That palm pressed down, utterly unremarkably, right into Tang Hao's escape path.
Bang!
The next second, Tang Hao violently spat out another mouthful of blood.
He flew backward even faster than he had come, slamming heavily into the edge of the enormous fissure from before.
Dust billowed.
Countless bones in Tang Hao's body had broken, and he lay on the ground like a puddle of sludge.
Space rippled, and Di Tian's figure slowly emerged before him.
"Go on, run."
Di Tian looked down at him, his voice calm. "Why aren't you running anymore?"
Tang Hao raised his head with difficulty, his mouth full of dark blood.
He looked at Da Ming and Er Ming, still prostrate on the ground nearby, and the more than ten thousand soul beasts that dared not even breathe loudly.
Only at this moment did he finally understand.
These high-ranking soul beasts had never been afraid of him, Tang Hao.
Nor were they afraid of the black-robed man named Di Tian before him.
"You... you..."
Tang Hao gasped for breath, his gaze laboriously following the fissure downward.
"What exactly is down there?"
At his words, Di Tian also followed Tang Hao's gaze and glanced underground.
"Human, you are very fortunate."
As he spoke, Di Tian slowly raised his right hand, and a mass of ink-black destruction energy rapidly gathered in his palm.
"To die on the fringe of the Dragon Ancestor's breath is a blessing an ant like you couldn't earn through several lifetimes of cultivation."
With those words, Di Tian struck down mercilessly with his palm.
The pitch-black energy instantly transformed into an enormous black dragon claw, hurtling straight toward Tang Hao's skull.
That enormous, pitch-black dragon claw was about to fall.
At the threshold of life and death, Tang Hao panicked completely.
Where was even a trace of his former, insufferably arrogant bearing as the Clear Sky Douluo?
"Don't kill me!"
"I came for my son and Xiao Wu!"
Tang Hao stared fixedly at the claw just inches away and roared frantically.
Hearing the name "Xiao Wu," Di Tian paused slightly.
The black dragon claw, radiating an aura of destruction, stopped dead less than half an inch above Tang Hao's head.
The violent wind swept past, shearing off a large patch of Tang Hao's short hair and drawing thin traces of blood from his scalp.
Seeing him stop, Tang Hao was like a man clutching at a life-saving straw.
To stay alive, he could no longer spare a thought for his dignity as a powerful human. Gasping for breath, he hurriedly spoke.
"Senior!"
"My wife was also a hundred-thousand-year soul beast! She took human form as a hundred-thousand-year Blue Silver Emperor!"
"When you think about it, we're family! We're on the same side!"
"I only came because I heard a soul beast had taken Xiao Wu. I feared something might happen, so I rushed over!"
Hearing this, Di Tian narrowed his eyes.
"Family?"
At those words, Di Tian could not help sneering, his dark-gold slit pupils filled with mockery.
"A human marries a hundred-thousand-year soul beast and thinks that makes him part of the Soul Beast Clan?"
"When that broken hammer of yours came smashing down just now, I certainly didn't see you treating anyone as family."
Under Di Tian's barrage of ridicule, Tang Hao's weathered face flushed red.
But with his bones shattered and his life hanging by a thread, he dared not utter a single word in rebuttal.
Just then.
From the darkness nearby, a clear, anxious voice suddenly rang out.
"Senior Di Tian, please show mercy!"
Hearing it, Tang Hao abruptly turned his head.
A pink figure hurried out from behind Da Ming and Er Ming's enormous bodies.
It was Xiao Wu!
Having broken through her bottleneck in the Dragon Ancestor's golden light just now, Xiao Wu still faintly radiated a trace of holy aura.
She glanced at Tang Hao, who lay on the ground like a dead dog, and a trace of complicated feeling flashed through her eyes.
Whatever else he might be, he was Tang San's father.
Although she had hardened her heart and driven Tang San away, deciding to remain and serve that great being, she did not want to see Tang San's father die here.
"Xiao Wu?!"
Seeing Xiao Wu safe and sound, with even her clothes undisturbed, Tang Hao froze.
"They didn't..."
"Your Excellency Haotian, I'm fine," Xiao Wu interrupted him directly.
Then Xiao Wu turned to face Di Tian.
The next second, her knees bent, and she knelt straight down.
"Senior Di Tian, he's my... a friend of mine's father."
"He was only anxious to save someone. He didn't know this was the Dragon Ancestor's resting place."
Xiao Wu bit her lip and pressed her forehead to the ground.
"Please, for my sake, spare his life!"
Seeing Xiao Wu actually kneel and plead with a soul beast in human form, Tang Hao was utterly dumbfounded.
He was the illustrious Clear Sky Douluo!
Since when had he needed a hundred-thousand-year soul beast to plead for his life?
And Xiao Wu called the other party her senior? She had even mentioned some "Dragon Ancestor's resting place"?
