Space and time went chaotic in the span of an instant, the entire battlefield shimmering with warped, grotesque distortions. The Innate Domain Lord's expression of stunned terror was frozen on his face as a long spear flickered back and forth, thrusting eighteen times in a single heartbeat.
In that moment of mortal peril, the Ink Clan Domain Lord could no longer care about Yang Kai. The power of ink surged from his body like a tsunami, crashing outward in every direction.
The distorted space shattered, and three figures were flung backward, each spitting blood.
At the same time, eighteen wounds erupted across the Ink Clan Domain Lord's body, drenching him in blood and leaving him in a wretched state.
He dared not linger in place. His body spun, transforming into a cloud of ink as he tried to flee into the distance.
"Keep dreaming!" Zhao Yebai roared with fury. His senior brother and sister had fought tooth and nail to inflict such a grievous wound — if they let the enemy slip away now, then all their years of cultivation had truly been wasted on a dog.
Besides, their master was watching from the sidelines.
He hadn't expected his master to intervene, and indeed Yang Kai had no intention of doing so — he was simply observing with keen interest.
As he spoke, his hurtling body abruptly halted. He took a single step forward, leaving an afterimage behind while his true self had already surged to the fleeing Domain Lord. In his hand, he now gripped something peculiar — it looked like a sword, yet also like a serpent, writhing restlessly in his grip as if untamable, ready to sink its fangs into him at any moment.
Yang Kai's eyes narrowed slightly, a flicker of quiet satisfaction passing through them. He hadn't checked in on these disciples in years, and to think the bumbling little brats of back then had grown to this level.
What Zhao Yebai clutched was neither a sword nor a serpent — it was a spatial rift. He had taken a spatial tear itself as his weapon, slashing it downward at the Domain Lord's head.
"Get lost!" the Domain Lord bellowed, his ink cloud roiling as he thrust a palm toward Zhao Yebai.
The spatial sword did not truly strike. Instead, it deftly traced an arc and sliced into the edge of the ink cloud. In the same instant, Zhao Yebai ducked low to evade the Domain Lord's punch, revealing the figure hidden behind him — Xu Yi.
In that brief moment when he had deployed the laws of space to intercept the enemy, he had brought his third junior brother along with him.
The Innate Domain Lord was focused entirely on escape, and with the two brothers' auras seamlessly fused, he had never noticed that two opponents stood in his path rather than one.
Xu Yi pressed his palms together, his expression solemn, dense laws of time churning around him. He gently pressed one palm forward — and time itself became a shuttle, rushing through the ages.
All the power he possessed was condensed into that single strike. Across the vast expanse of the void, it was as though countless cycles of spring fading into autumn had passed. By the time the Domain Lord's fist hammered into Xu Yi's palm, only half of its original force remained.
Xu Yi's body jolted as the Domain Lord was blasted backward, and Zhao Yebai's spatial sword came slashing down at the same time.
The sky of ink rolled away, revealing the Domain Lord's figure once more. At his waist, a gaping wound oozed blood — not a clean cut or piercing injury, but something that looked as though a savage beast had torn a massive chunk from his flesh.
Before the Domain Lord could steady himself, a razor-sharp killing intent surged in from behind. The spear in Zhao Ya's hands was the very embodiment of the Great Freedom Spear Technique's essence, erupting into a sky full of spear shadows that enveloped the gravely wounded Innate Domain Lord.
By now, the Innate Domain Lord had lost any chance of escape.
"Kill him!" Xu Yi shouted in a low voice. He and his eldest brother pressed the attack together, no longer recklessly overextending but fighting with methodical precision. It took a full half hour of grueling combat before they finally brought the Innate Domain Lord down.
When Zhao Ya's spear shattered the Domain Lord's skull and she wrenched it free, the three siblings were all gasping for breath, their faces deathly pale. But when they exchanged glances, they could feel an indescribable surge of elation welling up inside them.
This was their first time killing an Innate Domain Lord!
They had fought Innate Domain Lords before — most of the time, they had come out on the losing end, with the three siblings fleeing in disarray under their eldest brother's lead. On rare occasions, they had fought to a mutual standstill. But they had never once believed they could slay an Innate Domain Lord.
Though Yang Kai's presence had certainly served as a deterrent in the first half, the Innate Domain Lord had fought with everything he had during the second half, holding nothing back. This kind of life-and-death struggle was invaluable to them. As long as they could fully digest the lessons of this battle, they were confident that the next time they faced an Innate Domain Lord, they would not be in such a wretched state.
"Please offer us your guidance, Master!" After catching his breath for a moment, Zhao Yebai turned to Yang Kai and cupped his fists with a solemn bow.
Yang Kai smiled. "A master can only show you the door — the cultivation itself depends on each individual. I have nothing left to instruct you on. All I can say is: you did well."
From his vantage point, the three youngsters' combat was still somewhat rough around the edges, and many opportunities on the battlefield had not been seized with perfect timing. But how could anything be flawless? Even he himself had never performed perfectly. On the battlefield, conditions shifted by the moment, and only by constantly pushing past one's own limits could one grow.
Moreover, their application of their respective Daos showed a spark of true ingenuity — especially the interplay between Zhao Yebai and Xu Yi, whose fusion of the laws of time and space had evolved into a seamless coordination of space-time force.