"It is fortunate... fortunate that our Hongchen family, because of Xiao Meng, chose to stand on the side of Sea Abyss City early on. Otherwise, today, our family would likely have been buried alongside this empire."
Jing Hongchen's gaze fell upon his granddaughter, Meng Hongchen, who was closely following beside Lu Jingming. For a family patriarch like him, the identity of the empire's master was not truly important. What mattered was whether the family's legacy and glory could endure—or even reach new heights—in the new era.
Meng Hongchen was now officially one of Lu Jingming's women, a guaranteed mistress of the new empire that would soon unify the continent. As long as this connection existed, the Hongchen family's status remained as steady as Mount Tai and would likely rise with the tide.
After Lu Jingming unified the continent, a redistribution of interests would be inevitable. As one of the earliest and most intimately connected families to switch sides, the wealth and power the Hongchen family stood to gain were simply beyond imagination.
"I know how to choose... This old man still has his wits about him. The era of the Xu imperial clan is over. Next comes the era of Lu Jingming."
In his heart, Jing Hongchen completely let go of his last shred of lingering attachment to the Sun Moon Empire.
Thus, amidst the clamor of war, the group walked calmly and without obstruction to the gates of the magnificent palace, the symbol of the Sun Moon Empire's supreme power. The heavy palace gates had long since been violently breached. Lu Jingming did not pause for a second, walking straight inside.
They crossed a deserted courtyard marked only by the scars of fierce combat and walked down a long corridor lined with red carpet. Finally, they reached the most grand and solemn chamber: the Great Hall of State Affairs.
The doors to the hall stood wide open. Inside, in stark contrast to the chaos outside, it was terrifyingly quiet. Lu Jingming's footsteps produced crisp echoes against the marble floor. He entered the hall, his gaze fixed directly on its furthest depths.
There, atop high steps on a massive throne constructed of rare metals, a man remained seated.
Xu Tianran.
He wore his most opulent black dragon robes, his long hair groomed with meticulous care. His face lacked its usual sinister madness; nor did it show the despair or indignation of a loser. He simply sat there in silence, his expression carrying a strange, almost liberating sense of calm. His gaze stared vacantly forward, appearing to look at Lu Jingming, yet also seeming to pierce through him to see a more distant, nihilistic void.
Standing silently beside him was an elderly figure: Kong Deming. This man, who had created the glory of the Sun Moon Empire's soul tool technology, likewise wore an expressionless mask.
Lu Jingming raised an eyebrow in slight surprise at Xu Tianran's appearance. "It seems you have come to your senses."
His voice broke the silence of the hall, carrying a hint of inquiry.
At those words, a flicker of focus finally returned to Xu Tianran's hollow eyes. He slowly lifted his head to look at Lu Jingming, his lips pulling back into a cold smile.
"Come to my senses?" He repeated the phrase in a low voice, his laughter gradually growing louder and filling with madness. "I have never believed in anyone—not ministers, not brothers, and not women... I only believed in the power held within my own hands."
His voice cut off abruptly, the smile vanishing instantly to be replaced by a venomous spite. "But there are times when a mortal's will is ultimately too fragile... and I am no exception."
He did not look at Lu Jingming; instead, he cast his gaze toward the empty air beside him, as if a shadow stood there that only he could see. "To be able to react in these final moments... I suppose that was also 'her' doing, on purpose."
Lu Jingming remained non-committal. Given Phantylia's methods, that was indeed a possibility. As a Heliobus—a creature that fed on the negative emotions of living beings—nothing was more delicious than the extreme despair, regret, resentment, and pain erupting from an emperor in his final moment of total betrayal and imperial collapse.
To release her control and influence over Xu Tianran's spirit at the very end, allowing him to taste and face the irrevocable ruin he had caused with a perfectly lucid mind... this was indeed something Phantylia would do. To her, it was merely letting the ingredients ferment to their perfect flavor before enjoying the main course.
