The Rong tribe member below, who had been commanding the banner, turned pale with shock. Without a moment's thought, he slapped his own heavenly spirit cap, and the coarse, stiff green fur covering his body let out a sharp "whoosh" as it transformed into a massive spread of green light that shot skyward.
But the descending silver ruler flickered with an elusive, ghostly motion, slipping effortlessly through the green light before crashing squarely onto the Rong tribe member's skull.
The Rong tribe member's protective spiritual light seemed to have completely lost its effect against the silver ruler, offering no resistance whatsoever as the enormous weapon plunged straight through. His skull shattered like a watermelon under the blow, blood spraying in every direction.
The headless body swayed once, then tumbled off the flying vehicle and plummeted downward.
With a muffled "pu," a ball of green shadow burst from the corpse at blinding speed, containing a small figure entirely green in hue. Its face twisted in terror, it flashed toward the nearby Rong tribe member who was commanding the bronze mirror, simultaneously crying out in panic: "Brother Liao, save me!"
But the words had barely left the small figure's mouth when — BOOM — a shadow of the ruler descended as if teleporting from the heavens, striking the small figure into nothingness, utterly annihilated.
Without the slightest pause, the giant silver ruler flickered once more and conjured three identical ruler shadows, sweeping toward the remaining three Rong tribe members.
The ruler shadows shimmered between visibility and invisibility, but the roar of wind and thunder that followed was absolutely deafening, the display nothing short of terrifying!
The other three, seeing their companion's physical body destroyed in an instant, were consumed by a mixture of fury and panic. They hastily deployed their own means to defend against the ruler shadows.
A swath of gray gauze and a black shield each materialized and shot out to block in front of them.
But when two of the ruler shadows struck these defenses, they merely erupted in a flash of silver light before vanishing.
They were nothing but illusory phantoms.
"Not good!" the two Rong tribe members cried out in their hearts almost simultaneously.
But it was already too late!
The Rong tribe member commanding the bronze mirror had also raised his hand, releasing a dharma wheel-shaped treasure to block the final ruler shadow.
Yet the ruler shadow vanished before the dharma wheel, and in the very next instant, half of the silver ruler thrust out from the void barely a foot away from the alien's hideous face, striking with ghostly precision.
Lightning flickered, and countless silver arcs of electricity sprang from the ruler's surface.
Thunder boomed deafeningly, and the Rong tribe member was instantly reduced to a cloud of ash, not even his Nascent Soul managing to escape in time.
The remaining two Rong tribe members' faces turned ghastly at the sight. But when the silver ruler completed one circling sweep and conjured more than a dozen ruler shadows descending toward them, one of them suddenly shouted a piercing command: "Run! This person's power is extraordinary — we can't fight him head-on!"
The words had barely left his mouth when the alien stomped a single foot on the flying vehicle below. The diamond-shaped craft let out a low hum and shot backward as a streak of cyan light, flashing several times before escaping the range of the ruler shadows.
The other Rong tribe member also snapped back to his senses in alarm. He hurriedly formed a one-handed seal and struck a spell forward onto the relief carving ahead.
The flying vehicle trembled, and the slender wings on either side beat once. Five-colored runes surfaced along the vehicle's body, as though it was about to flee into the distance for good.
But at that very moment, a faint voice drifted down from above the flying vehicle: "Thinking of leaving now — don't you think it's a little late!"
The words had barely echoed through the air when with a thunderous "boom," an enormous black mountain peak materialized above the flying vehicle in a single flash, spanning well over a hundred zhang in size.
And upon the summit of that peak, a figure stood perfectly motionless.
It was Han Li!
At some point, he had activated the Primordial Magnetic Pole Mountain and crossed the void to appear here.
The two below felt their hearts sink the moment they saw him.
One's face contorted with a vicious flash. He rubbed his palms together, and a layer of eerie green flames erupted from his body with a "pu." The flames then coiled and transformed into a fire dragon over ten zhang long that lunged upward into the sky.
The other let out a great roar, his body swelling to twice its size in an instant. Both arms thickened considerably, and his ten fingers, now unnaturally sharp, clawed upward through the air.
A deafening tearing sound erupted as dense, innumerable claw marks materialized, sweeping upward in a canopy.
In their hearts, they harbored no illusion that these attacks could kill their opponent. They only hoped to briefly obstruct his killing strike, giving the flying vehicle a chance to tear through the void and flee.
By this point, after witnessing Han Li kill two of their kinsmen in what seemed like the span of a single exchange, these two aliens had completely lost any will to fight. All they wanted was to escape.
Han Li narrowed his eyes and pressed a single foot down upon the mountain peak beneath him.
The Primordial Magnetic Pole Mountain's gray light flickered once, and amid a great surge of radiance it dropped downward — but then silver runes across its surface blazed bright, and the colossal peak plunged into the void and vanished.
The fire dragon and claw marks struck nothing but empty air.
The two Rong tribe members felt a massive black shadow flash into existence directly overhead, impossibly close. The black mountain peak reappeared with eerie abruptness, slamming down toward them without the slightest mercy.
"Not good—"