"Yang Jian!"
Giant Spirit God's roar crushed the night.
"You surviving whelp of the Yang family! How dare you look at me like that?"
Above the clouds, a thousand heavenly soldiers raised their halberds as one.
Immortal light interwove as their battle formation spread, sealing off the entire sky above the ruined temple.
Giant Spirit God stood atop the clouds, several dozen feet tall, the Mountain-Splitting Giant Axe in his hand and fury churning in his eyes.
He had seen it clearly.
There had been no fear in Yang Jian's gaze just now.
Only a cold glint.
As though he were looking at cultivation resources delivered right to his door.
That sent Giant Spirit God's fury surging straight to the crown of his head.
He was the Heavenly Court's vanguard general.
He wielded immense strength and waged war across the lower realm.
If a mortal youth cowed him today, how could he ever stand in the Lingxiao Treasure Hall again?
"You gained a little sinister power, and now you dare defy Heaven?"
Giant Spirit God stepped forward.
The clouds beneath his feet exploded.
"Today, I'll subdue you with my own hands!"
As his words fell,
the Mountain-Splitting Giant Axe rose high.
Hummm!
Immortal patterns lit up along the axe blade.
Heavy streams of power descended, locking down Yang Jian's muscles, bones, blood, and soul.
Before the ruined temple,
Yang Jian slowly raised his head.
He did not retreat.
The eight divine elephant particles within him trembled at once.
Deep in his dantian, the Hell Furnace slowly turned.
Under Giant Spirit God's crushing pressure, the ninth divine elephant particle, covered in cracks, quivered wildly.
Just a little more.
Only one last sliver!
Yang Jian clenched his fists, his eyes growing brighter and brighter.
"Come."
His voice was soft.
Yet many heavenly soldiers on the clouds felt a chill seize their hearts.
Giant Spirit God's expression abruptly darkened.
"Die!"
The giant axe cleaved downward.
A thousand-foot arc of axe light tore through the night, crashing down upon his head with the might to split mountains and rend the earth!
Rumble!
The mountain forest shook.
Loose rocks tumbled.
Before the axe light even struck, its pressure had already gouged a deep fissure in the ground.
The ruined temple behind Yang Jian swayed violently in the gale.
Only the space around the altar remained still.
Within the statue,
Gu Changqing quietly watched it all.
He did not intervene.
Yang Jian had to fight this battle himself.
Giant Spirit God's pressure was precisely the flame needed to ignite the ninth divine elephant particle.
Boom!
When the axe light reached thirty feet above Yang Jian's head,
the crack-riddled divine elephant particle within him finally burst open!
A deep elephant's trumpet thundered from the depths of his flesh.
The ninth divine elephant particle had awakened!
In that instant,
nine torrents of crushing power surged through every limb and bone.
Yang Jian's blood energy soared.
Unable to withstand that power, the ground beneath his feet collapsed with a thunderous crash.
"Shatter!"
Yang Jian shot upward to meet the blow.
No immortal arts.
No magical treasures.
Only a single punch.
Nine phantom divine elephants flashed before his fist and vanished. All their power compressed into a single point and slammed into the thousand-foot arc of axe light.
Boom!
The deafening crash echoed throughout the mountains.
Axe light and fist collided, sending terrifying waves of force sweeping in every direction.
Mountain rocks shattered.
Ancient trees snapped.
A vast rift ripped through the clouds overhead.
The heavenly soldiers atop the clouds had still been sneering.
An instant later, every expression froze.
That arc of axe light, powerful enough to cleave a mountain, was breaking apart inch by inch beneath Yang Jian's fist.
Crack!
Crack!
Fractures crawled across the entire arc of axe light.
Then it exploded!
Immortal light scattered across the sky.
Yang Jian paused in midair for only a moment before charging straight at Giant Spirit God with even fiercer momentum.
"What?!"
Giant Spirit God's pupils contracted sharply.
Even an ordinary True Immortal would not dare take that axe strike head-on.
Yet Yang Jian had shattered it with his fist?
Just what was the origin of this boy's body?
There was no time to ponder it.
Yang Jian was already upon him.
That bloodstained fist rapidly swelled in Giant Spirit God's vision.
An unprecedented sense of danger instantly seized his mind.
"Mountain-Splitting Shield!"
Giant Spirit God roared.
He held his giant axe across his chest.
Immortal light surged from its broad blade, forming a thick shield of light.
This was a protective divine ability he had honed over years of military campaigns.
