"But until you've beaten me, you'll always be the little brother — don't you forget your place!" Sister Lan reminded him once more.
Brother Huang replied with barely concealed humiliation, "I naturally won't forget."
Yang Kai had been watching for quite a while and offered some comfort: "Victory and defeat are common in battle, Brother Huang. No need to be discouraged. Regroup your forces and try again."
Brother Huang gave a sullen grunt and vanished in a flash, seemingly eager to rebuild his Stone Clan as quickly as possible.
But with only a dozen-odd Stone Kings and a pitifully small guard force remaining, the road ahead was long and arduous.
By contrast, Sister Lan still commanded an army of a hundred thousand, holding an overwhelming advantage. In the next great battle, her odds of winning were unquestionably far better.
"Thanks to your brilliant idea!" Sister Lan gazed at Yang Kai with a beaming smile. "After all these years, I've finally gotten to hear him call me 'big sister.' Go on — what reward do you want?"
"There's a reward?" Yang Kai perked up immediately.
"Of course there is... Never mind, I already know what you want without you saying it." With that, Sister Lan slipped out of the territory covered by the Small Universe. When she returned, she brought with her a mountain's worth of Yellow Crystals and Blue Crystals, dumping them straight in front of Yang Kai.
Yang Kai was overjoyed.
He had thought there would be no more chances to easily obtain these Yellow and Blue Crystals, yet here Sister Lan was, offering them of her own accord.
He certainly wasn't going to be polite about it. After thanking her profusely, he sent the materials over near the medicine garden.
After the great battle, Brother Huang and Sister Lan both settled down considerably. Brother Huang focused on developing his Stone Clan, and Sister Lan wasn't idle either — though she had won this round, she had lost ninety percent of her Stone Clan forces, so she naturally needed to replenish them as fast as possible. If she grew complacent over this single victory and stopped pushing forward, next time it would be her turn to call someone "big brother," and that was something Sister Lan would never tolerate under any circumstances.
Though both were busy with their own affairs, Sister Lan still paid visits to Brother Huang from time to time, purely to hear him call her "big sister." Every time, she walked away satisfied, while Brother Huang was left fuming with rage, all the more determined to wash away his humiliation.
That battle had granted Yang Kai a profound insight, elevating his comprehension of the Great Desolation Scripture to yet another level. He vaguely felt he was on the verge of glimpsing a hidden secret within the technique, but unfortunately the gain was modest — he still hadn't figured out what connection the Great Desolation Scripture truly had to the Time Laws.
One day, Yang Kai suddenly sensed something and lifted his gaze toward a particular spot.
There, upon a massive boulder near the cliff's edge, Xu Yi sat cross-legged. His entire aura was surging wildly, spiritual power raging ceaselessly within his body, while above his head, lightning crackled and thunder rumbled as dark clouds gathered overhead.
These were the signs of an imminent breakthrough!
Xu Yi had already reached the Transcendent Third Stage. The next step was the Saint Realm.
It was a very delicate stage, one that reminded Yang Kai of himself many years ago. Back on the Profound Sky Continent, the pinnacle of martial cultivation had been the Saint Realm. It was only after Yang Kai left that continent and entered the Star Field that he first encountered realms beyond it.
Yang Kai had long suspected that when his third disciple attempted to advance to the Saint Realm, something unusual might occur. So the moment he detected the signs, he came to observe.
In truth, Yang Kai had watched every one of Xu Yi's advancements. Unfortunately, nothing particularly notable had turned up before.
This time was clearly different.
Before Xu Yi had even broken through, the Time Law marks within the Small Universe had already begun to stir faintly, as though resonating with him from afar.
This same sensation had appeared once with his first disciple, Zhao Yebai — except what had resonated with Zhao Yebai were the marks of the Space Laws.
Yang Kai wasn't particularly worried about Xu Yi's breakthrough this time. Though his cultivation had progressed at a decent pace, his unique aptitude for the Dao of Time meant he had spent far more time asleep than what passed in reality, giving him an extraordinarily solid foundation.
A mere advancement to the Saint Realm was naturally no obstacle for Xu Yi.
The baptism of heaven and earth crashed down upon him like a deluge, yet Xu Yi seemed utterly unaware of it. He made no effort to brace himself; instead, he lowered his head as though he had fallen into a deep slumber.
It was only at the very instant the energy reached his body that Xu Yi abruptly raised his head, his bizarre, inhuman eyes locking onto the void, a strange smile playing at the corner of his lips.
Yang Kai frowned slightly.
The heavenly baptism continued without cease, pouring into him in an endless torrent. Xu Yi opened his body and soul to receive it, and before long his entire form was battered and bleeding. Yet beneath the onslaught, his aura surged upward in tiers, swiftly reaching the absolute peak of the Transcendent Realm.
The Great Desolation Scripture was pushed to its utmost limit, shielding his vital points, while the Time Law marks within the Small Universe grew ever more active. Yang Kai could clearly sense that a great many Time Law marks were flowing into Xu Yi's body along with the baptism energy, being devoured and absorbed by him.
In the span of half an hour, Xu Yi's aura — already at its zenith — abruptly leapt to an entirely new level. A visible shockwave erupted from his position, sweeping outward in all directions.
The Saint Realm!
At the same moment, the flow of time within the Small Universe appeared to be subtly affected, and the entire world seemed to pause ever so briefly.
The fog in Yang Kai's mind remained, and he still hadn't unraveled the relationship between the Great Desolation Scripture and the Time Laws. But he could clearly sense that the flow of time within his own Small Universe had accelerated significantly.
If the time flow within the Small Universe had previously been twice that of the outside world, then now it had become threefold!
This change left Yang Kai thoroughly shaken.
After all, he had reached what he himself defined as the sixth tier of mastery in the Dao of Time — an outstanding level — merely to make his Small Universe's time flow accelerate at all.