Just as the Fang family patriarch was still wrestling with his doubts, the towering golden figure that obscured the sky suddenly seemed to sense something, turning its gaze in his direction. That gaze pierced through the barrier of distance, taking in the situation at the Fang Family Manor in a single glance.
With a flick of its finger, a streak of light shot out from beyond the heavens, arriving before the Fang family patriarch in the blink of an eye and hovering before him with a humming tremor.
The patriarch stared intently and saw that the incoming streak of light was unmistakably a longsword — unadorned and plain, its divine resonance withdrawn inward. It was an Artifact of extremely high grade.
The Fang family patriarch hastily rose to his feet and reached out to draw the blade, which slid free with ease.
With the longsword in hand, he caught sight of the character "Fang" engraved upon the hilt and immediately understood. He called out in a loud voice: "It is Ancestor Tianci! We respectfully send off Ancestor Tianci!"
Behind him, countless members of the Fang clan roared in unison: "We respectfully send off Ancestor Tianci!"
The golden figure that Fang Tianci had manifested inclined his head slightly, then hurtled alongside Thunder Shadow toward the golden dragon shadow. Halfway there, the two figures began to crumble, dissolving into motes of luminous light that merged into the golden dragon shadow.
Though he was merely a clone of the original body, he had been born here and raised here, and still harbored some attachment to the Fang family. Before departing, he left behind his personal sword — so long as the sword remained, the Fang family's fortune would endure through the ages, their descendants unending.
Moreover, this entire world was the original body's Small World, so how could a clone's sword ever be lost? In truth, as long as the original body survived and the Small World persisted, the Fang family would continue on in perpetuity.
This was, in its own small way, a private indulgence of his as a clone.
With the fusion of two clones, the dragon shadow grew ever more golden, its vast serpentine body trembling ceaselessly as it surged forward by a full measure. It had already been nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine zhang long — just a single step short of ten thousand. Now, with the fusion of the two clones' source essence, it finally took that final step.
Yang Kai felt a flicker of surprise.
Back when his Dragon Bloodline had been stuck at that final threshold, unable to advance further, he had once wondered whether he might need to reach the Ninth Order before he could break through that last barrier and achieve the Holy Dragon's body.
He had not expected to attain the Holy Dragon's body today, ahead of schedule.
On second thought, it wasn't all that strange. Whether the human form or the dragon form, both were extensions of his own source essence split from the whole. Now that two clones had merged back in, his source essence had naturally strengthened, allowing him to take that critical step.
Yang Kai wanted to let out a long, triumphant laugh. The timing of this Holy Dragon's body couldn't have been more perfect.
At this very moment, he had already been cornered by three pseudo-King Lords with nowhere left to run. Though he had repeatedly invoked the Space Daos to flee, his own Great Dao power was in turmoil at this moment, and the movement of his spatial power was sluggish — he simply couldn't shake off the powerful enemies. The three pseudo-King Lords had him boxed in within a stretch of void.
Those three pseudo-King Lords were now radiating surging waves of aura that hammered at Yang Kai and the surrounding void alike, unsettling his mind and destabilizing the space around him, leaving him no opportunity to escape again.
Seeing that Yang Kai had nowhere left to flee, the pseudo-King Lords' killing intent blazed. One of them barked: "Kill!"
Three figures lunged from three directions. The power of the Ink churned as devastating techniques thundered toward Yang Kai, battering him until he staggered, his appearance wretched.
Without the protection of the Holy Dragon's body, Yang Kai could never have withstood such a ferocious assault from three pseudo-King Lords for long. He would have been forced to devote far more of his attention to dodging and defending. But a difference of a single zhang in the dragon's body — the leap in the Dragon Clan hierarchy — brought a transformation in strength that was nothing short of earth-shaking.
The gap between an Ancient Dragon and a Holy Dragon was no different from the gap between the Eighth Order and the Ninth Order.
It was fair to say that with the Holy Dragon's body now achieved, Yang Kai had the capital to face these three pseudo-King Lords in single combat.
Yet he still appeared harried and cornered. There was no other reason: the Three Parts Return technique had reached its most critical juncture, and whether he could break through to the Ninth Order hinged on this very moment.
The power of his Dragon Bloodline was only one part of his overall strength — his Small World was his foundation.
Deep in his intuition, he sensed that the realm beyond the Ninth Order could not be reached through the Dragon Bloodline alone. Only by strengthening his Small World could he peer into the higher echelons of the martial path.
He had devoted more than half his attention to monitoring his own Small World, driving forward the Three Parts Return technique, with only a fraction left to contend with the combined assault of the three pseudo-King Lords. Naturally, his situation looked dire.
Fortunately, the greatest benefit of achieving the Holy Dragon's body was its extraordinary resilience.
The Dragon Clan was already renowned for its thick hide and tough flesh — to say nothing of the Holy Dragon, which stood at the pinnacle of the hierarchy.
Thus, from the outside, Yang Kai appeared to be trapped in a hopeless deadlock, besieged by three pseudo-King Lords in a joint assault, with no chance of survival. Defeat and death were merely a matter of time.
Ouyang Lie was already fighting with manic ferocity on his end. Xiao You, who faced him, could only swallow the bitterness in his mouth, not daring to let the man slip away. He clenched his teeth and endured, coordinating with eight Domain Lords to weather Ouyang Lie's increasingly savage onslaught.
Yang Xue's lips were bitten to the point of drawing blood. At this stage, it was no longer her clinging to Mo Naye — it was Mo Naye clinging to her.
With Yang Kai on the verge of death, how could Mo Naye possibly allow Yang Xue to intervene and ruin the moment?
Everyone believed that Yang Kai was as good as dead — perhaps in the next instant, perhaps in the one after that. Only the three pseudo-King Lords harbored a sense of disharmony. Their combined assault had indeed given them the overwhelming advantage, yet there was a persistent, strange feeling gnawing at them.
Something wasn't quite right!
By all logic, Yang Kai was merely a peak Eighth Order cultivator. His greatest asset was his ability to deploy spatial techniques to flee. No matter how powerful his actual combat strength might be, it had to have a limit.