After careful deliberation, Perfected Lord Gangxing Budao took a decisive step forward.
He had little choice. Standing outside the sea of insects was a losing game; any probing technique he sent forth were instantly devoured by the Qi-Eating Insects.
To gain any actionable intelligence, he had to experience the swarm firsthand.
Moreover, he still harbored the hope of overwhelming Lu Yang through sheer, superior force.
Only by crushing him head-on could he achieve the maximum effect of demoting the Supreme Stature of [Heavenly Fire].
Boom!
In the next heartbeat, Gangxing Budao merged with his sword light, plunging into the swarm like a meteor of raging flame.
Wherever his path cut, the Qi-Eating Insects were incinerated into drifting ash.
"Hmm... This is..." Lu Yang's brow furrowed.
Within that streak of sword light, he glimpsed the manifestation of a blazing, primordial furnace.
Heaven and earth as the furnace, Yin and Yang as the charcoal.Rising glory illuminates the universe, smelting all within the Qian and Kun.
This was the legendary [Furnace Crucible Fire]. At this moment, Gangxing Budao had invoked the Dao Fruit Wonder attached to his Grotto-Heaven, causing his sword light to seethe with monstrous, incinerating qi.
But he didn't stop there. Lu Yang watched as the insects, reduced to ash, did not scatter. Instead, they coalesced on the spot, transforming into tiny, gray sword-artifacts.
Though each was no larger than a single insect, they swarmed together, turning back to wage war against the living Qi-Eating Insects.
While their individual quality was low, their numbers were staggering—and because they were fueled by the corpses of the swarm, they were effectively endless.
"The fundamental Wonder of [Furnace Crucible Fire]?"
Lu Yang's mind raced as his fingers twitched within his sleeve, calculating the variables. "This Wonder is named the [Heavenly Works Platform]. It grants the marvel of creation."
Put simply, it was creation through visualization. Regardless of the materials at hand, as long as the user possessed a blueprint in their mind, they could forge it out of thin air.
Gangxing Budao was using the remains of the swarm to forge his own miniature army, sustaining his offensive by recycling his enemy's resources.
"What shoddy craftsmanship," Lu Yang muttered, shaking his head.
Gangxing Budao was clearly no master of artifact refining, nor was the Perfected Lord who originally controlled the [Furnace Crucible Fire].
At best, they were merely skilled in honing blades. True creation should be as unpredictable and profound as the Patriarch's [Heaven of Carefree].
However, Lu Yang admitted internally, he wasn't wrong about one thing. With such a Wonder as its foundation, [Furnace Crucible Fire] truly has the potential of a Supreme Dao Fruit.
It's far more formidable than the [Heavenly River Water], which was almost more of a burden than a blessing.
These crude sword-artifacts might be nothing individually, but they are successfully pinning me down.
The Qi-Eating Insects were not infinite. While they could regenerate, that process required a constant infusion of spiritual power—and that spiritual power came directly from Lu Yang.
He was currently pumping energy into Jade Maiden's body within the banner, forcing her to produce replacements at a breakneck pace.
I can't let this become a battle of attrition.
The real problem wasn't just the spiritual power consumption; it was that Gangxing Budao had surrounded himself with a wall of fire, preventing the insects from getting close enough to land a hit.
If they couldn't touch him, [Sever All Evil] couldn't be triggered.
Did [Sky-Shrouding] or the Old Dragon Lord warn him? Lu Yang wondered.
It's not impossible. Those two are old monsters... after suffering at my hands, they likely deduced the trigger conditions.
Lu Yang shifted his strategy immediately. He invoked [Inscribing Heavenly Chapters], slipping through the microscopic cracks in the logic of space.
Hidden from all senses, he drifted silently until he stood directly before Gangxing Budao.
He formed a hand seal and pointed slowly forward.
[Great Might Kui-Gang Righteous Qi]!
Profound, mighty light surged forth, shattering the protective firelight around Gangxing Budao in an instant.
With the barrier broken, the Qi-Eating Insects swarmed the opening like water through a burst dam.
Severing Marks stacked and detonated instantly!
[Judgment: You have exceeded the target in the fields of Dao Art and Dao Fruit. The opponent has received a minor injury.]
Gangxing Budao let out a muffled grunt. His aura, which had been at its zenith, faltered and dipped.
A few strands of pure silver suddenly bled into his jet-black hair—a sign of drained life force.
But his eyes remained unnaturally bright, his resolve unshaken by the wound.
He stared straight at Lu Yang, locking onto his position through the chaos.
In the next second he draw his sword.
Without a moment's hesitation, Gangxing Budao forced his stature upward, shattering the unseen limits of his current state.
A brilliant, blinding sword light ignited the entire sea of insects.
Wherever this light touched, the insects were powerless to devour it; they were simply crushed.
The sound of chirping was drowned out by the thunderous hum of the blade.
Pure white light filled the firmament, piercing the dark clouds of the swarm like dawn breaking through the abyss, searing into Lu Yang's pupils.
[Ascendant Victor Sword Intent]!
A thin, scarlet line of blood appeared across Lu Yang's neck.
His head tilted dangerously, looking as though it were about to fall to the ground with a thud.
Then, a scene unfolded that left Gangxing Budao utterly stunned.
Lu Yang's expression did not flicker. A graceful, shimmering water-light surfaced around his body.
Under the "washing" of this light, the fatal wound on his neck knitted together and vanished before his very eyes.
"Impossible!" Gangxing Budao's eyes widened.
That strike had been delivered with the stature of a Great Perfected Lord.
It was a move capable of instantly slaying even a mid-stage Golden Core.
The injuries it inflicted should have been permanent, unerasable unless the victim reincarnated a dozen times over.
Lu Yang lacked the mid-stage characteristic of "immortality and indestructibility," yet he had taken the blow and emerged unscathed.
It defied all logic.
But Lu Yang wasn't as relaxed as he seemed. Inside the Righteous Dao Banner, a figure was suffering a cycle of violent destruction.
It was Suo Huan.
Rumble!
Suo Huan's form exploded repeatedly, reassembling only to be shattered again by the residual sword qi.
He cycled through death and rebirth more than twenty times before his figure finally stabilized.
"Such... terrifying sword qi!" Suo Huan gasped, his face deathly pale.
It was he who had used his Dao Fruit Wonder to act as a surrogate, forcibly bearing the weight of the Great Perfected Lord's strike for Lu Yang.
Normally, Suo Huan wouldn't have survived even a fraction of that power. But with the Patriarch's help, he was "false-holding" a mid-stage Golden Core rank.
Relying on that temporary immortality, he had died twenty times to catch that single blade, though the trauma to his soul was immense.
"My Grotto-Heaven is shaken..." Suo Huan whispered. "My foundation is unstable. If I have to take another strike like that, my [Universe Ruins Heaven] will likely collapse."
"No harm done," the divine sense incarnation of Lu Yang within the banner chuckled.
"Thank you, Fellow Daoist Suo Huan. One sword was all I needed... Now, it is my turn to counterattack!"
In the physical world, Gangxing Budao stumbled back, spitting out a mouthful of blood.
This was the price of the backlash from forcibly raising his stature and compounded by the wound from [Sever All Evil].
He had no time to recover.
His "sure-kill" move had failed, leaving him vulnerable—and Lu Yang was already upon him.
"I'm using this move for the first time as well," Lu Yang said with a sharp grin.
The firelight from [Inscribing Heavenly Chapters] collapsed inward at his fingertip, condensing into a tiny, impossibly bright point of light.
"Good luck."
Boom!