Along with the completion of the light pillar, the Tongyou Island started to absorb the world origin that made up the Manyu Continent’s World’s Will.

Shang Xia and Ren Bainian raised their heads to observe the pillar of light above the island with complex emotions running through their hearts.

After some time, the light pillar finally stabilized and Shang Xia gasped in shock as though he discovered something new.

Ren Bainian heard the astonishment in Shang Xia’s voice and he couldn’t help but ask, “Young Master Shang, is something the matter?” 

Shang Xia wore a grave expression as he replied, “Senior Ren, can you feel that the light pillar above our island is a little thinner than the others?” 

Widening his eyes slightly, Ren Bainian turned to observe the other islands.

Even though the Tongyou Island and the other islands were thousands of miles apart, the pillars of light above each island could be clearly seen.

It didn’t take long before Ren Bainian noticed the difference. “The pillar of light above the island that is larger than us is indeed a little thicker. However, there isn’t much difference between us and the smaller island…” 

By that time, Ren Bainian had also noticed the problem.

Shang Xia muttered in a deep voice, “Clearly, the thickness of the pillars determines how quickly we are absorbing world origin. Taking our island’s size into account, we’re actually the slowest!” 

Ren Bainian opened his mouth slightly, but he didn’t know what to say. Shang Xia was right. They weren’t absorbing world origin as quickly as compared to the other islands.

It was also then they realized why Yun Jing and Shang Bo didn’t look too excited even though Liu Qinglan was celebrating that they were one of the first to arrive. They definitely knew that the Tongyou Island’s grand formation wasn’t that great and their speed of absorption would be much slower than the rest.

Even though the size of the island directly determined the amount of world origin they could eventually absorb, there was a limited amount of it! If the Tongyou Institution's speed of absorption was slow, the moment other islands arrived, they would be placed at a massive disadvantage. Their gains might barely be able to rival those smaller islands out there.

At the end of the day, the Tongyou Institution had far too weak foundations. Chu Jia was the one and only Formation Grandmaster of the institution and she was a newly promoted one at that. They couldn’t possibly expect her to do more than she already has.

Of the various factions that entered the Manyu Continent, the Tongyou Institution was also one of the latest ones! The time they spent to lay down their formations and refine their workings paled in comparison to other powers.

For them to be able to achieve so much was already a remarkable achievement.

The experts on the Tongyou Island could only hope that the other islands would appear as late as possible. Only then would they be able to absorb the most world origin they could.

Unfortunately for them, it wasn’t quite possible for that to happen. Not too long after the light pillar above the Tongyou Island formed, another island that was comparable in size arrived. They appeared the same way the Tongyou Island did, and the space ripples around their location eventually died down to reveal their true appearance.

Shang Xia narrowed his eyes and observed the island that just arrived, taking special attention to the protection barrier in their core region before muttering a second later, “Seems to be a power from the Azure Spiritual World.” 

When they finally arrived, the newcomers quickly adapted themsleves to what was happening. They immediately started their preparations to absorb world origin.

Looking at the island, ShangXia could tell that they seemed to have suffered some serious damage on their way over. They used a lot more time than the Tongyou Institution to complete their preparations.

Moreover, the light pillar that emerged from that island didn’t seem too much larger than the one above the Tongyou Island. 

Shang Xia and Ren Bainian felt a lot better after seeing that.

Unfortunately, their relief didn’t last long. Perhaps it was because they managed to strengthen their grand formation or something with the world origin they absorbed, the light pillar above the island that just arrived started to grow and surpass that of the Tongyou Island.

“This… This…” Ren Bainian didn’t know what to say as he witnessed the change on the island.

He felt a sense of belonging to the Tongyou Institution after fighting alongside them for so long, but he might also be putting on an act to seem more involved with the Tongyou Institution. Whatever the case, he truly hoped that the Tongyou Institution could obtain more benefits from their endeavors.

“At the speed they’re going, it won’t take long before they absorb more world origin than us!” Shang Xia muttered. However, his gaze was drifting about as he spoke and he seemed to be thinking of something.

All of a sudden, Ren Bainian yelped in shock. He pointed at the Great Sun that was the source of the World’s Will above them and exclaimed, “Young Master Shang, hurry up and take a look! The source of the World’s Will is shrinking!” 

Shang Xia was startled and he quickly raised his head to see what was going on. He discovered that the Great Sun was definitely smaller than what he originally remembered.

One had to know that there were probably more than 15 factions from both the Azure Origin World and Azure Spiritual World that had plans for the Manyu Continent and its destruction. Less than a third of them had arrived, but the source of the World’s Will was already visibly shrinking due to their absorption.

The moment any other islands arrived, the speed at which world origin would be devoured would increase. There wouldn’t be enough to go around!

Once the source of the World’s Will was sucked dry, those islands that came later would definitely not give up easily. When that happens, a massive battle will definitely break out.

The Tongyou Island might not have arrived late, but the speed at which they absorbed world origin was too damn slow!

“We can’t keep this up…” Shang Xia muttered to himself.

Raising an eyebrow in shock, Ren Bainian asked, “Do you have a plan?!” 

“I don’t know, yet…” Shang Xia’s reply truly confused Ren Bainian. He quickly added, “I don’t know if my plan will be useful at all…” 

With a truly puzzled look, Ren Bainian wondered out loud, “Are you for real?” 

Shang Xia nodded and left after leaving behind one last sentence. “I’ll go test it out. I’ll hand everything here to you.” 

He turned into a streak of light and left without waiting for a response. 

Ren Bainian couldn’t help but but look around himself as he was at a loss for what to do. Eventually, he muttered to himself, “They really left me in charge of the massive Tongyou Island… They really do trust in me…” 

Rising into the air, he started to patrol the area around the protection formation in case experts of other powers came to cause trouble.

The moment he moved, another disturbance happened around the Great Sun. The sixth island eventually appeared.

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…

Arriving at one of the less important formation nodes that the Tongyou Institution placed throughout the entire island, Shang Xia decided to start his plan. Even though he was currently on one of the more remote formation nodes, there was no problem connecting to the grand formation. 

As soon as he made the connection, he felt that he could assist the grand formation by pouring his inner qi into the formation node. He could also clearly feel the vortex above the island as well as the pillar of light that was absorbing world origin. 

The Tongyou Island’s grand formation was operating at its limit and even if Shang Xia joined in, his input of extermination qi wouldn’t allow them to suck up even more world origin.

Of course, using his inner qi to power the grand formation was never his goal. After familiarizing himself with how the grand formation worked, Shang Xia pressed his hand against the formation node while circulating his extermination qi crazily. A trace of world origin escaped from the confines of the grand formation and entered his body before being devoured completely.