Tang Hao's mind raced, cold sweat breaking out in layer after layer.
What earth-shattering secret was hidden here?
Meanwhile, looking at Xiao Wu kneeling on the ground, Di Tian frowned slightly.
Under normal circumstances, he would long since have slapped a human who dared run wild in the core of Star Dou Great Forest into a pulp.
But things were different now.
Xiao Wu had just bathed in the Dragon Ancestor's blood qi aftershock!
Moreover, their lord, Gu Yuena, had ordered them to gather all soul beasts to serve the Dragon Ancestor together.
This little rabbit now counted among the first followers under the Dragon Ancestor.
"For your sake?"
Di Tian snorted coldly and slowly withdrew his palm.
"You little girl certainly have good fortune, basking in the Dragon Ancestor's glory."
As he spoke, Di Tian glanced down at Tang Hao.
"Consider yourself lucky today."
"But though you may escape death, you cannot escape punishment!"
With those words, Di Tian abruptly raised his right foot.
Bang!
He mercilessly stamped down on Tang Hao's back!
"Aah!"
Tang Hao immediately let out a wretched scream, his entire body convulsing.
To his horror, he discovered that the meridians inside him, already in turmoil from his martial soul shattering, were now being sealed inch by inch by this overbearing soul power!
Pfft!
The next second, Tang Hao spat out another great mouthful of dark blood mixed with fragments of his internal organs.
He could clearly feel his formerly surging rank-ninety-five soul power draining away wildly, like air escaping a punctured ball!
Rank ninety-four, rank ninety-three...
In just a few breaths, he could barely even maintain his standing as a Titled Douluo!
"You... you crippled my cultivation?"
Tang Hao lay limp on the ground, looking at Di Tian in despair.
For a powerful man, being stripped of his strength was more agonizing than being killed.
Hearing this, Di Tian coldly withdrew his foot.
"Not killing you was already an immense mercy."
As he spoke, Di Tian clasped his hands behind his back, his gaze imperious.
"Get lost."
"And take a message back to your human world for me."
"From today onward, Star Dou Great Forest is completely closed!"
"If anyone dares set even half a foot inside and disturb the Dragon Ancestor's slumber..."
With those words, a savage might capable of destroying heaven and earth erupted from Di Tian.
"I shall unleash a beast tide and raze every city you humans possess!"
Hearing those words, Tang Hao felt as though he had plunged into an ice cellar.
He knew the skies over Douluo Continent were about to change!
This terrifying ferocious beast named Di Tian absolutely had the strength to make good on his words.
Tang Hao struggled to prop up his upper body with both hands and looked toward Xiao Wu beside him.
"Xiao Wu..."
He gritted his teeth, his eyes filled with unwillingness.
"Come with me! San is still waiting for you outside!"
"It's too dangerous here. If you stay, sooner or later they'll..."
But before Tang Hao could finish speaking.
"Your Excellency Haotian, leave."
Xiao Wu shook her head, her voice extraordinarily calm, even carrying a note of absolute resolve.
"I won't go with you."
"And I will never return to the human world again."
"Go back and tell Brother San to consider... the Xiao Wu he once knew dead."
Hearing this, Tang Hao froze completely.
He had never imagined that the girl his son yearned for, the girl he would even risk his life to save, would say such things.
Not only would she refuse to leave, she would even sever all ties with Tang San?
"You..."
Tang Hao wanted to say more, but seeing Di Tian's increasingly icy gaze, he was frightened into hastily shutting his mouth.
If he kept talking, he would never leave this forest alive today.
The next second, enduring the excruciating pain of his ruptured meridians, Tang Hao stumbled toward the forest's edge like a stray dog that had lost its home.
Watching Tang Hao disappear completely into the night.
Xiao Wu took a deep breath, turned around, and faced the enormous fissure again, her gaze becoming utterly resolute.
Meanwhile.
Slaughter City, the underground Blood Pool.
"You blind beast!"
"Do you have any fucking idea what you just smashed?!"
The King of Slaughter's eyes were bloodshot as he seized Tang San's collar, spittle flying.
Right now, he even wanted to tear Tang San apart alive.
He had finally managed to seal the Blood Pool, precisely because he feared its aura might leak out and disturb the being underground.
Yet this brat had not only barged in, but even swung his hammer and smashed it straight down!
The little fucker must have thought he had lived too long and wanted to drag all of Slaughter City into the grave with him!
At this moment, although both Tang San's arms were broken and his face was deathly pale, his gaze remained stubborn.
Hearing the King of Slaughter's furious abuse, he not only showed no fear but instead sneered.
"All this supernatural smoke and mirrors!"
"Isn't it just the energy hub of some lousy formation?"
"The fact that my Clear Sky Hammer couldn't smash it only proves the material used to forge this hub is somewhat unusual."
"King of Slaughter, since you don't dare accept my challenge and open the trial for the Divine Slaughter's Domain, why bother making such a pathetic excuse?"
