Protecting Yun Yun, Defeating Medusa

"You want to let her go?" Xiao Yan said immediately.

Medusa decisively shook her head, her voice icy. "That was the original plan, but what just happened made me realize that letting her leave will bring endless trouble."

"Get rid of her. Once I evolve successfully, even if her master Yun Shan, whose fate is unknown, comes for me, I can destroy him with a wave of my hand!"

Xiao Yan stopped where he was, having arrived outside the prison.

Yue Mei, the Snake-People Tribe commander, emerged from the prison, with two snake people escorting someone he could not have known better.

Yue Mei bowed to Medusa. "Your Majesty, the prisoner has been brought out. Where shall we take her next?"

Medusa coldly looked at Yun Yun. As the queen of the Snake-People Tribe, she was never one to hesitate or waver.

Since she had already decided to kill Yun Yun, she would not change her mind.

"Keeping her here may lead to unforeseen complications, and letting her go is even more impossible. In that case, kill her!" Medusa said coldly.

Yue Mei froze for a moment, not expecting her queen to suddenly change her mind. However, as Queen Medusa's most steadfast supporter, she did not hesitate. "Yes, Your Majesty!"

As soon as the words fell, dark green energy gathered in her hand and shot toward Yun Yun's heart.

Yun Yun was still dazed. Her mind had only just processed Medusa's sudden change in attitude when she saw Yue Mei's dark green energy attacking her.

She instinctively mobilized the Dou Qi within her body, but she had long been sealed. She could summon less than a tenth of her power, and the protective gauze she formed over her chest with all her strength shattered in the next instant.

Yun Yun's pupils contracted sharply. Beneath the threat of death, countless vivid memories surfaced in her mind.

Scenes of studying swordsmanship in the Misty Cloud Sect and cultivating under Yun Shan.

Scenes of taking Nalan Yanran as her disciple and teaching her with care.

And the most numerous, the clearest memories of all, were the days in the Magical Beast Mountain Range.

She had watched alchemy, yet all her attention had rested on the boy's serious face.

She had secretly watched the boy train his body. When he leaped out of the river, his solid, naked body was exposed to the air.

When she faced the Silver Moon Wolf King's attack and her heart nearly stopped, the boy had stood before her...

One scene after another flashed before her eyes. In her daze, Yun Yun even saw that figure who had occupied her thoughts for countless nights protecting her once again.

No... this did not seem to be an illusion!

"Queen, it would be better not to take things to such extremes." Xiao Yan's seemingly calm voice rang out.

The fabric over his chest had been corroded away by Yue Mei's attack, yet his flesh was completely unharmed. Instead, it exposed the slight bulge beneath, looking utterly suggestive.

Yun Yun looked at the back standing before her and listened to that incomparably familiar voice. Tears instantly welled in her eyes.

The sense of mortal danger vanished at once. The instant she realized who stood before her, an indescribably immense sense of security washed over her, making her body go soft.

The dignified Sect Master of the Misty Cloud Sect, one of the Jia Ma Empire's renowned Dou Emperor experts, an elegant noblewoman whom others dared not profane, now pressed herself against the back of the person before her like a little girl.

She did not understand why Xiao Huo was here.

Countless questions arose in her mind, but she did not ask them. Her lips trembled as she merely whispered, almost soundlessly, "Why are you here?"

Queen Medusa did her best to avoid looking at the torn area of Xiao Yan's clothing and asked coldly, "You know her?"

Xiao Yan nodded and admitted without hesitation, "We're the best partners."

"The best partners?" Medusa did not understand why a man and a woman would develop such a relationship, but that did not stop her from realizing that Xiao Yan and Yun Yun were extremely close.

At that thought, even her lovely lips drooped slightly, and an inexplicable feeling of betrayal surged within her.

Xiao Yan knew Yun Yun. Then was his deal with her genuine? Did he have some other motive as well?

