Yue Guan's Demise, the Name of Heavenly Phoenix Douluo!

"Remember my name!"

The cold, commanding voice rang out like thunder from the highest heavens.

It exploded above the shattered domain, instantly vaporizing the curtain of rain that filled the sky.

"I am Leng Yaozhu, titled—Heavenly Phoenix!"

As the Two Extremes Stillness Domain was brutally torn apart, a terrifying backlash surged through its casters.

Yue Guan and Gui Mei shuddered as though struck by lightning, each coughing up a great mouthful of blood.

Their once-powerful auras instantly withered to their lowest ebb.

Yue Guan clutched his agonizing chest.

He stared fixedly at the crimson figure looking down on them from midair like a deity, his eyes filled with profound despair.

He knew better than anyone.

Against a terrifying existence of this caliber.

Unless one of them stayed behind and threw away his life to pay the price today, none of the three would escape alive!

"Old Ghost, Ling Yuan! You two are fast—go! Report everything here to His Holiness the Pope, without leaving out a single word!"

His eyes bloodshot, Yue Guan shoved Gui Mei away from his side.

He turned resolutely, facing that suffocating pressure.

Then he charged at Leng Yaozhu like a moth throwing itself into a flame.

"No! You damned chrysanthemum, if you're staying, we're staying together!" Gui Mei's eyes nearly split with anguish, and he instinctively turned to follow Yue Guan.

They had been partners through life and death for decades. How could he simply watch his old friend march to his doom?

Yet Yue Guan did not look back.

His deep-hued seventh and ninth Soul Rings erupted in dazzling golden light, one after the other.

"Martial Soul Avatar!"

"Ninth Soul Skill—Chrysanthemum Withered, Wounds Across the Ground, Falling Flowers Break the Heart!"

Boom!

The enormous singular velvet sky chrysanthemum shattered in midair, becoming a skyful of mournfully beautiful golden petals.

Each petal became a rapidly spinning crescent blade, instantly converging into a vast golden tornado that bridged heaven and earth.

This raging golden torrent did not merely slash toward Leng Yaozhu.

The shock waves of its eruption also completely sealed off Gui Mei's route back.

"Go!"

Yue Guan's piercing roar echoed through the storm.

Bloody tears streamed from Gui Mei's eyes as he clenched his teeth.

Seizing the tiny opening Yue Guan had bought with his life.

He grabbed the already terror-stricken Ling Yuan and became a streak of black shadow, fleeing frantically toward the horizon at incredible speed.

Facing the golden tornado of death powerful enough to tear mountains apart, Leng Yaozhu's breathtaking face showed not the slightest ripple of emotion.

She merely raised her chin slightly, and the fifth Soul Ring behind her quietly shone.

“Phoenix Fire Sweeps the Plains.”

She uttered the words with casual ease.

Towering crimson Heavenly Phoenix True Fire swept outward with the force of mountains toppling and seas overturning, like a blood sea from the deepest netherworld bursting its banks.

The golden tornado that seemed capable of destroying heaven and earth, upon touching the Heavenly Phoenix True Fire.

Could not last even a second before the extreme heat burned it into nothingness.

Yue Guan's figure, too, was utterly reduced to ash within that sea of fire.

Leng Yaozhu spared no further glance at the drifting ashes.

Instead, she turned her head and coldly watched Gui Mei and Ling Yuan, who had already fled far into the distance.

She slowly raised her right hand. Fire gathered in her palm, forming a Heavenly Phoenix Feather Spear blazing with searing heat.

She casually hefted it in her hand.

Her narrow phoenix eyes narrowed slightly, and her immense Spiritual Power instantly crossed the intervening space, locking firmly onto the two fugitives' course.

Whoosh!

She hurled the spear like a javelin!

The instant it left her hand.

The spear transformed into a flaming phoenix that beat its wings and gave a piercing cry, trailing a long tail of fire as it screamed toward the horizon.

"Boom!"

A ghastly cloud of bloody mist burst among the distant clouds.

Accompanied by two screams, those two auras instantly weakened, yet they still fled desperately into the distance.