"Though her influence was key," Lu Jingming's voice rang out again, interrupting Xu Tianran's soliloquy. His tone was flat as he dissected the truth Xu Tianran most dreaded admitting. "In the end, you were the one who made these choices. Even without Phantylia, there would have been other people and other events that would have allowed that undue ambition in your heart to swell until it consumed everything."
Lu Jingming's words were like a heavy hammer smashing into Xu Tianran's heart. Xu Tianran's body jolted, and he became dazed for an instant.
Yes... it was himself.
It started from when he was still the Crown Prince, when he personally murdered all his brothers in that brutal struggle for the throne, stepping over their bones to take this seat. It started from when he took the initiative to cooperate with the Holy Ghost Cult to gain power, tacitly allowing those evil soul masters to spread terror throughout the empire. It started from when he unhesitatingly brought down the executioner's blade on the distinguished veteran families to consolidate his authority...
That ambition, that suspicion, and that unscrupulous thirst for power had long been rooted in his very marrow. Phantylia's appearance was merely the spark thrown onto a pile of dry wood that was already prepared, causing it to burn in a manner more frenzied and uncontrollable.
Once he realized this, the venom in Xu Tianran's eyes gradually faded, transforming into a sense of resignation. He looked back at Lu Jingming, and a trace of a smile actually appeared on his face.
"Heh... hehehe... I did not expect that at our first formal meeting, you would understand me so well." There was a hint of poignancy in his laughter. "If we were not enemies, perhaps... we truly could have been friends."
"Who knows?" Lu Jingming shook his head slightly, his face unreadable. "I don't hate people with ambition. In the end, the driving force behind the development of human civilization is 'desire.' The desire for food and warmth, the desire to explore the unknown, the desire to become stronger, the desire to control everything... as a human, I am no exception."
He and Xu Tianran were essentially the same kind of person. Both possessed ambitions unimaginable to ordinary people, and both yearned to bring the entire continent under their thumb. It was simply that he was stronger.
As the saying goes, likes repel; two people with such ambitions could not coexist in peace. One's ambition was destined to be swallowed by the other. Thus, they were fated to be enemies.
Thinking of this, Lu Jingming completely lost interest in this philosophical dialogue. He looked at Xu Tianran, his eyes returning to a state of cold indifference.
"Phantylia and Celenova have abandoned you. They haven't appeared, leaving you to face this end alone. Now, whatever trump cards you have left, bring them out."
He had no interest in continuing a conversation with a dying man. Xu Tianran had no chance of survival; this war that had swept across the entire continent needed a scapegoat to appease the fury of the masses. Xu Tianran was the perfect candidate. He would die bearing the eternal infamy of starting a war and slaughtering billions of living souls. His name would be carved onto the pillar of historical shame, achieving immortality in another form.
"Haha... Hahahaha!"
At Lu Jingming's prompt, Xu Tianran's laughter echoed through the empty hall, filled with delirium. As he laughed, he slowly, inch by inch, stood up from that cold throne.
A cripple whose legs had long been missing actually stood up straight without any external assistance.
"Boom—!!!"
An indescribable, terrifying pressure filled with the aura of ruin and destruction erupted from his seemingly frail body. Purple lightning, resembling electric snakes, crackled violently around him. Every bolt contained a terrifying power capable of tearing space apart. Under the ravages of this lightning, the hard marble floor was easily decomposed and ionized like tofu, turning into charred powder.
Rank 99. A Limit Douluo.
The moment Jing Hongchen and the others behind Lu Jingming felt this pressure, their expressions changed drastically, their eyes filled with horror and disbelief.
"This... how is this possible?!" Jing Hongchen cried out in shock.
He had worked with Xu Tianran for many years and believed he understood the emperor deeply. He knew Xu Tianran was exceptionally talented, but he never imagined that this emperor, who always kept a low profile regarding his personal strength, had unknowingly reached the pinnacle of what a mortal could achieve. This was a true Limit Douluo hidden in the shadows of imperial power.
