As the army boarded the warship, Ye Liuyun cloaked himself and departed ahead of the others to scout the alien forces.

Along the way, he encountered a reconnaissance team sent by the aliens. Evidently, after waiting over half a month without any movement from the human forces, the aliens had grown restless. They had dispatched two silver-armored alien commanders—each at the Dominator Realm—along with four lesser aliens at the third level of the Celestial Realm, all cloaked in invisibility mantles. This squad had already eliminated a team of human scouts known as the Flying Swallows.

Yu Xiaofeng had been frustrated at being unable to track down the culprits, but now, by sheer chance, Ye Liuyun had intercepted them. Even with their invisibility cloaks, they couldn’t evade the piercing gaze of his golden pupils.

Weighing his options, Ye Liuyun decided not to take unnecessary risks. He immediately employed his temporal powers to brand the two silver-armored aliens with slave seals. As for the four Celestial Realm aliens, he executed them on the spot, handing their corpses over to Mulai to absorb and enhance his strength.

The two silver-armored aliens, however, proved far more useful—Ye Liuyun subjected them to soul-searching, extracting valuable intelligence. Through this, he uncovered the aliens’ strategy: the three-eyed aliens had been deliberately dispersed among their ranks.

Each silver-armored commander carried one three-eyed alien within their spatial realm, while the gold-armored commanders each concealed two. Among the Celestial Realm squads, twenty more three-eyed aliens were hidden within the spatial realms of select warriors. Even the lower-tier alien troops and the main army each had ten three-eyed aliens stashed away in the spatial realms of their officers.

This distribution ensured that Ye Liuyun’s forces would be caught off guard, making it nearly impossible to eliminate all the three-eyed aliens in a single strike. Once chaos erupted on the battlefield, these hidden killers would emerge indiscriminately, slaughtering human cultivators.

Upon learning this, Ye Liuyun wasted no time relaying the intel to Yu Xiaofeng and Dian Qing, urging them to prepare accordingly. He then ordered the two silver-armored aliens to release the three-eyed aliens from their spatial realms, promptly branding them with slave seals as well.

To minimize risks, Ye Liuyun immediately deployed these newly subjugated silver-armored and three-eyed aliens into battle, replacing Lei Ming, the Dragon Maiden, the Nine-Headed Demon Dragon, and Liang Xue to keep them out of harm’s way.

As for the Primordial Tower and the Blood Silkworm Threads, Ye Liuyun returned to the warship and lent them to Yu Xiaofeng and Qin Peng, ensuring they had the tools to counter the three-eyed aliens hidden among the enemy commanders.

Moreover, they had the two captured silver-armored aliens send false intelligence back to their kind, claiming that the human martial cultivators were still mobilizing their forces. This was meant to lull the aliens into complacency.

Ye Liuyun then continued his advance toward the alien stronghold, keeping a distant watch over their movements. Whenever they dispatched scouts, he would ambush and capture them, extracting more information to relay back to his own forces.

He estimated that eliminating this wave of alien forces would further weaken their strength. Unless they summoned reinforcements from the eastern and southern fronts, he could completely eradicate their western strongholds in one fell swoop.

If he could capture even more alien elites—especially the three-eyed aliens—it would make future confrontations far easier. Using the aliens against their own kind was undoubtedly the most effective way to minimize human casualties.

While monitoring the alien camp, Ye Liuyun suddenly noticed something unusual—a golden-armored alien elder had donned an invisibility cloak and was sneaking away from the stronghold alone, heading straight for the human encampment.

*"Another prisoner delivered right to my doorstep!"*

A surge of excitement ran through him. He summoned his doppelgänger and the Vermilion Bird, and the three of them, concealed by their own stealth, launched a coordinated soul attack on the golden-armored elder.

Each of their spiritual strengths far surpassed that of the alien elder. With their combined assault, the elder didn’t even have time to react before a slave seal was branded onto his soul.

A quick soul search revealed the elder’s intentions—he had planned to ambush either Ye Liuyun or Dian Qing while the human forces were still preparing. At the very least, he aimed to eliminate some of the human Sovereign-level experts to reduce pressure during the impending battle, while also gathering intelligence on Ye Liuyun’s forces.

Little did he expect that he would be delivering himself straight into Ye Liuyun’s hands.

With this stroke of luck, Ye Liuyun not only gained control over an alien elder but also the two three-eyed aliens hidden within the elder’s spatial artifact.

The alien leadership had assigned this elder to support Mu Lai and Hong Guang in battle, but Ye Liuyun handed the two three-eyed captives over to Yu Xiaofeng instead, intending to use them as an unexpected trump card against the aliens.

The intelligence extracted from the elder’s mind further confirmed the aliens’ battle strategy, allowing Ye Liuyun to refine his own tactics.

Only four golden-armored alien elders remained. Ye Liuyun, his doppelgänger, the Demon Vine, and the Sealing Stele would handle them, while Dian Qing led the captured alien prisoners to deal with the remaining Sovereign-level adversaries.

The Purple Kylin Snake was still dealing with the alien race at the Heavenly Human Third Level, launching attacks before they could unleash the Three-Eyed Aliens.

The remaining human Sovereign Realm experts and Heavenly Human Third Level martial cultivators were tasked with eliminating the Heavenly Human First and Second Level aliens, with the Sovereign Realm warriors focusing on taking out their commanders.

Every fighter was to strike proactively, aiming to annihilate the enemy before they could release the Three-Eyed Aliens.

Ye Liuyun also dispatched his clones to scout other landing points around the alien stronghold for the army.

Day after day, he hoped the aliens would send more Sovereign Realm experts to gather intel or attempt assassinations. Unfortunately, even as the human forces arrived at their destination, the aliens never sent another wave of strong warriors.

It wasn’t until Ye Liuyun’s colossal warships began their landing that the aliens finally realized their scouts had been compromised.

The alien forces, caught in the midst of disbanded training, scrambled to regroup. Meanwhile, Ye Liuyun’s troops took full advantage of the chaos, landing smoothly and forming battle-ready ranks.

Seeing that Ye Liuyun’s forces had successfully disembarked, the alien elder refrained from ordering an immediate assault. Instead, he led his elite warriors toward Ye Liuyun’s position.

In battles of this scale, the strongest fighters from both sides always clashed first—otherwise, their sheer destructive power would wreak havoc on the ordinary troops.

Seizing the confusion, Ye Liuyun first released the Demon Vine, which burrowed underground to lie in ambush. Then, he and his martial cultivators stepped forward, positioning themselves at the frontlines to meet the enemy.

With his golden pupils—and those of his clones—he spotted several cloaked alien experts hidden among their ranks, poised for a sneak attack.

On Ye Liuyun’s side, his clones, along with Zhu Que, Mu Lai, two Golden-Armored Elders, and two Three-Eyed Aliens, were also draped in invisibility cloaks. Combined with the absence of the Demon Vine and the Sealing Demon Stele, their forces appeared severely outnumbered.

The alien elder took one look at the situation and immediately decided against any probing attacks. Instead, he ordered a full-frontal assault, aiming to wipe out the human elites in one fell swoop.

**"Roar... Roar..."**

A Golden-Armored alien elder let out a series of guttural cries.

**"They’re sending all their elites into battle—including the Heavenly Human First and Second Level forces!"** Mu Lai quickly relayed the aliens’ intent to Ye Liuyun.

**"Pick your targets—we’re diving into chaos!"** Ye Liuyun alerted his forces.

The human martial cultivators swiftly locked onto their respective opponents, while Yu Xiaofeng led the troops further back to avoid being caught in the crossfire of the high-level battle.