Leng Yaozhu had not aimed to kill with that throw.

She wanted to leave those two with their last breaths so they could return and report to Spirit Hall.

But Yue Guan had to die!

That was her bottom line.

If others left her alone, she would leave them alone; if they attacked her, she would kill them!

She could hardly let people stalk her like a rat for three days, take their attack, and then fail to strike back and establish her might.

"Is this... the gap between a Demigod and everyone below that level?"

Sheltered in Leng Yaozhu's arms, Lu Xuan had witnessed this breathtaking scene firsthand.

Faced with a Martial Soul Fusion Skill unleashed by two level-95 Titled Douluos fighting for their lives.

And a Titled Douluo's suicidal strike.

Leng Yaozhu had handled everything with such relaxed ease that it was practically like crushing a few ants.

"Xiao Xuan, don't insult a Demigod's strength."

Leng Yaozhu chuckled and reached out to ruffle Lu Xuan's hair, her tone brimming with absolute pride.

"These clay chickens and pottery dogs aren't worthy of making me use my full strength."

With that, she landed deftly on the ground and began looting the remains.

After sweeping up all the high-grade Soul Tools and valuables Yue Guan had left behind.

She finally took Lu Xuan back to Dugu Bo's residence in Heaven Dou City as a streak of light, thoroughly satisfied.

Back at the residence, Lu Xuan looked around and suddenly remembered something. "Oh, right, where did Grandpa Dugu go?"

Logically, when they went out today.

Leng Yaozhu should have brought Dugu Bo, the local snake, along to deal with those tails.

"Oh, that old green-haired fellow."

Leng Yaozhu poured herself a cup of tea and answered casually.

"He said the constant rain lately had left his body feeling strange, so he went back to the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well early to recuperate in seclusion."

Rainy weather? His body feeling strange?

A flash of inspiration struck Lu Xuan, and he suddenly understood.

Heaven Dou City had been rainy for days. This muggy, damp weather was precisely when the poison within Dugu Bo flared up most painfully!

He had been so busy cultivating lately that he had forgotten all about the jade phosphorous serpent poison afflicting Dugu Bo and Dugu Yan!

"You mean Dugu Bo is suffering a backlash from his own poison?"

After hearing Lu Xuan's explanation, Leng Yaozhu's hand paused slightly around her teacup, and a trace of surprise crossed her exquisite face.

She had always known that Dugu Bo was poisonous from head to toe, and that he had even condensed a poison pill inside his body.

She had assumed it was some extreme cultivation method exclusive to the jade phosphorous serpent Martial Soul, so she had never asked much about it.

"To be precise, the reason most jade phosphorous serpent Soul Masters have short lives."

“It’s because as their soul power increases, they inevitably suffer a backlash from their own Poison. The higher their cultivation, the more deeply Poisoned they become.”

With a grave expression, Lu Xuan took out the Mysterious Heaven Treasure Record, which contained the Tang Sect Secret Arts.

He had two solutions available.

The first was the method used in the original story: using a Soul Bone as a vessel and forcing the Poison within the body into it for storage.

The second was to consume an immortal herb, directly causing the Martial Soul to evolve and mutate, or making the body immune to all Poison, thereby resolving the Poison backlash at its root!

He knew no other methods.

Lu Xuan closed the book and looked in the direction of the Ice and Fire Yin Yang Well.

When the time came, he would let Dugu Bo choose for himself.

However, given his understanding of Dugu Bo.

Dugu Bo would certainly give his granddaughter Dugu Yan the chance to consume an immortal herb and change her destiny without the slightest hesitation.

Yet a smile curled at the corner of Lu Xuan's mouth.

Immortal herbs were meant to nurture their own people in the first place, and now Grandpa Dugu and his granddaughter were firmly bound to their war chariot.

They counted as family, so naturally he would not be stingy with these treasures of heaven and earth.

However, only one herb suited Dugu Bo and his granddaughter: the earth dragon golden melon.

Consuming it might steer their Martial Souls toward the earth dragon.