Roar!
A dragon's roar thundered as a gaping maw, bristling with fangs, clamped down upon his head from above.
Boundless darkness descended as Chang Tian bit clean through the man's skull.
Crack…
The skull shattered, and the headless corpse tumbled from the sky, blood fountaining from the severed neck in a gushing spray.
In the span of a single breath, a Third-Order Open Heaven cultivator had fallen!
The turn of events had been so sudden that his companion hadn't even reacted before the man's life was extinguished and his Dao obliterated.
Though Chang Tian didn't know who Guo Ziyan was or where he'd come from, anyone who saved his life in the jaws of death was no enemy. Having dispatched one with ruthless efficiency, he pressed his advantage without mercy and blasted a torrent of dragon breath at the remaining low-grade Open Heaven cultivator.
That dragon breath contained world-destroying power. Under normal circumstances, the man might not have paid it much mind, but at the very instant the breath was unleashed, Guo Ziyan brought his axe crashing down once more.
World Force surged!
The man's expression shifted. He jerked his long halberd upward to bat Chang Tian aside, then channeled his own World Force, wreathing the halberd in a blazing aura as he met the great axe head-on.
BOOM!
A deafening shockwave rocked the heavens as the surrounding void fractured in all directions.
Both were Third-Order Open Heaven cultivators, yet this clash had left them dead even! Guo Ziyan's figure swayed slightly, a flush of crimson rising to his face, while the other Third-Order Open Heaven used the rebound to flip backward through the air, pivoting mid-flight and fleeing toward the sky at full speed!
He was clever enough. He knew that alone he stood no chance against Chang Tian and Guo Ziyan working together—linger any longer and he would almost certainly perish. Better to cut his losses and head for the tower ship to deliver warning.
As for his three remaining companions, he could no longer afford to worry about them.
But in the very instant he turned, he caught sight of a bewitchingly beautiful woman ahead, watching him with a faint smile. Their eyes met, and the woman's gorgeous gaze blazed with a soul-piercing radiance, transforming into a vast vortex that seized upon his mind and spirit, dragging him down into an endless abyss.
In the span of a heartbeat, phantoms cascaded before his eyes, and the screams of battle roared in his ears!
What terrifying illusion arts! The man's heart lurched. His senses told him the woman was merely at the Emperor Realm, yet the illusions she wielded far surpassed what any Emperor Realm cultivator should have been capable of—enough to catch even a Third-Order Open Heaven cultivator off guard!
She had to be a specialist in soul cultivation!
"Break!" the man bellowed. His Divine Soul surged, and the illusory world before him shattered with a thunderous crack.
Yu Rumeng let out a muffled groan. Her illusion had been forcibly broken, and the backlash struck her like a hammer. Her face drained of color in an instant, her body staggering, and crimson blood trickled from the corners of her eyes!
With her strength, even bolstered by the Demon Realm's home-field advantage, attempting to ensnare a Third-Order Open Heaven cultivator with illusion arts was far too great a strain.
But… it was enough!
She hadn't managed to hold the enemy in place, but she had cost him a single precious breath of time.
Here and now, that single breath was the difference between life and death.
A massive dragon claw suddenly tore through the void and seized the man in its grip. The claw clenched tight, and the man's face contorted in agony as a series of bone-snapping cracks echoed from within his body.
He twisted his head to look and saw that Chang Tian—the very dragon he'd knocked flying moments ago—had returned, drenched in his own blood, fighting with everything he had to pin him down.
Meanwhile, Guo Ziyan raised his great axe and plummeted from the sky like a meteor, bringing it crashing down with killing intent that turned the man's blood to ice in his veins.
The halberd trembled as he drove it toward Chang Tian's arm—a devastating blow that nearly burst the limb apart entirely. But Chang Tian refused to let go, enduring the gushing dragon blood and the snapping of bone and sinew as his other claw closed in as well, slamming shut with a thunderous boom that locked the man down even more firmly.
There was truly no escape now—no path to heaven, no path to earth.
With a look of utter despair, he watched the great axe fall. His vision went white, and then he felt nothing at all.
From the moment Guo Ziyan appeared to the deaths of both Third-Order Open Heaven cultivators, barely a dozen breaths had passed. Yet for Chang Tian it felt as though ten thousand years had crawled by. With the second enemy dead before his eyes, his colossal form finally collapsed to the ground with a deafening rumble, shrinking back to his human shape as his aura rapidly withered.
At the instant the first Third-Order Open Heaven cultivator was slain, the Open Heaven cultivators on the other two battlefields sensed it.
The woman locked in a bitter struggle with Bei Li Mo's expression plummeted. Before she could even make out what had happened, a figure appeared directly before her.
She started in alarm, but upon quickly probing him, she relaxed—the newcomer was merely an Emperor Realm cultivator.
Beside her, the disheveled Bei Li Mo let out a cry of surprise: "Yang Kai?"
The one who had come to her aid was none other than Yang Kai. This was the plan he and his Dharma Body had agreed upon beforehand. There was no mystery to it—Bei Li Mo's opponent wasn't particularly strong, only a Second-Order Open Heaven cultivator. With his current power, he could handle her easily.
Bei Li Mo's initial joy quickly gave way to horror. She shrieked, "Run! She's comparable to the Great Demon God—you and I can't handle her!"
But Yang Kai seemed not to hear. He reached out and grasped at the void as a dragon's roar exploded through the air and the Azure Dragon Spear materialized in his grip. His voice was calm and even: "So what if she's the Great Demon God? It's not like I haven't killed one before!"
The moment those words left his lips, the Golden Crow let out a piercing cry, and a blazing sun leapt into existence behind him.
Heaven and earth trembled!
The Second-Order Open Heaven woman hadn't taken Yang Kai seriously when he first appeared, casually producing a silk-kerchief-like Artifact and hurling it toward him to shroud his head.