Touching the Heavens
The moment Ryeong unleashed her lightning bomb, all sound vanished from the battlefield. The sheer destructiveness defied belief.
"Did she... swallow some mythical elixir while she was gone? Or did she actually break through to the Profound Realm?"
Ga Ak-sang blurted out the words in utter bewilderment. Around him, the other martial artists nodded in numb agreement, their minds unable to fathom the spectacle they had just witnessed.
Across the entire field, only Ak Gu-yu and Sagon truly grasped what technique she had employed. She had compressed lightning qi to its absolute limit within a small orb, essentially creating a living bomb. Anyone could conceive the idea in theory, but if one lost control for even a fraction of an instant, it would detonate right in their palm—a guaranteed one-way ticket to the underworld. It was a suicidal method no sane martial artist would ever dare attempt.
What was more, Ryeong did not look the least bit fatigued. To unleash such cataclysmic destruction and remain completely unfazed was staggering. In that moment, Ak Gu-yu revised his assessment of her; she was far more extraordinary than he had ever imagined.
Sagon was in no better state. Watching nearly eight hundred jiangshi vanish into ash wiped the arrogance entirely from his face, leaving only raw shock. He had considered them his trump card, yet they had been utterly obliterated before the battle could even properly begin. The cultists' morale plummeted to rock bottom; the overwhelming majesty displayed by a single woman had instantly shattered their momentum.
Sensing the shift, Ryeong flashed an infuriating grin. Flaring her fiery wings wide, she made it abundantly clear that she was still in peak condition. Sagon could not afford to stand idly by any longer.
"All forces, charge!"
"Whoa, easy there," Ryeong mocked with a lazy smirk. "Move if you want a few more of these. Think you can handle a carpet bombing?"
Chuckling, she conjured another palm-sized orb of lightning. While its actual concussive force was lower than the hyper-compressed version, its visual intimidation was twice as striking. Sagon, however, understood the nature of lightning qi well enough to ignore her bluff and bellowed the charge.
Weighing whether to throw it at him, Ryeong shifted her gaze toward the ground.
"Might as well finish off the rest of the jiangshi first."
BOOOOM!
She hurled the lightning sphere straight into the surviving undead ranks. Seizing that very opening, Sagon kicked off the ground and rocketed toward her. But as if she had anticipated his move all along, Ryeong flared her Vermilion Bird Fire Qi even hotter.
At the same time, shouts echoed from the ramparts of Hebei.
"Load the cannons!"
"Hebei martial artists, prepare to advance!"
With the battle fully underway, the cannons roared to life, spitting flame and iron. Martial artists held their ground until the charging cultists crossed within striking distance. Naturally, the first to spearhead the counterattack was Ak Gu-yu. Led by his unstoppable charge, Jin Yeong, Paeng Jo-gang, Ga Ak-sang, and the rest of Hebei's masters surged forward.
"The enemy has four Supreme Demon masters!" Ak Gu-yu bellowed over the din. "I will handle two of them! Treat them like rabid beasts, not men! These madmen will swing their blades until their last breath!"
"I can hold one of the Supreme Demon masters!" Jin Yeong shouted, rallying her spirit. "I leave the rest to you all!"
Ak Gu-yu thrust his spear forward, instantly pinning down two Supreme Demon masters. Behind him, a newly resolute Jin Yeong locked blades with the third, while Ga Ak-sang, Paeng Jo-gang, and several other Peak Realm masters encircled the fourth. Any disadvantage in numbers was swiftly balanced by the covering fire of the artillery.
Even while fending off two vicious Supreme Demon masters, Ak Gu-yu stole a glance toward the heavens. The clash unfolding in the sky was nothing short of breathtaking.
Sagon, the Fourth Blood King, was an opponent who had pushed even Ak Gu-yu, the Commander of the Shadow Sword Squad, to the brink. While Ryeong's godlike display could easily be mistaken for that of a Profound Realm grandmaster, one-on-one combat was an entirely different beast.
What Ak Gu-yu did not realize, however, was that while Ryeong was indeed most devastating when fighting outnumbered, her second greatest strength was a duel to the death where she could unleash every trick in her arsenal. To her, a single combat against Sagon posed no terror whatsoever. If anything, it was the perfect proving ground to test the growth of her Four Divine Beasts arts.
Though Sagon had charged with arrogant ferocity, he quickly found himself suppressed by her sheer aura. The immortal qi she radiated was the absolute bane of his demonic arts, and the resonant synergy between her burgeoning White Tiger Wood Qi and Vermilion Bird Fire Qi multiplied her power exponentially.
What in the world is this wench? Sagon gritted his teeth in disbelief. Her energy holds total dominion over our Cult's arts!
He realized that no matter the cost, she had to die here. Reaching into his robes, Sagon popped a blood jade pill into his mouth. Ryeong's eyes flashed with curiosity.
FWOOOOSH!
A surge of noxious blood qi erupted outward with him at the epicenter. The aura resembled what she had felt from the Fifth Blood King, yet carried a subtle difference. Ryeong widened the distance and contracted the wings of fire behind her back. Spreading them wide drained internal energy too quickly; while grandiose for intimidation, compact wings were far more practical for prolonged combat. When Sagon emerged from the crimson haze after absorbing the blood jade, his aura had surged a notch higher. Though it was only an incremental rise, being careless against him now could easily prove fatal.