Within the Heavenly Court's Vanguard Camp, the Mountain-Splitting Shield was what gave him the confidence to rampage through the lower realm.
But this time,
the shield of light lasted only an instant.
Bang!
Yang Jian's fist struck.
The shield caved inward violently.
Cracks burst from its center, spreading across the entire massive shield in the blink of an eye.
Giant Spirit God's expression changed drastically.
"Impossible!"
Boom!
The Mountain-Splitting Shield exploded on the spot.
The punch's remaining force slammed into the head of the Mountain-Splitting Giant Axe without weakening.
Clang!
A deafening crash rang out like a great bell.
Blood seeped from the ears of many heavenly soldiers, and their battle formation shuddered.
Giant Spirit God's arms shook violently.
His divine body, famed for its immense strength, could not withstand this single punch.
A rapid succession of bone-cracking sounds rang out.
"Pfft!"
He spat out a mouthful of divine blood.
Giant Spirit God's enormous body flew backward and smashed through half a cliff face, divine blood spilling across the clouds.
Rumble!
The mountain shook violently.
Broken rocks came tumbling down.
Above the clouds, deathly silence reigned.
The thousand heavenly soldiers gripped their long halberds, every trace of arrogance gone from their faces.
What had they just witnessed?
Giant Spirit God had lost.
The Heavenly Court's vanguard general, renowned for his strength, had been sent flying by a single punch from Yang Jian!
"Is... is he really still a mortal?"
A heavenly soldier's voice trembled.
Dust billowed along the cliff face.
Giant Spirit God knelt amid the rubble, his chest caved in and his arms almost completely numb.
He looked up at Yang Jian in midair.
The youth's black hair streamed around him, his gaze chillingly cold.
Not the slightest hint of exhaustion
showed.
A chill gripped Giant Spirit God's heart.
I can't keep fighting.
If this goes on, that eerie furnace will refine me too!
No longer caring about his dignity as a vanguard general, Giant Spirit God bit through the tip of his tongue.
He spat a mouthful of divine blood into his palm.
"Mountain-Splitting Escape!"
Boom!
Dazzling golden light flared across his battered armor.
A blood-red path through the clouds was forcibly torn open.
Yang Jian's gaze sharpened, and he was about to pursue and kill him.
Just then, Gu Changqing's divine sense reached into his mind.
"Let him go."
Yang Jian's fist paused.
Within the blood-red cloud path, Giant Spirit God glanced back at him.
Just one glance.
It chilled Giant Spirit God to his very soul.
What he saw in Yang Jian was no longer a mortal youth.
He was a ferocious god the Heavenly Court itself had forced into being!
"Retreat!"
The Giant Spirit God roared hoarsely.
But the moment he finished shouting, he had already turned into a streak of blood-red divine light, fleeing madly toward the South Heaven Gate.
He did not even dare wait for the Heavenly Soldiers behind him.
The Heavenly Soldiers on the clouds fell into utter chaos.
Their commander had fled.
Their battle formation had fallen apart as well.
"The general's gone!"
"Fall back!"
"This brat has demonic arts! Get back to the South Heaven Gate!"
No one knew who shouted first.
The next instant, a thousand Heavenly Soldiers turned and fled in disarray.
Cloudlight scattered in every direction.
The clatter of armor dissolved into a chaotic din.
Yang Jian watched them flee, not a trace of pity in his eyes.
During the day, these men had hunted him and Xiaochan on orders.
Without the art his master had bestowed upon him, he and his sister would have been the ones dragged back to the Heavenly Court now.
"Think you can leave?"
Yang Jian raised his right hand.
Within his dantian, the Hell Furnace suddenly shook.
Dark-gold divine flames surged upward.
"Hell Furnace, refine the formation!"
Boom!
The battle formation the thousand Heavenly Soldiers had formed earlier had not yet fully dispersed.
Its lingering channels of magical power still clung to them like an invisible net.
With this activation from Yang Jian,
the Hell Furnace's aura instantly locked onto the entire battle formation.
The few Heavenly Soldiers fleeing fastest suddenly froze.
Then, to their horror, they discovered that the immortal power within them was flowing backward beyond their control.
"My magical power!"
"The formation is dragging me back!"
"Save me!"
Screams rang out one after another.
Dark-gold fire spread through the void, following the formation's channels to coil around every Heavenly Soldier.
Caught by the formation's lingering traces, they fell one after another into the Hell Furnace's aura.
Immortal bodies.
Magical power.
The spiritual essence of their weapons and armor.
