The Overture of Collapse

Qi Heng's fist was tightly wrapped in golden aura. The entire mass of flames seemed alive as it spun, surged, and crashed forward, peeling away the purple Destruction energy coating his fist inch by inch, tearing it into fragments before devouring it completely.

Every instant the aura ripped through the Destruction energy, it unleashed a piercing annihilation shriek that made one's teeth ache.

Strange, fine lines gradually surfaced across the energy sphere Champa had formed with all his strength—not cracks caused by an external impact, but fractures spreading outward from the sphere's very core, splitting layer by layer like a spiderweb.

Qi Heng's power had pierced straight through the Destruction energy's defenses, carving the prelude to collapse into its most vulnerable interior.

"Impossible..." The muscles in Champa's cheeks twitched violently as he forced the words from deep in his throat, his voice filled with shock. "That was an attack I put absolutely everything into..."

Before he could finish, the energy sphere changed.

Rather than exploding with the deafening boom he had expected, it let out a crisp, shrill wail like shattering crystal.

The sphere instantly fell apart, turning into countless purple shards of light of varying sizes that scattered in every direction.

Every speck of light carried the aura of destruction, enough to effortlessly flatten mountain ranges and vaporize oceans.

Yet the moment those purple fragments touched the golden aura still blazing around Qi Heng, they vanished without a trace in the blink of an eye, like snowflakes falling into a furnace.

Qi Heng's figure suddenly burst through the swirling purple fragments and shot forward! He still held his punching stance, right fist extended, his entire body drawn taut like a bow, every line of muscle exposed beneath his tattered clothes.

The golden aura continued to flicker, waxing and waning, yet never going out as it trailed a dazzling tail of light behind him.

He crossed the realm of death, ignoring the still-flying fragments of Destruction light, his whole body transforming into an unstoppable golden meteor. His speed soared to its limit in that instant as he charged straight at Champa, who had yet to recover from his shock.

The air was torn apart by his body, producing a sharp, piercing explosion.

Even space itself was pulled into faint ripples.

Within Champa's pupils, that golden meteor grew larger and larger, already right before him.

Too fast! He had no time to make a careful dodge. Instinctively, he crossed his thick arms before him as purple Destruction energy surged wildly into them.

Purple light churned violently, instantly condensing into a heavy, profound diamond-shaped energy barrier. Purple lightning coiled across its surface, and its aura was frighteningly cold as it stood between him and Qi Heng.

The barrier had only just formed when Qi Heng's fist arrived.

No flourish, no change of technique—only speed and power at their absolute peak, all crashing into the very center of the barrier!

Boom—!!!

A dull blast erupted, as though it had detonated directly within their souls.

The point where fist and barrier met first caved in sharply, then erupted with blinding golden and purple light!

A terrifying shockwave spread along the shattered ground from the point of impact, blowing away every remaining boulder and leaving behind an enormous, smooth crater.

"Boom—!!!"

It seemed as though nothing remained between heaven and earth but that thunderous roar.

Golden light and the purple barrier collided at a single point in the void like two stars crashing head-on.

But this clash was unbalanced from the very beginning.

That golden light was no longer as restrained as before. The instant it made contact, all its energy erupted completely like an exploding star—violent, frenzied, utterly without reservation. Like a supernova, it swallowed everything around it.

The broken clouds, the cracked earth, and the surviving fragments of stars in the distance were all bleached white by the golden radiance.

The light was so intense that it even briefly dispelled the perpetual gloom of this divine realm.

Before that pure radiance of destruction, the seemingly indestructible purple barrier finally released a wail as it reached its limit.

It held for less than a second before a tiny yet dazzling crack suddenly appeared, as though cleaved open by an invisible blade.

Then came a second, a third... Cracks multiplied wildly, intertwining and spreading until they covered the entire barrier in the blink of an eye, like a giant web of despair.

Fragments of purple energy began to peel away and drift off, only to be swallowed by the even fiercer golden light the instant they emerged.

Then—

"Crack... Crash!!!"

The barrier shattered completely.

It did not slowly break apart. Like glass smashed by a heavy hammer, it burst into countless shards of purple light that flew in all directions, only to be instantly consumed by the golden torrent.

Behind the barrier, Champa's crossed arms were completely exposed beneath Qi Heng's fist.

Qi Heng's fist was still wreathed in thick golden aura, like it was dragging a roaring golden dragon behind it. It tore through the fading rain of purple light and struck solidly against the point where Champa's arms crossed!

At the instant of contact, time seemed to stretch.

Purple divine markings flashed wildly across Champa's arms as they desperately resisted that overwhelming force.

But immediately afterward came a scalp-numbing series of "Creak... creak..." sounds—not metal, but the groan of a god's bones beneath extreme pressure.

The muscles in his arms visibly sank and convulsed. Tiny tears split open across his skin, and droplets of purple-gold divine blood seeped out.

"Urgh—!"

Champa's pupils contracted sharply as a muffled groan escaped his mouth.

His massive body could no longer remain standing.

The next moment, it was as if he had been struck by a mountain moving at high speed, or hurled away by an ancient catapult. He became a blurred purple afterimage, flying backward at a terrifying speed!

The air along his path was compressed to the extreme, exploding into rings of milky-white vapor clouds one after another. Sonic booms rang out continuously, as though he had ripped a wound through the sky.

He first streaked like a meteor over the bottomless giant crater below, the gale sweeping dust and residual energy from the pit floor high into the sky.

Then he skimmed across ground cracked like a dried riverbed, the shockwave ripping up every already-fragile layer of rock.

Finally, his back slammed viciously into an ancient stone pillar towering a thousand meters high, one that had yet to collapse completely.

"Bang—Rumble!"

The stone pillar snapped at once, its upper half exploding into countless chunks of rock beneath the immense force, crashing down amid billowing dust.

Yet Champa's backward flight barely slowed as he continued shooting away. Only the streak of violet-gold blood at the corner of his mouth drew a long, mournful arc through the air, like tears shed when a god fell.

At last, after flying several thousand meters, he crashed like a falling meteor into the very edge of the floating continent.

"BOOM—!!!!!"

A colossal roar, more earth-shaking and profound than any of the previous impacts, rang out.

The entire continent trembled with it, groaning in anguish.