"Now I understand how that fool Geuk-pyeong perished," Sagon spat, his eyes bloodshot. "To think such a master was lurking in the Central Plains."
"I keep telling you, you picked the wrong fight," Ryeong replied dryly. "Why covet the Central Plains in the first place? It's only going to end in your complete extermination."
"Extermination, you say? With a mere thousand cultists, we brought Liaoning to its knees. If anyone is facing extermination, it is the Central Plains."
Ryeong scoffed. Where on earth did they get such blind confidence? It was true that the Central Plains martial world was currently suffering a drought of supreme masters. But would the Imperial Court simply sit on its hands and watch the martial world collapse?
The disaster in Liaoning had already proven that. While the Imperial Court traditionally observed a policy of non-interference with the martial arts world, the total devastation of a province had forced their hand. Martial artists were still subjects living under the Emperor's realm. The more madness the Demon Blood Divine Cult unleashed, the deeper the Imperial Court would intervene—and that intervention would drag the Cult straight into the abyss.
"You lot aren't even afraid of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, are you?" Ryeong said. "That's why you're barking up the wrong tree in the Central Plains."
"The moment our God is reborn as a true divinity, mortal weapons will become utterly meaningless."
"Is your god an idiot by any chance? Because if so, that actually explains a lot."
"Do not blaspheme our God!"
BOOM!
Sagon kicked off the air itself, rocketing forward at blistering speed. In the blink of an eye, his fist shot in a straight line toward Ryeong's solar plexus. But shifting her form with the Shifting Shapes technique, she slipped past the blow and counterattacked with the first stance of the White Tiger True Sword.
"Great Tiger Cross Cleave."
With a single swing, dual arcs of sword gang erupted. Sagon caught the blades of sword energy with his bare hands and literally crushed them to pieces.
Ryeong's assault didn't end there. Hurling throwing daggers to maintain her distance, she served him a lightning sphere whenever he tried to close in. Sagon was a brawler who fought with fists; while he could project fist gang at range, distance naturally diluted its destructive power. With her wings of fire granting unrivaled aerial mobility, Ryeong methodically whittled down his stamina piece by piece.
As the skirmish dragged on without a decisive clash, Sagon sensed something amiss and ground to a halt. Ryeong hovered at a comfortable distance, beckoning him with a cocked finger in an open taunt.
"If you keep running away like a rat," Sagon growled, "your innocent subordinates below will die in your stead."
"Subordinates? Please. They're just individuals who gathered for the same goal."
"Then you won't care if I do this."
WHIRRR!
Sagon unleashed a barrage of fist gang toward the earth below, but Ryeong instantly intercepted and canceled out every blast with bursts of lightning. A sinister grin spread across Sagon's face. He had confirmed that she harbored that useless, pathetic virtue: valuing the lives of her allies.
"Let's see you block all of this!"
Sagon rained down blows toward the ground like a madman, saturating the sky with what looked like flaming catapult stones plunging from the heavens. The moment Ryeong moved to intercept them, he planned to impale her with his supreme lethal strike.
Only then did Sagon realize what an idiot he had been.
Ryeong hadn't moved to shield the ground.
She was plunging straight toward him.
"Black Tortoise Tyrant Sword Esoteric Art."
"Shit—!"
Esoteric Secret Art of the Black Tortoise Tyrant Sword
ROOOAAAR!
The colossal silhouette of a divine beast imbued with boundless water qi manifested in the sky. With no time to mount a proper defense, Sagon was mercilessly engulfed by the torrential Black Tortoise Water Qi.
"AAAAAAAAARGH!"
It was the concentrated essence of pure immortal qi. Carrying the overwhelming tyranny inherent in the Black Tortoise Tyrant Sword, the strike possessed more than enough power to tear an unguarded opponent to shreds. When the deluge cleared, Sagon hovered in agony, his right arm brutally mangled and torn away as if ripped off by massive fangs.
"What kind of moron takes his eyes off his opponent in the middle of a life-and-death fight?" Ryeong scoffed. "Did you mistake me for some righteous orthodox saint?"
"What kind of Sword Empress are you...?" Sagon wheezed, clutching his bleeding stump. "Sacrificing the few for the sake of the greater whole... The heavens themselves must weep!"
"Who said anything about sacrificing anyone? Has your eyesight gone bad along with your arm?"
"...!"
Sagon's eyes snapped wide. His fist gang should have rained destruction upon the martial artists below, crushing them into paste. Yet down on the battlefield, not a single one had fallen to his barrage.
Only then did his gaze catch sight of a lone figure below. Though drenched in blood, it was the master from the Murim Alliance whom the Embroidered Uniform Guard had thrown their lives away to protect. He had intercepted and shattered every single blast of fist gang falling from the sky, reducing casualties to zero.
In the end, Sagon's cowardly ploy had merely hastened his own demise. Ryeong's immortal qi was constantly eroding his demonic qi by the second. If this continued, he would meet his end without accomplishing a single thing.
"Do you think... I would let it end like this?!"
KABOOOOM!
Sagon roared in fury, igniting his innate true qi. As a vortex of blood-red energy enveloped his entire body, the very atmosphere trembled.
It was, as always, the classic death rattle of a desperate man.