All were refined away layer by layer by the dark-gold divine flames, becoming wisps of pure source essence that poured into Yang Jian's body.
Boom!
The tenth divine elephant particle began to tremble.
Yang Jian's blood and vital energy surged throughout his body.
The Hell Furnace spun faster and faster.
With every Heavenly Soldier he refined, the power within him grew heavier and stronger.
In the sky, flight became a rout.
The rout became despair.
"General Giant Spirit God!"
"Save me!"
"I don't want to die!"
At the end of the blood-red cloud path,
the Giant Spirit God heard the screams behind him and could not help glancing back.
Dark-gold divine flames filled the night sky.
The formation of Heavenly Soldiers he had brought was being devoured and refined by Yang Jian, mouthful by mouthful.
The Giant Spirit God's pupils shook violently.
He wanted to save them.
But that punch had already scattered his immortal power.
More importantly, he did not dare turn back.
He feared that if he turned back, that uncanny furnace would swallow him too.
Gritting his teeth, the Giant Spirit God burned his remaining divine power, and the light carrying him away surged once more.
"Yang Jian..."
"This must be reported to His Majesty!"
"There must be some great terror behind this brat!"
Covered in divine blood, he fled toward the Nine Heavens.
Inside the ruined temple.
Upon the divine altar.
Gu Changqing sat steadily within the divine statue, taking in everything outside.
The dark-gold divine flames shone upon the statue's surface, making its ancient face look all the more unfathomable.
The Giant Spirit God had escaped.
Gu Changqing had deliberately let him go.
A dead divine general of the Heavenly Court would only bring fiercer pursuers.
Only a Giant Spirit God who escaped back could turn Yang Jian's name into a source of dread within the Lingxiao Treasure Hall.
Gu Changqing had never wanted merely to kill a few Heavenly Soldiers and Generals.
He wanted the Heavenly Court to understand.
Someone stood behind Yang Jian.
His disciple was not to be touched.
Just then,
the system's notification sounded.
[Ding!] [Detected that your disciple "Yang Jian" has cultivated "Divine Elephant Suppressing Prison Force" and "Hell Furnace," severely wounded the Heavenly Court's divine general Giant Spirit God, and refined the source essence of a Heavenly Soldier battle formation!] [Ten-thousandfold critical return triggered!] [Congratulations, host! Obtained: one million years of cultivation!] [Congratulations, host! Obtained: Divine Elephant Suppressing Prison Force · minor attainment in law comprehension!] [Congratulations, host! Obtained: Hell Furnace · one wisp of source divine flame!] [Congratulations, host! Obtained: one wisp of the Giant Spirit God's divine power source essence!]
Boom!
A vast torrent of energy poured into the divine statue.
Gu Changqing's divine soul suddenly grew more solid.
One million years of cultivation thundered within his divine embryo, driving his cultivation realm upward without pause.
Mid-stage Heavenly Immortal.
Late-stage Heavenly Immortal.
Perfected Heavenly Immortal.
Only at the threshold of True Immortal did the statue itself firmly hold that returning power in check.
The dark-gold patterns on the statue's surface grew deeper.
The Hell Furnace's source divine flame coiled deep within his divine embryo, expanding his Divine Realm along with it.
Within a ten-mile radius, the workings of heaven grew even more obscured.
Any ordinary immortal or god attempting to peer into this place would see only a dilapidated mountain god temple.
Feeling the power within him, Gu Changqing finally gained a little more confidence.
"The rewards from this battle were richer than I expected."
His gaze passed beyond the temple doors toward the direction in which the Giant Spirit God had fled.
That vanguard general of the Heavenly Court had already had his courage shattered.
After this night,
Yang Jian's name would surely be spoken in the Lingxiao Treasure Hall.
Outside the temple,
the battle formation's lingering immortal light was completely refined away by the dark-gold flames.
The night sky fell quiet once more.
Hovering in midair, Yang Jian slowly exhaled a breath of
stale air.
The tenth divine elephant particle fully lit up within him.
Ten streams of ancient mammoth power shook his flesh and blood.
His aura was far stronger than before the battle.
Yang Jian descended to the ground.
He looked toward the direction in which the Giant Spirit God had escaped, the chill in his eyes still lingering.
A moment later,
Yang Jian withdrew his gaze and turned to look east.
At the edge of the night, the mountains stood silent.
But he knew.
There was a mountain there.
Peach Mountain.
His mother was imprisoned beneath it.
Yang Jian slowly clenched his fists.
The ten divine elephant particles within him trembled in unison.
"Mother..."
"Wait for me."