Medusa narrowed her phoenix eyes. "It was not easy for you to cultivate to this point. Why ruin our cooperation for the sake of one woman?"

Xiao Yan shrugged. "Cultivating to this point has felt pretty easy to me."

Behind him, Yun Yun clenched her fists.

Xiao Yan made it sound easy, as though he had completely forgotten all the hardships he had endured.

But as an observer, Yun Yun knew very clearly just how much effort Xiao Yan had put in.

Out of twelve hours a day, his total rest time did not exceed one hour. The rest was all spent cultivating, practicing Dou Techniques, tempering his body, and refining medicine.

Other than that, he went into the Magical Beast Mountain Range to fight magical beasts.

She remembered how Xiao Yan had blocked the Silver Moon Wolf King's attack for her, his entire body covered in wounds.

It was as if he had deliberately or unconsciously glossed over or forgotten all of it.

"Since you have made your choice, do not blame me for showing no mercy. Today, both you and Sect Master Yun Yun will remain here!" Medusa's Peak Dou Emperor aura instantly bore down on Xiao Yan and Yun Yun.

In her senses, Xiao Yan possessed only Dou Wang-level Dou Qi cultivation.

Since Xiao Yan insisted on protecting Yun Yun, she did not mind killing him and taking the Green Lotus Core Flame!

"Queen Medusa, once we fight, you will understand just how sincere I was not to seize the Green Lotus Core Flame by force." Xiao Yan assumed a fighting stance, utterly fearless.

Without Yao Lao possessing him,

relying on the physique of a Tier Six Magical Beast and two Earth Rank Dou Techniques, he was confident that even against a Peak Dou Emperor like Medusa, he could fight and win!

"Arrogant!"

With a sweep of her hand, Medusa instantly flung out a violet energy ribbon, carrying enough power to severely wound a Dou Wang in an instant.

Xiao Yan raised an arm to block it. The attack landed on his arm without leaving even a mark, merely forcing him back two meters.

Medusa was startled by this. She then launched another attack, its energy transforming into two little violet snakes that bared their fangs and bit at Xiao Yan.

This strike was even more powerful. The little snakes tore through the air, their sharp fangs biting fiercely into Xiao Yan's arm and sinking into his flesh.

Xiao Yan immediately clenched his fist, his arm muscles bulging as the snakes' venomous fangs were instantly forced out.

He then followed up with two rapid punches. With two booming impacts, the little snakes were instantly blasted apart.

After this brief exchange, Medusa immediately realized that Xiao Yan's words had not been empty boasts.

He had taken two of her attacks head-on without suffering the slightest injury. Such a powerful body qualified him to fight her.

But if that was all he had, he was still far from being her opponent!

Medusa once again gathered the energy within her body, forming it into a massive violet serpent more than ten meters tall. Its long tongue flicked out as it charged fiercely at Xiao Yan.

Xiao Yan grinned as Dou Qi surged through his body toward both fists, drawing upon the power of heaven and earth to bolster them.

The two flames at the deepest part of his body also clung to his fists of their own accord, one red and one violet.

Aiming at the giant serpent's head, he threw a punch.

An Earth Rank Dou Technique,

"Flame Burst!"

Boom—!

Scorching waves of fire swept across the entire battlefield.

Yue Mei and Yun Yun, who were closest, were both blasted away.

Within the thick clouds of sand and dust, the intertwined red and violet flames still blazed brightly.

The head of the violet giant serpent Medusa had transformed into was deeply caved in, drenched in blood.

Then its body dispersed like flowing sand, leaving only Medusa standing there with blood at the corner of her lips, stubbornly forcing herself not to collapse.

Nearby, Xiao Yan's abdomen had been pierced clean through, and he was not in much better condition.

However, after taking a healing pill from his Storage Ring and swallowing it, his wound began to heal at a visible rate.

In merely a few breaths, his injuries had completely recovered.

He walked toward Queen Medusa and asked loudly, "Queen, are you convinced?"