For a moment, everyone looked at Xia Hui with immense gratitude.
Had it not been for her warning, this battle might have already ended in disaster.
‘They’re hopeless…’ Xia Hui muttered under her breath.
If the next generation of Saint Sect disciples were all at this level of strength, she suddenly felt that the entire Right Path might be doomed.
Moments after the Strong Man reached the vicinity of the Stone Pillar, Hua Jian and Shiqi arrived in quick succession.
Seeing the Five Elements Grand Array standing tall near the Stone Pillar, both women showed expressions of relief.
It seemed this group of people wasn’t so foolish that they would forget to set up a defense.
However, even with the array established, it was a bit of a stretch for these Spirit Masters to completely withstand the Strong Man’s attacks.
If no one was there to distract him, they would never last until the Stone Pillar finished resetting.
At this time, Hua Jian and Shiqi needed to continue their efforts.
Among everyone present, only the two of them had the ability to briefly divert the Strong Man’s attention.
The strategy for victory was simple: everyone else would stay tucked inside their shells while the two of them harassed the Strong Man, preventing him from focusing all his might on attacking the array.
Clang!
A sword lunged toward the Strong Man’s back. Hua Jian’s attack was something he had to take seriously.
He swung a fist toward her Ling Sword, intending to block the strike with his physical body.
The moment his fist touched the tip of the blade, Hua Jian twisted her wrist.
As Spiritual Power poured into the Ling Sword, the entire blade suddenly became as flexible and agile as a venomous snake.
One must not forget that this was no ordinary Ling Sword.
“You actually had a hidden move like this?” The Strong Man was caught off guard, nearly taking a direct hit to the chest.
Fortunately, his reaction speed was fast enough. He twisted his body to avoid his vitals, allowing the blade to merely graze his arm.
Ssss… A sound like cold water hitting a hot surface erupted as wisps of green smoke rose from the Strong Man’s arm.
His expression shifted slightly. “What potent poison!”
Although he had used Spiritual Power to isolate the toxin outside his body before it could enter his system, the sheer ferocity of the poison still left him with lingering fear.
If he had accidentally allowed it to enter his body, even someone like him might have been laid low.
Having failed to land a decisive blow, Hua Jian tapped the ground lightly and pulled back to create distance.
“But you are still a cut above, Senior Brother.”
The poisons of Wanhuagu were not invincible. While they could cause a Spirit Master to lose their combat effectiveness instantly, they could only serve as a tool of attrition against a Ling King.
This caused Hua Jian’s original plan to “cheat” her way through the fight to fail.
She had thought she could use this poison to stall for much more time.
“If your strength were equal to mine, I’m afraid I would have already lost to you.” The Strong Man chuckled, then suddenly pounced toward her.
“I see it now. If I don’t deal with you first, I won’t be able to break that array!”
Hua Jian was the core of everything. Only by taking her out would he have the leisure to smash that turtle shell!
Having realized this, the Strong Man decisively abandoned his assault on the array and turned to focus all his might on Hua Jian.
Seeing the aggressive momentum of the Strong Man’s charge, Hua Jian knew this was no longer a game.
If she didn’t handle this seriously, she would be taken out in a few moves.
A head-on clash was absolutely out of the question, so she could only run!
Hua Jian, who was quite confident in her own lack of frontal combat power, chose to flee without hesitation.
Because she was weaker, she needed to defeat her enemy through movement.
But this time, it was difficult to run.
The array was right nearby. If she ran too far, the Strong Man could simply turn back and attack the array.
If that happened a few more times, the defense wouldn’t hold.
She needed to maintain the Strong Man’s attention for a specific duration to buy enough time for the cultivators resetting the Stone Pillar.
This was a difficult task. Even if the top-ranked cultivators from the Genius List came together, they might struggle to accomplish it.
Yet now, Hua Jian was alone, and even Shiqi found it hard to assist her in this situation.
The Strong Man was clearly determined to kill her at all costs.
He didn’t even bother to acknowledge Shiqi’s attacks, choosing to tank them with his body.
The result of his endurance was nothing more than a few white marks on his skin, while Shiqi was forced back by his protective Solar Flame Aura.
Shiqi, who couldn’t even withstand the Solar Flame Aura, naturally found it difficult to help Hua Jian.
