.

What’s interesting is that all five ships that escaped were Dreadnoughts. Not a single one was a Battleship, Star-Annihilator, or Star River-class ship.

Noticing this, Song Chi realized they weren’t the only ships that could’ve made it out. Several Star-Annihilator and Star River-class warships above were fully capable too.

But there was a reason it was these five—the others were shouldering a heavier burden. Those ships had to keep the Seventh and Eighth-Tier Serpent Demon Dominators occupied.

Without them holding the line, the Eight-Armed Serpent Demons, bolstered by their Prison, would have overwhelmed the balance easily.

But that meant the final responsibility now fell squarely on the shoulders of these five.

Without a word or a moment’s hesitation, the five Dreadnoughts surged forward out of the prison’s range. Three peeled away instantly, diving toward the Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra skimming low below.

These three—Heavenly Ruin’s Mirror Warship, the Meng Clan Dreadnought, and one extreme-model Dreadnought from Xian Qin Heavy Industries—were all ships boasting overwhelming defensive power.

As far as Song Chi knew, each was clad in black-grade hull armor and came with the double-layered armor feature. Even to the naked eye, their hulls were much thicker than an ordinary Dreadnought.

That confidence was what let them surge forward so boldly.

Of course, if there were any other option, no Captain would ever choose to face an Eighth-Tier behemoth head-on, no matter how tough their ship—or even if the Hydra was already badly injured. The danger simply defied imagination.

But if they wanted to stop the Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra’s advance, this was what had to be done.

How could anyone expect to halt an Eighth-Tier creature with just a Dreadnought’s firepower?

Take now—the two Dreadnoughts behind had already launched their attacks. Howling beams struck the Hydra’s two remaining heads dead on, but the end result was disturbing: each head was only scored by a bloody gash less than a hundred meters long.

A hundred meters sounded like a lot, but for a creature whose body stretched over a million kilometers, it was a flea bite.

It wasn’t that the rear Dreadnoughts were weak—one was even commanded by the current Ninth Prince of the Divine Dynasty, who had just fired a black-grade supercannon upgraded to the Eighth Tier.

But the real problem was the Eighth-Tier Law Field radiating from the Hydra. Before the energy beams even hit, that Law Field had already stripped away most of their power.

This explained perfectly why Song Chi and the others opted for close-quarters combat.

All three Dreadnoughts were armed with anti-control modules. These might’ve been useless against the multi-layered Serpent Prison, but facing just a single wounded Eighth-Tier’s Law Field—they made all the difference.

As their engines roared, the Dreadnoughts breached the Hydra’s Law Field and immediately slowed, but the good news was, they didn’t stop. Steadily, the three ships closed in on the beast below.

Out beyond the Demon Serpent Floating-Land, in many of the Torch Battleships helming the Xian Qin Divine Dynasty’s main task force, the various major powers were tracking every heartbeat of the situation through countless channels.

Even these fossil-level Captains—some over a hundred, even hundreds of thousands of years old—found themselves holding their breaths as the decisive moment arrived.

This outcome would shape not just the battle for the Demon Serpent Continent, but the entire arc of the civilization war.

……

Inside the Secret Realm, skimming low over the floating core landmass, Song Chi’s Mirror Warship was first to reach the Hydra’s massive form.

With its golden Blood War Stele and just-activated Behemoth Heart, the Law Field released by the Hydra had minimal effect on the ship.

And as soon as the warship collided with the beast, the two sharp ramming prows at the bow drove mercilessly deep into one of the gaping wounds left by the severed hydra heads.

Splurt!

Blood and flesh sprayed everywhere, followed by a guttural roar from the Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra.

But that was nowhere near the end. With the other two Dreadnoughts still a ways off, Song Chi gave the order for the Sky-Domain AI to trigger yet another feature.

The next instant, searing light burst from the Mirror Warship’s streamlined hull. In the time it took to blink, the ship seemed to transform into a tiny neutron star.

Zzzzt!

The savage heat that erupted in a flash scorched the Hydra’s body so badly that the flesh around the wound melted away in huge swathes.

This module, upgraded to Eighth-Tier mythic grade, far outclassed the old Neutron-Star Core Armor. It was easy to see—the Hydra, already badly weakened, grew even more feeble. Its once crushing vitality nearly slipped back below Eighth-Tier altogether.

And the backlash didn’t stop with the Hydra. Even the two Dreadnoughts behind took heavy burning damage from the Mirror Warship’s attack.

Thankfully, Song Chi had timed it perfectly. When the neutron star’s hellish heat exploded, the other Dreadnoughts were still far enough away to avoid catastrophe—though they took some heat, they weren’t seriously harmed.

By the time they closed in, the blinding heat of the microstar had already dissipated.

Thud, thud!

Once more, the flesh-splitting sound echoed out. Like Heavenly Ruin, the Meng Clan and Xian Qin Heavy Industries Dreadnoughts had both already transformed their ramming prows. Using all their gathered momentum, the Dreadnoughts plunged deep into two more of the hydra’s mutilated neck wounds.

