Volume 2 - Chapter 59: Slaying the Enemy - Part 1
This spear strike rang out like a phoenix’s cry in the heavens, blazing with the brilliance of divine flames. It was inescapable!
Completely locked on!
Earlier, Feng Shanjun’s retreat had been a deliberate ruse to lure Li Tiangang away from the formation. His intent was to pierce Li Tiangang’s body and crush his divine soul, tossing him before Li Hao to despair as he witnessed his father’s brutal demise firsthand!
As the divine spear descended, it was suddenly met by a burst of resplendent divine might. A blade, blazing like furious flames, rose sharply to meet it!
“Shatter!”
With a single slash, the spear's radiance was severed. At the same time, the surge of divine might and an overwhelming aura caused Feng Shanjun’s body to falter momentarily!
Seizing the opening in that fleeting moment, Li Tiangang’s eyes glowed with divine light as he roared skyward. His divine blade slashed out violently, splitting half of Feng Shanjun’s body in one stroke!
Golden blood, radiant and fierce like sparks, splattered in every direction. Feng Shanjun let out a wretched scream, his body hurriedly retreating as he looked up in terror.
Li Tiangang strode forward, his divine blade in hand, his aura soaring straight into the sky. He resembled a blazing sun, a true god of wrath engulfed in raging flames!
“The Four Extremes Realm?!”
Feng Shanjun’s pupils contracted in shock. Li Tiangang had been concealing his aura all this time, masquerading as someone at the Three Immortals Realm!
Yet now, his revealed cultivation level was unmistakably the Dao Heart Realm!
This true dragon of the Li family had unknowingly ascended to the ranks of the Four Extremes experts!
...
“Reversed Heaven Nine Steps—die for me!”
At this moment, Li Tiangang ceased to hold back. His black hair flew wildly, and the aura of the Four Extremes Realm erupted.
It was precisely because his cultivation had broken through that he dared to step out of the formation to confront this demon king in battle.
Other than Li Junye, he was also a rarely seen prodigy. At twenty-three, he had entered the Three Immortals Realm, a cultivation speed that could shake the world, though he had kept it low-key.
For over a decade, he had fought in Yanbei, long since reaching the peak of the Three Immortals Realm, even touching the threshold of the Dao Heart Realm.
Shortly after his battle with Li Hao in Qingzhou, he had stepped into the Four Extremes Realm, finding his own Dao Heart.
The Law of All Things!
This was his Dao, his heart!
Step by step, he unleashed the masterful martial art he had created, the Martial Art of Supreme Righteousness. With each of the six steps he took, the heavens and earth beyond the defensive lines seemed to tremble. With every step forward, his aura grew more formidable, and the divine flames enveloping him blazed ever brighter!
Upon taking the sixth step, his aura was like that of a god descending upon the mortal realm. With a roar, his blade cleaved downward.
The heavens and earth seemed to split apart, following the laws of nature. He upheld the laws of the heavens, seeking to correct all chaos and rebellion in the world!
“Kill!”
The strike was brilliant and dazzling, like the scorching sun, unleashing waves of divine light and ferocity.
Feng Shanjun, reduced to half his body, was filled with utter dread. Though Li Tiangang had just entered the Dao Heart Realm, the aura he unleashed at this moment sent shivers down Feng Shanjun’s spine, leaving him with an overwhelming sense of powerlessness.
The humiliation he had suffered outside Tianmen Pass seemed poised to repeat itself.
Feng Shanjun’s eyes turned crimson as he spat out divine flames, his fury erupting as he revealed his true form.
However, his half-phoenix body appeared pitiful. One half remained flesh, while the other was condensed from divine flames. Half his body radiated phoenix fire, roaring and spitting out the primordial flames of the true phoenix!
The surrounding temperature spiked dramatically, the ground cracked, and molten rock seemed ready to emerge. The air twisted and steamed, threatening to distort reality itself.
Centuries ago, Feng Shanjun had swept through a city. Merely flying over it had turned its residents to ashes. Now, the full release of his true phoenix flames generated residual heat that could cause the bodies of those at the Unbreakable Realm to rupture!
...
A deafening explosion reverberated as the overwhelming sea of flames was sliced apart. Li Tiangang emerged, walking through the fire. As he stepped forward into the seventh step, his aura surged yet again.
“A Reverse Fate cultivator? I’ll sever your life here and now!”
Li Tiangang’s eyes glinted with an icy sharpness as his blade descended in a violent arc. He unleashed a torrent of hundreds—then thousands—of blade strikes, obliterating the fiery ocean and forcing his way directly toward Feng Shanjun’s true form.
