Yang Kai had always felt he was better suited to fighting alone.
He possessed strength that could crush cultivators of the same rank, an Ancient Dragon body capable of contending even with Domain Lords, unpredictable Space Divine Abilities, and advantages that no other Seventh-Order human could hope to match.
Fighting alone allowed him to maximize those advantages to the fullest.
Combining with the other members of the Dawn Squad could certainly minimize danger, but for him, it was also a constraint—the others couldn't keep up with his reflexes and speed, so he inevitably had to coordinate with the squad's movements.
Now that Po Xiao had departed, the invisible shackles weighing on Yang Kai had dissolved entirely.
Under the activation of the Grand Freedom Spear Art, spear shadows filled the sky. By the time Yang Kai withdrew, the massive swath of Ink Clan behind him had already burst into fine powder in unison.
He moved with his spear, heading wherever the Ink Clan were most numerous. Wherever he passed, clusters of Ink Clan fell like straw in a gale.
When a dragon's roar shook the heavens, he abruptly transformed into a seven-thousand-zhang Ancient Dragon. Dragon breath surged, and his tail swept across the battlefield, clearing a vast open space.
But he didn't dare maintain the dragon form for too long.
Though the Ancient Dragon body was powerful enough to rival a Domain Lord, the target was simply too large, making movement cumbersome. In just a brief moment, attacks from every direction had left him covered in wounds.
They were all minor injuries, of course, but he couldn't afford to ignore them.
He retracted the dragon form, leaving the countless Ink Clan suddenly without their target, and reverted to human shape to wreak havoc across the battlefield once more.
The constant shifting between human and dragon forms drew the attention of enormous numbers of Ink Clan. The pursuit behind Yang Kai was practically limitless, but he paid it no mind whatsoever—only charging forward, burying his head in the kill.
Without warning, the laws of space rippled, and Yang Kai's figure vanished abruptly. When he reappeared, he had plunged into the thick of a fierce battle circle.
It was the clash between a human Eighth-Order cultivator and a Bone Helm Domain Lord of the Ink Clan!
In that instant, the silhouette of the Bone Helm Domain Lord reflected in Yang Kai's eyes. The laws of time spread outward, and the entire world seemed to freeze in that single moment.
The spear thrust out, stabbing toward a seam at the back of the Bone Helm Domain Lord's skull.
These Bone Helm Domain Lords wore bone armor of extraordinary hardness, but that armor was not without flaws—one of them being the crack at the back of the head.
The Azure Dragon Spear pierced with pinpoint accuracy into that seam. Sparks flew immediately, and Yang Kai at once felt immense resistance bearing down from ahead, enough to halt even the unstoppable Azure Dragon Spear in its tracks.
He was mildly surprised—he hadn't expected that striking a weak point directly would still fail to land.
That was just too tough!
He frantically channeled the power of heaven and earth, roaring: "Die!"
The long spear thrust forward with savage force, the sparks blazing ever brighter. At last, the seam split open and the spear plunged into the back of the Domain Lord's skull.
It failed to penetrate all the way through—the Domain Lord's hardened skull blocked the Azure Dragon Spear's advance.
Yang Kai tried to pull back, but he was already too late.
The instant the attack landed, the Bone Helm Domain Lord swept the bone shield in his hand backward. Violent force raked across Yang Kai's abdomen, numbing half his body. A massive gash was torn open in his midsection, golden blood spraying wildly, his writhing internal organs clearly visible.
The Domain Lord moved to finish him off, but Yang Kai had already conjured a sphere of Purifying Light and cast it down over his opponent's head.
This was the power most devastating to the Ink Clan—how could Yang Kai not use it?
He hadn't encountered a suitable target before, but now, facing a Domain Lord, there was no reason to hold back.
Even the Bone Helm Domain Lord, who had been unmoved by a spear to the brain, now seemed to be enduring the most excruciating torture imaginable, his mouth opening in a wretched howl.
The Purifying Light, as if alive, seeped through the cracks in the bone helm and invaded his body, dissolving against his Ink Force and returning both to nothingness.
In that moment of distraction, a blade of light swept across his neck. The bone helm was cleaved clean through, the massive head soaring into the air as Ink Blood gushed from the severed neck like a fountain.
"Excellent work!" Xu Linggong raised his great saber and shouted in hearty praise.
Without Yang Kai arriving at that critical moment, he genuinely might not have been the match of that Domain Lord.
Xu Linggong had only advanced to the Eighth Order a few years ago. His foundation couldn't compare to those veteran Eighth-Order cultivators, and these Bone Helm Domain Lords were Innate Domain Lords specifically created by the Ink Clan—each one formidable beyond measure.
In their earlier exchange, Xu Linggong had been at a clear disadvantage.
He had even deployed the Evil-Breaking Divine Lance.
Yet the Bone Helm Domain Lord had almost no openings across his entire body. Unable to break through his defenses, even the Evil-Breaking Divine Lance had accomplished little.
The principle behind the Evil-Breaking Divine Lance was to use the Artifact's own lethal force to pierce into the Ink Clan's body, allowing the Purifying Light to erupt within and erode their Ink Force.
Now, with these Domain Lords boasting such extraordinary defense, the Evil-Breaking Divine Lance's effectiveness was extremely limited.
In contrast, someone like Yang Kai, directly channeling Purifying Light, posed a far greater threat to the Bone Helm Domain Lords—because Purifying Light could seep through any crack, infiltrating through the gaps in their bone helms to annihilate their Ink Force.