With his strength nearly spent, Yang Kai didn't dare let his guard down against a Domain Lord powerhouse.
Even though Heiyuan had no intention of killing him — only capturing him alive — Yang Kai couldn't simply comply. If Heiyuan seized him and delivered him to the Royal City, he would likely spend the rest of his days as a slave to the Mo Clan, never to rise again.
Before Heiyuan could close in, Yang Kai began channeling what remained of the power in his Small World.
Strike first!
A golden crow cried out as a blazing sun leapt into the sky, its dazzling light spreading in all directions.
A full moon rose, its silvery glow cascading downward, bathing the world in cold luminance.
When sun and moon shone together, the Laws of Space were pushed to their extreme. The twin celestial bodies merged into a spinning, top-like phenomenon, churning through the Laws of Space and Time, manifesting an extraordinary power of spacetime as it hurtled toward Heiyuan.
The Sun-Moon Divine Wheel! Against a foe of Heiyuan's caliber, Yang Kai held nothing back, unleashing the most devastating technique he currently possessed.
Heiyuan halted instinctively, sensing the terrifying power contained within the incoming secret art. His expression grew grim. Under the influence of that mysterious force, even his thoughts and movements seemed to be affected.
Boundless, dense Ink Force surged from within him, forming a protective barrier.
He had barely completed the defense when Heiyuan realized, with a start, that the secret art was already upon him.
A violent shockwave tore through the void, making the very world tremble. Heiyuan was forced back step after step. The surrounding Mo Clan warriors who had been closing in on Yang Kai were caught by the residual impact and were annihilated in an instant, reduced to nothing but ash.
Moments later, the raging energy subsided. Heiyuan stood rigid and motionless, strange strands of visible energy crackling across his body like serpents of lightning.
The surviving Mo Clan members stared at Heiyuan in terror, dreading that their Domain Lord might actually die. After all, they had witnessed the power of Yang Kai's secret art, and it was truly terrifying. None of them knew what would happen if a Domain Lord took that attack head-on.
Fortunately, Heiyuan appeared to be affected by the art but showed no signs of perishing. After only a moment, his body shuddered, and the serpentine energy writhing across him burst apart and dissipated. Heiyuan coughed out a mouthful of dark Ink Blood, his aura dimming slightly.
He abruptly turned his head toward a specific direction, gnashing his teeth, then transformed into a black streak of light and shot away at full speed.
Only then did the surviving Mo Clan warriors realize that Yang Kai had vanished at some point. Presumably, after unleashing that secret art, he had fled immediately. But they had been so fixated on the technique's power that they hadn't noticed his departure at all.
Still, with their Domain Lord personally giving chase, that human surely wouldn't escape.
At that very moment, Yang Kai stumbled out of the void, nearly losing his footing. His face was pale as paper.
He was practically running on empty.
Compared to other Seventh-Order Open Heaven cultivators, his Small World's foundation was far more robust. But ever since his escape from the Royal City's secret realm, he had been burning through his reserves without restraint to fuel spatial law teleportation. Killing Liu Zi'an and Gui Liao had cost considerable effort, and the subsequent clash with Heiyuan had nearly drained his Small World entirely.
Fortunately, he had the World Tree's sub-tree. Without it, his current state would have destabilized the foundation of his Small World — and once the foundation was damaged, that would be a catastrophic problem.
He didn't dare stay in place. Hurriedly, he pulled a handful of Kaitian Pills from his space ring and swallowed them. The recovery from Kaitian Pills wasn't fast, but it was better than nothing at this point. Moreover, the living beings he had been nurturing within his Small World were constantly generating Heavenly Might, which also helped accelerate his recovery.
Almost as soon as he set off, Yang Kai felt a distant aura lock onto him from far away.
It was Heiyuan's aura.
As a Domain Lord-level Mo Clan powerhouse, as long as Yang Kai hadn't fled too far, Heiyuan could easily track him down.
Yang Kai cursed inwardly. He hadn't expected the Sun-Moon Divine Wheel to actually harm Heiyuan — after all, there was a full major realm of difference between them, and the gap in their strength was immense. But he had still harbored a sliver of hope, hoping the technique would at least injure Heiyuan and slow his pursuit, buying enough time to escape his detection range. Once he broke free of that perception, Yang Kai would be temporarily safe.
But Heiyuan had recovered far faster than expected. Now that he was locked on by that aura, shaking him off would be extremely difficult — unless Yang Kai could keep using spatial teleportation to widen the gap.
Yet that was something Yang Kai simply couldn't do in his current state. Forget teleporting repeatedly — even a single teleport was beyond him.
Left with no choice, he could only focus on recovering while forcing himself onward.
Heiyuan, consumed by fury, was closing in with terrifying speed. The distance between them was shrinking rapidly.
To make matters worse, Yang Kai kept running into small groups of Mo Clan warriors along his path. These were undoubtedly denizens of Heiyuan's territory, acting on his orders in squad formations. They weren't large — ten or twenty at most, occasionally over thirty — and their leaders were merely Lord-level cultivators.
These Mo Clan warriors couldn't actually threaten Yang Kai, but they severely hampered his escape speed. He either had to skirt around them or plow straight through. Either way, it cost him precious energy that he had barely begun to recover.
In the time it took an incense stick to burn, Yang Kai broke through three separate Mo Clan squad blockades. And by now, Heiyuan was drawing ever closer.