Meanwhile, inside a secluded location of the Inner Segments of the River Serpent Sect, a man with a wizened countenance who appeared to be in a deep state of meditation was abruptly woken with fury evident in his gaze.
"How dare that little bastard defy me in such a way!?" He bellowed out while firing beams of light in every direction.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
His Cave Abode, along with a few million mountains, evaporated from existence, as the old man emerged from the rubble with an absolutely livid look on his face.
"I swear I'll kill you, boy! But before I do that, I'll make sure to have some fun with those two women you attempted to hide away from me-!"
His expression morphed into a disgustingly lascivious one, but before he could even finish his sentence, a razor-sharp, thin-blade filament emerged from a layer of space beside his figure.
"!!!" He didn't even receive the time to notice this disturbance as his physical form was sliced up into a billion different pieces, subsequently turning him into a blood firework!
"You should've just kept your mouth shut. If you did that, then you could've stayed alive a little bit longer."
A voice that sounded like it originated from the depths of hell echoed out as a blue, illusory man with a disposition that seemed out of this world materialized from a small pocket dimension.
"You think I didn't know about your identity? Did you, Hong Go? If you thought you could invade my home and escape the discernment of my eyes, then you're nothing more than a fool."
Azmodeus made sure to set up a 'Divine Secrets Discernment' Formation Rune Array in the area outside his home.
He never thought he would have a reason to use this particular Formation Rune Array, but this Inner Deacon gave him the reason he needed.
"Please, Sir! I didn't realize you were such a great one! This one is incapable of seeing Mt. Tai and promises to kowtow before a statue of you from this day onward!"
The Inner Deacon started to beg in his Nascent Soul form as he bashed his fists against the air with fervent passion.
However, it looked like it made no difference for the merciless, fallen immortal-like man as he grabbed the Nascent Soul before squishing it.
"NOoOo…!"
A painful scream sounded before eventually dying out as the Inner Deacon's life force dissipated.
After which, Azmodeus absorbed the soul dust that was formed from the dispersal of the Inner Deacon's Nascent Soul.
Following the assimilation of a soul that used to belong to an Early Unity Form Synthesis Realm Cultivator, his main body not only received a plethora of system notifications but also a tremendous increase in overall soul quality!
BLING!
*Ding!* *You have killed an Early Unity Form Synthesis Realm Inner Deacon of the River Serpent Sect!*
*Ding!* *You have obtained 10 Quintillion Evolution Essence!*
*Ding!* *Your Evolution Essence Bank has had its total value increased by a substantial margin!*
*Ding!* *Would you like to Assimilate or roll for one of the Abilities of the being you just killed?*
"Assimilate."
BLING!
*Ding!* *You have gained 12 Quadrillion Stat Points in Strength, 11 Quadrillion points in Speed, 10 Quadrillion points in Defense, and 16 Quadrillion points in Qi.*
*Ding!* *Your overall combat strength has spiked up!*
Following all of the various system notifications, Azmodeus decided to use his comprehension of the Laws of Nature and Earth to remodel some of the evaporated mountains back to what they were before the Inner Deacon appeared.
After a few flashing green and brown lights erupted in the surroundings, he made his way back to his Cave Abode like an immortal descending from the heavens.
If any mortals were around the area, then they would surely begin bowing while waiting for the teachings of the mysterious crimson-haired Sun Sword God!
Nevertheless, this 'Sword God' was welcomed with the sight of two voluptuous women giving him flirtatious glances as he passed them by before sitting back down on his cultivation mat.
He didn't really want to bother himself with the desires of a few pent-up girls.
At least not at this point in time…
Whether or not those values would change over the next period of time was unknown, as spending countless years in secluded cultivation could have any number of effects on someone.
Even so, that was a topic for another, far older version of himself, as right now, the only thing he wanted to do was figure out how to better understand the 'Time Rune', 'Space Rune', and the 'Space-Time Rune'.
He found a secret manual inside an Outer Elder's storage ring a few months ago, and since then, he has been trying to comprehend the profundities of the first few scribbles that were recorded in the 'Log of the Timeless Immortal'.
However, no matter how much he scanned through the script, attempting to discern the dialect of a language long forgotten, he couldn't figure out a single thing besides how to create the stone that holds the rune.
Of which, he had to kill hundreds of Void-Refining Realm Beasts just to acquire the most basic substitute materials for the 'Absolute Newbie Time Rune'.
Furthermore, every single one of the Void Refining Realm Beasts possessed combat strengths above their cultivation base, making them extraordinarily hard to find even with hundreds of clones constantly scouring the Outer Segments of the River Serpent Sect.
Nonetheless, after months of searching, he amassed enough materials to begin going through trial and error while transmogrifying them over and over again.
On a side note, if it wasn't mentioned before, then let it be known that transmogrifying was not omnipotent, and for it to create something especially high level, it needed at least the smallest 'essence' contained within what you were using to transmogrify.
In other words, you had to have a matching 'essence' between what you were using as transmogrifying materials and what you were trying to turn them into.
And in the case of the 'Time Rune', all the 'essence' required was essentially impossible to find with the typical trash and junk that Azmodeus kept within his storage bag.
Even the higher-end stuff he possessed only contained a few of the special elements that were required as 'essence' to make the Time Rune.
It all went to show just how rare and complicated something that touched upon the concept of time was!
And that was just to obtain the lowest level stone to hold the actual Time Rune…
In addition, those were just the requirements for materials, not the actual secrets that needed to be comprehended in order to inscribe the contents of the Time Rune on the stone.
Which led to Azmodeus's current quagmire, as he had been trying to comprehend the complexities of the Time Rune for nearly a year, and yet he felt no closer to being able to effectively utilize the rune in order to affect time.
He thought of himself as a genius to a degree, and that was true for most things.
That was until now…
Something was finally able to stump him, and unless he improved his Cultivation Talent even further, it was highly unlikely that he would be able to use even the lowest level Time Rune within the next century.
And that wasn't to mention the belated comprehensions of the Space Rune and Time-Space Rune that were included in the 'Introductory Section' of the Logs of the Timeless Immortal, both of which were left on backlog...
...…