But the Meng Clan’s extreme Dreadnought especially, the power it unleashed next made Song Chi, whose real body was far away at the Omniverse Market, sit up and take notice.

“A mythic-grade ramming prow module!”

His sixth-tier Dual Pupils caught a flash of color at the root of the ship’s blood-red prow.

“Tri-color—a lower-mythic grade prow!”

That split second was enough for him to confirm exactly what class the module was.

But there was no time for further thought—the Meng Clan Dreadnought’s next move grabbed Song Chi’s full attention.

Whoosh!

Apparently, the vivid prow’s active power had triggered. The Meng Clan Dreadnought, after plunging into the Hydra’s wound, began to spin—first slowly, then ramping up dizzyingly.

Within moments, the ship spun so furiously that the entire Dreadnought looked like a massive steel top—the colored prow acting as a drill, burrowing ever deeper into the hydra’s bloody flesh.

ROAR! ROAR! ROAR!

The Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra finally felt a new level of agony. Its remaining two heads bellowed in wild, unending pain.

No question, the Meng Clan Dreadnought’s attack had hit the mark.

But before anyone could savor the triumph, the Hydra was driven over the edge—clouds of nearly tangible blood-red steam wracked and covered its entire form.

Whereas before its burning life force was just a minor risk—leaving it merely weakened, costing a few centuries of life at most—

Now it had gone utterly berserk, fully igniting its forbidden secret technique. Regardless of how long it kept fighting, it was guaranteed only one end—its own death.

The trade-off, of course, was an explosive surge in raw power.

While the neutron-star fission and the Meng Clan ship’s ravaging assault had just tamped its aura below Eighth Tier, as the life force lit up entirely, its strength surged back up.

In just breaths, it had soared past peak Seventh Tier and climbed right back to half a step from Eighth. At this rate, it wouldn’t be long before it was fully restored.

Far away, outside of time—Omniverse Market.

Up on the Market Heavens, Song Chi hovered in the sky, shrouded by a blazing aura of Ninth-Tier Dominion Power. His Dual Pupils’ phantom spun in his eyes as his mind raced through countless decisions in an instant.

To everyone else, only a heartbeat passed. In Song Chi’s mind, he’d already played out a thousand plans.

Then, his gaze snapped into focus. A fierce light shone in his eyes.

Back at the floating core of the Demon Serpent Floating-Land, in the low-altitude battlefield of the cosmic secret realm—

Thanks to Song Chi’s decisiveness, as soon as the hydra’s aura rebounded to half-step Eighth Tier, the Heavenly Ruin Mirror Warship was already responding.

Inside the Mirror Warship, a flurry of commands streamed from the Sky-Domain AI.

The very first: targeting the temporary mythic-grade Neutron-Star Core Armor.

Neutron-Star Core Armor: ‘Gamma Ray Burst’!

Behind it, more orders followed.

Divine Thunder Cannon: ‘Ninefold Violet Heaven World-Ending Calamity Thunder (Silver Law of Lightning Crystal)’!

Black Hole Evolution Layer: ‘Black Hole Singular Burst’!

Pusa Zen Seal: ‘Zen Seal · Internal · Time Acceleration’!

Blood Spear: ‘God of the Hunt’s Weakpoint Mark’!

Voidlock Skyseal Sigil: ‘Fixed Point—Heaven Prison Lock’!

Bind-God Chains: ‘Void Bind-God’!

……

With command after command, nearly every one of the Mirror Warship’s modules blazed to life. In the ship’s control room, red, silver, gold, black, and rainbow light intertwined in brilliant flashes.

It’s worth noting—this time, Song Chi used the Pusa Zen Seal’s ‘Time Acceleration’ not on the Gamma Ray Burst or the Ninefold Calamity Thunder, but on the still-cooling ‘God of the Hunt’s Weakpoint Mark.’

The logic was simple.

There was only one Pusa Zen Seal module, and its ‘Time Acceleration’ could be used once at a time. Whether on the Gamma Ray Burst or Calamity Thunder, their charge times were just too long to overlap effectively.

So instead, he sped up the Weakpoint Mark. This trait could blend together the power of the Calamity Thunder, Black Hole Singular Burst, and others—doubling up their damage for maximum impact.

Which is why, right afterward, the Heaven Prison and Void Bind-God chains appeared.

For an Eighth-Tier creature, red or silver-grade shackles were never going to truly restrain it. But Song Chi was well aware.

These chains weren’t meant to bind the hydra, but—under the Sky-Domain AI’s cunning control—to lash the Mirror Warship to the beast itself.

In this way, the only purpose of the special chains was to lock the Mirror Warship to the hydra even more tightly.

And the point? To keep the hydra from shaking the Mirror Warship loose, no matter how violently it struggled.

As the Sky-Domain AI triggered one high-grade module after another, the Abyssal Nine-Headed Hydra instantly sensed the looming threat. Overwhelming Dominion Power surged from within, battering the Mirror Warship’s hull in a desperate attempt to dislodge it.