“Shiqi, go help them! Leave this to me!” Hua Jian shouted loudly to her companion.
Before her words could land, the Strong Man had already charged in front of her, swinging a fist downward.
Her body immediately transformed into scattered flying flowers.
Adhering to the strategy of dodging rather than fighting, Hua Jian used her escape techniques to evade his attacks while occasionally using various small gadgets to keep the Strong Man distracted.
“The Spirit Vines of the Wanling Sect? A pity your strength is too low to bring out their true potential.”
Burning away a Spirit Net Hua Jian had thrown with a single hand, the Strong Man once again closed the gap.
Even though Hua Jian’s Flying Flower Evasion was exceptionally good at maneuvering within short distances, a Ling King was a Ling King.
The Strong Man only looked clumsy; in reality, his agility was not inferior to hers at all.
By utilizing various small tricks with fire-type Spirit Techniques, his short-range burst speed was actually steadily superior to Hua Jian’s.
Using the recoil of an explosion to propel himself forward was a technique Hua Jian had seen for the first time.
She could only admit that he was worthy of being chosen as a gatekeeper Boss; his strength was truly powerful enough to make one lose hope of victory.
This time, Hua Jian couldn’t completely dodge the punch even with her evasion technique.
The searing flames singed the edges of the flying flowers, knocking Hua Jian out of her hidden state.
She rolled across the ground somewhat disheveled.
Before she could even stand up, the Strong Man had already performed a massive leap, landing above her and stomping down toward her head.
Hua Jian didn’t dare try to stand. Using the momentum from the previous punch, she continued rolling across the ground to avoid the stomp.
Avoiding one move wasn’t the end. After missing his stomp, the Strong Man kicked off the ground, charging straight at her like a rhinoceros.
‘So fast!’ Hua Jian frantically lunged to the side, but she still couldn’t completely avoid the strike.
With a massive boom, the flames on the Strong Man exploded as he reached her side.
Violent Spiritual Power was not something that could be dodged with mere technique; Hua Jian was forced to endure the impact with her own body.
During the process of fighting her, the Strong Man had accurately captured Hua Jian’s weakness and found the simplest way to defeat her.
Yes, she was agile, as slippery as an eel. But she was extremely fragile.
Even being grazed by the shockwaves of an attack a few times would leave her unable to get back up.
Since that was the case, the Strong Man abandoned his tactic of concentrating power into a single point and instead chose to sacrifice some destructive force in exchange for a larger attack radius.
‘As long as you can’t escape the range of my skills when I strike, what use is your agility?’
Escape techniques weren’t invincibility or intangibility.
While it looked like Hua Jian turned into petals and vanished, those petals were just a visual effect to deceive the eye.
Her true body still existed; she was merely invisible.
If she was hit by an area-of-effect attack, she would still be affected.
When fighting enemies of the same level, this problem wasn’t very obvious.
She could handle the shockwaves from someone in the same rank without an issue.
But once faced with someone of a higher rank, the situation changed.
She couldn’t withstand the shockwaves from any attack, especially the fire-type ones, which were both scorching and powerful.
It was enough to give her a massive headache.
Now that this fatal weakness had been discovered, Hua Jian’s situation became increasingly perilous.
She was like a stunt performer walking on a tightrope; a single mistake would plunge her into an abyss of no return.
Yet, even without making a single mistake, the more shockwaves she endured, the further she slid toward defeat.
In a one-on-one fight, she definitely couldn’t win.
Her clothes were already scorched with numerous holes, revealing her white undergarments.
The largest gap was at her waist, caused by that earlier glancing punch.
It was that very strike that had put Hua Jian at a severe disadvantage.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The Strong Man continued his pursuit, sending Hua Jian scurrying. With every punch he threw, her condition visibly worsened.
The shockwaves generated by his fists were the Strong Man’s true attacks. Every wave made her blood boil within her chest.
As a massive Fireball erupted beside her, the shockwave of the explosion sent Hua Jian flying before she could use her evasion technique.
At that moment, the Strong Man knew that victory belonged to him.
The hit Hua Jian had just taken was more severe than any previous attack.
The fact that she wasn’t directly kicked out of the Secret Realm was a testament to her physical resilience.
But even if she wasn’t dead now, he just needed one more punch to send her away.