However, in the face of this terrifying pressure that could change the very weather, Lu Jingming's expression did not change. He remained standing there calmly, not even the hem of his robe fluttering, as if the destructive lightning sweeping through the hall was nothing more than a gentle breeze.
Lu Jingming was not surprised. Xu Tianran was originally one of the top geniuses of the Douluo Continent, and his martial soul, the 'Purple Radiant Exterminating Dragon,' was a top-tier dragon-type soul with the destruction attribute. After being deeply influenced by Phantylia, an Emanator of Destruction, he had essentially been receiving a constant baptism and infusion of the purest Power of Destruction. Under such circumstances, it was inevitable for his strength to advance by leaps and bounds.
Furthermore, with the conclusion of the Holy Grail War, the plane level of the entire Douluo Continent was rising, and the energy ceiling had increased accordingly. The Limit Douluo level, once nearly impossible to breach, had become significantly less difficult. It was entirely within his expectations for Xu Tianran to reach this level.
Had Xu Tianran possessed a true Godhood inheritance or enough time to gather faith and create his own divinity, with his talent and fortune, there might have truly been a sliver of a chance for him to break through to godhood. But it was only a possibility; theoretically, any powerhouse who breaks through to Limit Douluo on their own has the hope of reaching the God Class.
Under Lu Jingming's watchful eye, Xu Tianran's aura reached its zenith. He spread his arms and roared to the heavens, his voice full of madness.
"I am the supreme ruler, the master of the Sun Moon Empire! Lu Jingming, if you want this world, use your strength to kill me with your own hands! But before that, I shall give you... a grand gift."
"Roar—!!!"
A dragon's cry filled with the will to destroy exploded. Behind Xu Tianran, a massive phantom of a dragon composed entirely of pure purple lightning roared into existence. That was his martial soul: the Purple Radiant Exterminating Dragon.
The moment that dragon phantom appeared, the space of the entire imperial hall began to warp and groan violently, as if unable to withstand that pure Power of Destruction. The next second, Xu Tianran let out a furious roar. That massive dragon phantom, carrying an aura of world-ending calamity, suddenly shrank and transformed into a purple streak of light that surged into his body.
Martial Soul Possession.
"Rumble—!!!"
A pillar of purple destructive lightning, ten times thicker than before, erupted violently with Xu Tianran as the center. The ceiling of the palace hall, incredibly sturdy and inscribed with countless defensive soul tool arrays, could not block it for even a moment; it was silently decomposed and ionized into basic particles, dissipating into the air. A massive hole appeared above the hall, revealing a sky reflected crimson by the fires of war.
Xu Tianran hovered in mid-air, his entire body wrapped in violent purple lightning. His long hair fluttered without wind, standing on end and flickering with electric sparks. His eyes had turned entirely purple, devoid of any human emotion, leaving only the pure madness of wanting to utterly destroy everything before him.
When that concentrated wave of destruction erupted from Xu Tianran's body like a tsunami, Kong Deming, who was closest to him, was the first to feel that horror. This old man, who had dedicated his life to soul tool technology, felt his brain stall in an unprecedented manner. His clouded eyes reflected that frenzied figure wrapped in purple lightning. A bone-chilling cold instantly spread through his limbs.
"This... what power is this?" Kong Deming's body trembled uncontrollably.
It wasn't simple soul power; it wasn't an energy he was familiar with. It was something more primal... more chaotic. It was pure because it existed only for destruction. It was chaotic because it scorned all rules and order. He felt a fatal threat emanating from Xu Tianran. The Xu Tianran before him was a horror he could not comprehend.
"He... stopped being human long ago..." Kong Deming reached this conclusion with difficulty, his heart turning cold. He had long known this emperor was not simple and was deeply hidden, but he never imagined that beneath those layers of disguise lurked such a... monster.