Tang San's face was full of arrogance. He was certain the other party was bluffing.
Hearing this, the King of Slaughter laughed outright in fury.
"A formation?"
"A hub?"
"Hahaha..." The King of Slaughter laughed until tears nearly spilled from his eyes, looking at Tang San as though he were the greatest fucking idiot alive.
"Did that worthless father of yours never teach you what it means to show reverence?"
As he spoke, the King of Slaughter seized Tang San by the throat, lifted him bodily off the ground, and forcibly dragged him to the edge of the Blood Pool.
"Open those damned eyes of yours and take a good look!"
The King of Slaughter pointed at the enormous dark-gold "pillar" in the center of the Blood Pool.
"That isn't a fucking pillar!"
"It's a living whisker!"
"A whisker that pierced through the rock from underground, with only a tiny section hanging down into Slaughter City!"
At those words, the sneer on Tang San's face instantly froze.
A dragon's whisker?
At those two words, Tang San's pupils trembled violently.
"Impossible! Absolutely impossible!"
The next second, Tang San began struggling frantically, his eyes bloodshot as he roared:
"How could a creature that huge possibly exist in this world?"
"Do you think making up such an absurd lie can hide the cowardice that keeps you from accepting my challenge?!"
As far as he knew, even a hundred-thousand-year-old Titan Giant Ape was only the size of a small hill.
A single whisker was dozens of meters thick?
This completely overturned his worldview as a transmigrator who had lived two lives and as a Tang Sect disciple!
Seeing Tang San remain so stubbornly impervious to reason, the King of Slaughter lost all patience.
"Idiot."
He no longer had even the desire to explain.
Explain what a Starry Sky Behemoth was to a frog at the bottom of a well who had never seen the world? What a waste of breath!
As his words fell, the King of Slaughter violently flung Tang San away as though throwing out trash.
Bang!
Tang San slammed heavily into the passage's hard wall. His already broken arms suffered another devastating blow, and his eyes rolled back as he passed out on the spot.
"Seal this passage shut with molten iron!"
The King of Slaughter turned and bellowed at Scott, who stood nearby, beside himself with rage.
"Post a hundred enforcement squads here to watch it day and night!"
"If anyone dares let so much as a fly in here again, I'll throw him straight into the Blood Pool to feed the dragon's whisker!"
Meanwhile.
On the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest.
Thud!
A blood-soaked figure crashed heavily onto a muddy main road.
It was none other than Tang Hao, who had fought desperately to escape.
He was now in an utterly wretched state.
Not only had the Great Sumeru Hammer, the Number One Tool Martial Soul in the World, been shattered, but most of the meridians in his body had also been destroyed by Di Tian's savage dark soul power.
His cultivation had now even fallen to the Soul Douluo level, and he could no longer defeat even an ordinary Titled Douluo.
"Di Tian, Dragon Ancestor..."
Tang Hao lay in the muddy water, gasping for breath.
He stared fixedly toward the depths of the Star Dou Great Forest, his eyes brimming with bitter refusal to accept this.
He could not accept it!
He was the mighty Clear Sky Douluo, who had swept across the continent for decades. Even the Former Pope of Spirit Hall had been killed by a single strike of his hammer.
Yet today, he had been trampled underfoot like a dog before a Soul Beast.
Not only had his cultivation been crippled, but he no longer even had the ability to avenge his son and bring back his daughter-in-law!
"Since you won't let me live in peace, you beasts can forget about having any peace yourselves!"
Tang Hao gritted his teeth, a glint of frenzied calculation flashing through his eyes.
He was no fool.
He knew very well that, on his own, he would never be able to take revenge on that monster named Di Tian in this lifetime.
Even if the entire Clear Sky Sect came out in full force, they would not be enough to fill the gaps between the teeth of a Ferocious Beast of that level.
To take revenge, he had to kill with a borrowed blade!
Borrow the blades of every top expert on the continent!
"Di Tian, didn't you say you were going to seal off the forest?"
"Didn't you say you would raze human cities if anyone dared enter?"
"Then I'll make everyone in the world go looking for you in the Star Dou Great Forest!"
Tang Hao struggled to his feet, a sinister sneer curling his lips.
What was humanity's greatest weakness?
Greed!
With enough profit at stake, those lofty Titled Douluo would charge in like moths to a flame, even knowing full well they would die.
"The soul ring and soul bone of a Hundred-Thousand-Year Soul Beast alone are enough to drive people mad."
"Then what if... it were an unparalleled Ferocious Beast beyond all understanding of the hundred-thousand-year threshold?"
"What if, underground beneath that Ferocious Beast's protection, there were an ancient treasure that could let someone break straight through to Level 100 and become a god on the spot?"
At that thought, Tang Hao made up his mind completely.
He would spread word of tonight's encounter, adding oil and vinegar to the tale.
Before you continue