Looking at Hua Jian, who lay motionless a short distance away like a fallen leaf, the Strong Man let his guard down slightly.
With a quick stride, he reached her. A condensed blade of fire formed in his hand, ready to descend upon her head.
At that exact moment, several colored Vines suddenly burst out from the soil beneath the Strong Man’s feet, firmly binding his limbs.
Hua Jian, who should have been too heavily injured to crawl, suddenly snapped her head up.
She exhaled a cloud of Demonic Qi directly into the Strong Man’s face.
Most of the colored gas was burned away by his flames, but a portion still reached its target.
Even though the Strong Man had held his breath in time, the Li Qi could still enter his body through his skin and mucous membranes, inducing a hallucinogenic effect.
He had stated earlier that he couldn’t use Ling King-rank Spirit Tools.
To resist the influence of Li Qi, a Spirit Master-rank tool was completely insufficient.
Now, he could only rely on his own Soulforce to resist the effects of the toxin.
However, for a cultivator of his level, the influence of hallucinations wasn’t that significant in the short term.
He focused more of his energy on breaking free from the Vines Hua Jian had released.
To his surprise, these Vines were completely unafraid of the flames burning on his body.
They remained tightly bound to him even under the searing heat.
He exerted all his strength to break free, yet he found himself unable to pull away.
They were too tough—so sturdy that they didn’t seem like something a Spirit Master Realm cultivator could summon.
Hua Jian gritted her teeth, pouring all her strength into maintaining the binding of the Vines.
She was one with these Vines. Now that she was focusing entirely on their existence, she naturally had no leeway to use other skills.
The fire was hot, but it was just heat. She felt no fear of being burned to death.
In fact, her Vines seemed to be slowly absorbing the power within the flames to nourish themselves.
“I’ll wrap you to death!”
Of course, Hua Jian was just talking big. She was struggling just to maintain the stalemate.
The Vines being torn at by the Strong Man required a massive amount of Spiritual Power to sustain; otherwise, they would snap in the next heartbeat.
Her Spiritual Power was being consumed rapidly. She had only temporarily controlled the situation.
To truly win, she still needed the Stone Pillar on the other side to finish resetting.
……
While Hua Jian was working hard to restrict the Strong Man’s movements, the resetting of the Stone Pillar on the other side had reached its most critical moment.
The original five cultivators driving the array had been swapped out due to exhaustion, replaced by five others who were in better condition.
After seeing Hua Jian fall into a disadvantage, they pushed even harder, pouring Spiritual Power into the formation as if their lives depended on it, wishing they could finish resetting the massive pillar in an instant.
Even a fool knew that if Hua Jian was defeated, their side would quickly be demolished by the Strong Man.
To win, they had to reset the pillar as quickly as possible.
Under the influence of the array, the massive Stone Pillar rotated like a drill, sinking into the ground.
Three-quarters of the pillar had already submerged.
As the Stone Pillar gradually returned to its place, the appearance of this Forbidden Land began to change.
The most obvious change was that the peripheral lava rivers were starting to solidify.
Cold winds and snow began to penetrate the Forbidden Land, repairing the once-scorching environment.
This environmental shift was also reflected in the Strong Man.
The aura on his body began to weaken bit by bit, making it easier for Hua Jian to control his actions.
Although the battle appeared to be a stalemate on the surface, Hua Jian could clearly feel that the rate of her Spiritual Power consumption was slowing down.
She popped a recovery pill into her mouth and offered a triumphant smile to the Strong Man, whose face was growing increasingly somber.
“It looks like I’m going to win.”
The Strong Man rolled his eyes helplessly. Of course she was.
He now had to split his attention to monitor the progress of the Spirit Pillar’s reset and adjust his output accordingly in real-time.
Otherwise, did Hua Jian really think his strength was dropping this rapidly by accident?
“The dust hasn’t settled yet. Don’t speak such tall tales,” the Strong Man growled with a ferocious expression.
He had to play his part. As a Boss about to be defeated, he couldn’t exactly speak to Hua Jian in a gentle tone.
On this eve of Hua Jian’s victory over a powerful foe, the rats hiding in the shadows finally bared their fangs.
Several attacks flew straight toward Hua Jian’s back.
Simultaneously, a few cultivators dashed toward the Strong Man, their faces filled with greed for the credit.