Feng Shanjun was both furious and terrified. He realized he no longer had a chance to regain his second life. If he died now, thousands of years of cultivation would be lost in an instant!
Shame and resentment filled his heart. He had failed against a mere boy at Tianmen Pass, and now, against Li Tiangang, he was just as pathetic!
“Phoenix Soul Blood Fusion!”
Feng Shanjun let out a furious roar as he activated the true phoenix bloodline within him.
It was true—he wasn’t originally of the phoenix race but rather of the Fire Cloud Sparrow clan. However, within his bloodline, a trace of the ancestral soul of the true phoenix had awakened, leading him down the path of cultivation.
Over the years, he had discarded his sparrow identity and adopted the image of a phoenix, reshaping his appearance to resemble the phoenix race while despising his humble origins.
...
He had long regarded himself as a true phoenix.
Now, cornered and desperate, the pride of the phoenix race within him surged. Infuriated, he burned his true bloodline, committing to a path of no return.
Once this ancestral phoenix blood was exhausted, he would have no connection to the phoenix race, but in this fleeting moment, he embodied the form of a genuine phoenix!
Ancient divine patterns surfaced on his body as an ancient, desolate aura emanated from him. His feathers, like molten gold, radiated a brilliance imbued with divine light and pure crimson power.
With a single breath, he exhaled a golden lotus, blazing with fire and exuding an aura that struck fear into anyone who witnessed it.
Li Tiangang’s expression turned grim as he inhaled deeply, stepping forward once more into the eighth step.
With this step, his aura surged once more. He unleashed his self-created Heaven-Punishing Blade, a technique so overwhelming it seemed to pierce the heavens.
The blade light erupted, towering like a peak reaching the sky. Its radiance illuminated half the battlefield, its brilliance threatening to split the very heavens apart as it slammed into the golden lotus.
The violent clash sent shockwaves reverberating across the battlefield. The golden lines on the defensive formation flickered wildly as they absorbed the brunt of the devastating force.
Meanwhile, the sheer heat and energy from the shockwave spread across hundreds of miles, scorching the earth black. Grass burned to ash, forests turned to charcoal, and lakes evaporated into thick plumes of vapor.
If this battle had erupted within a city, the entire area would have been obliterated in an instant.
Li Tiangang’s armor glowed red-hot from the overwhelming heat, searing his body as if he were being roasted in a furnace. Even with his indestructible physique, the pain was unbearable. Yet, his icy gaze hardened as he advanced toward Feng Shanjun with relentless determination.
Feng Shanjun’s aura began to falter rapidly. Despite burning his ancestral phoenix blood, the amount within him was pitifully small.
As the middle-aged man charged toward him like a wrathful god, Feng Shanjun’s mind wavered. For a moment, he hallucinated, seeing that young boy from outside Tianmen Pass once again stepping forward.
Despair flickered in his eyes.
Now, with his aura withering, he could no longer muster the strength to resist.
Bereft of his phoenix blood, his emotions spiraled into turmoil—fear, trembling, and even thoughts of pleading for mercy filled his mind.
“Help me!”
He turned and fled, letting out a pitiful cry for aid, his former majesty completely gone.
Suddenly, two cold streaks of light shot toward Li Tiangang at lightning speed.
Yet, Li Tiangang paid them no mind. Without even glancing at the attacks, he activated his Divine Roc Movement Technique, rapidly closing the distance to Feng Shanjun.
“Die!”
Ignoring the oncoming attacks, Li Tiangang swung his blade fiercely.
With a thunderous boom, the divine might of the blade cleaved through Feng Shanjun’s neck, severing his head from his body.
A fiery bird-like divine soul escaped, screeching in terror as it fled into the distance. But Li Tiangang simply raised his hand, summoning a divine palm blazing with light. The palm descended, trapping the firebird’s soul within its grasp.
“No! Spare me...”
Feng Shanjun’s soul pleaded desperately.
Li Tiangang remained unmoved. Without hesitation, he clenched his fist.
The fiery soul let out a shrill scream before being snuffed out completely.
And so, a Reverse Fate Realm demon king perished.
From the moment Feng Shanjun had burned his phoenix blood, Li Tiangang realized that this demon king had no chance of reversing fate. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been forced into such a desperate gamble.
This was why Li Tiangang chose to risk injury to ensure the kill. Allowing his enemy even a moment to recover would make him far more difficult to kill.
Boom! Boom!