The End of the Battle, Tang Hao's Death

The battle had been deadlocked for far too long. The blood-red glow of Divine Slaughter's Domain and the thunderous power of the Blue Lightning True Body repeatedly tore at each other in midair, neither side able to completely overwhelm the other in a short time.

Every strike of Tang Hao's Clear Sky Hammer still carried earth-shattering force, but Yu Yuanzhen sharply noticed that his hammer swings were half a beat slower than at the start of the battle.

Yu Yuanzhen deflected a heavy blow from Tang Hao, using the recoil to retreat three steps. His gaze swept over Yu Luomian and Yu Jin. The three exchanged looks, needing no words. The lightning around Yu Yuanzhen suddenly contracted, and his ninth soul ring lit up. A massive dragon phantom formed entirely from lightning surged skyward from his body, its head raised high as its roar shook the nine heavens.

"Ninth Soul Skill, True Dragon's Wrath, Sound Shaking the Nine Heavens!"

At that very moment, Yu Luomian's ninth soul ring lit up as well. The blue thunder dragon let out a skyward roar, and the electric arcs around its body shifted from blue to pitch-black. This was the sign that lightning power had been pushed to its extreme. His foundation was not as deep as Yu Yuanzhen's, and the ninth soul skill placed an enormous burden on him in his current state, but he held nothing back.

Yu Jin lit up his eighth soul ring, pouring every last bit of his remaining Soul Power into this strike. His Thunder Hawk martial soul emitted a shrill cry, and the lightning around it transformed into countless fine thunder needles that poured down like a torrential rain.

The three soul skills blasted toward Tang Hao from three directions at once. Blazing white thunder dragons, pitch-black dark lightning, and dense thunder needles intertwined in midair into a thunder prison capable of destroying heaven and earth, sealing off every possible route of escape around Tang Hao.

Tang Hao stood at the center of the thunder prison. His breathing was heavy, and the web of his hand gripping the hammer had split open, blood dripping down the hammer's handle. Facing the full-force attacks of three Title Douluo, even as the Clear Sky Douluo, meeting them head-on meant near-certain death. Yet if he did not take them head-on, there would be no chance of survival at all.

Tang Hao held the Clear Sky Hammer across his chest and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, every emotion had vanished from his gaze, leaving only a nearly mad determination.

"Great Sumeru Hammer, secret art, Ring Detonation."

His first soul ring exploded. The yellow ring shattered into countless tiny motes of light, and a violent energy surged from the broken soul ring into Tang Hao's body. Then the second soul ring exploded, followed by the third, the fourth, and the fifth. Two yellow and three purple soul rings—all five rings shattered.

Five violent currents of energy rampaged through his meridians. Countless blood-red fissures appeared across his skin, a sign that his meridians were beginning to rupture under the unbearable force of the detonated rings.

These five soul rings were the limit of what his current body could withstand from Ring Detonation. After absorbing the power of all five rings, the Great Sumeru Hammer expanded by an entire size. Every inscription on its surface lit up, its crimson glow so intense that it seemed ready to drip blood.

The three soul skills collided with the Great Sumeru Hammer.

Blinding white light exploded through the forest. Every tree within two hundred paces was uprooted by the shockwave, while earth and shattered stone were hurled into the sky by the blast, forming a small mushroom cloud.

At the center of the collision, the ground collapsed into a deep crater dozens of paces wide. The soil at its bottom had been scorched by the extreme heat into glass-like crystals. The entire night sky north of Suotuo City was illuminated as brightly as day, and the guards on the city walls looked up in shock toward the apocalyptic sight in the north.

As the light faded, Yu Yuanzhen knelt on one knee at the edge of the crater, his right hand braced against the ground and a streak of blood hanging from the corner of his mouth. More than half of his nine soul rings had dimmed. Yu Luomian leaned against the trunk of an ancient tree that had been blasted apart halfway up, his dark-purple robe in tatters and his chest rising and falling violently. Yu Jin was in the worst condition. He sat collapsed atop a pile of rubble, his Thunder Hawk martial soul withdrawn into his body, not a trace of color left in his face.

Tang Hao stood at the center of the crater, drenched in blood. The upper half of his cloak had been completely reduced to scraps, exposing a body covered in old scars and fresh cracks. The arm holding the Clear Sky Hammer trembled without pause, blood continuously dripping through his fingers. The backlash from Ring Detonation, compounded by the direct impact of the three soul skills, had inflicted tremendous trauma upon his internal organs. At least half his ribs were broken.

Yet he remained standing. The Clear Sky Hammer supported him against the ground, keeping his body from collapsing. He drew a deep breath, blood spilling from the corner of his mouth and dripping down his chin. Tang Hao turned, attempting to flee deeper into the forest under the cover of the lingering energy from Ring Detonation and the smoke and dust.

"Thunder Punishment Chain."

Six chains tore through the smoke and dust, shooting from Yu Yuanzhen's hand. The chains were forged from solidified lightning, each as thick as an adult's arm. Countless tiny arcs of electricity coiled around them, crackling continuously.

The six chains precisely wrapped around Tang Hao's limbs, waist, and neck, and the paralysis of lightning instantly spread through his entire body. Tang Hao's body stiffened abruptly. The last trace of Soul Power he had just gathered was used to cast Clear Sky Body Protection, but before the chains, Clear Sky Body Protection was utterly useless.

Yu Yuanzhen pushed himself to his feet, not even having time to wipe the blood from his mouth. His right hand maintained control of the Thunder Punishment Chain while his left hand gestured to Yu Luomian and Yu Jin. Yu Luomian straightened from the tree trunk as the thunder dragon condensed once more, cutting in from the left. Yu Jin gritted his teeth and forcibly roused the last trace of his Soul Power. The Thunder Hawk soared into the air again, the remaining lightning on its talons gathering into one final sharp edge as he cut in from the right.

Yu Yuanzhen grasped the Thunder Punishment Chain with both hands and violently pulled, fixing Tang Hao's body in midair. Then he charged straight at him. The phantom of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon lit up behind him one final time, and its dragon claw, wrapped in the last remnants of thunderous power, shot directly toward Tang Hao's heart.

Three attacks pierced through Tang Hao's body simultaneously from three different angles. Yu Yuanzhen's thunder dragon claw penetrated the center of his chest. Yu Luomian's dark lightning dragon claw tore open his back. Yu Jin's Thunder Hawk talons pierced through his side.

Tang Hao's body jolted violently at the point where the three attacks converged, then completely lost all strength. The Thunder Punishment Chain slowly loosened, and his body fell from midair, crashing heavily onto the glass-like ground at the bottom of the crater.

The smoke and dust slowly dispersed. Tang Hao lay on the ground, and his tattered brown cloak finally fell completely apart, revealing his weathered face, covered in scars. His eyes remained open, looking toward some distant place in the night sky. There lay the former site of the Clear Sky Sect, the beginning of all his youthful glory and regrets.

Yu Yuanzhen lowered his head to look at Tang Hao's corpse. After a long silence, he said, "Worthy of the youngest Title Douluo on the continent. I admire such methods. But your death was inevitable. You have no one else to blame."

Yu Luomian and Yu Jin also straightened their bodies and each voiced their own thoughts.

At the edge of the forest, moonlight spilled from behind the clouds once more, shining upon Tang Hao's corpse, now utterly devoid of life, and upon Yu Tianlin's face. He looked toward the bottom of the crater without any unnecessary expression, merely silently remembering a name: Tang San. Tang Hao was dead, but his son still lived. Wildfire could not burn it all away; to pull up weeds, one had to remove the roots.