It must be said that the blade was not completely destroyed by Venerable Mei’s hand alone; rather, it was only through the combination of Venerable Mei's Xuan Gong and Lei Wubei's power that it was utterly ruined in one blow!
Because when Venerable Mei struck with her three fingers, her left hand was turning clockwise, while Lei Wubei moved counter to her force, twisting left. At the very moment the two forces reached their zenith—the instant the blade’s body was on the verge of extreme torsion—one of Venerable Mei's fingers, imbued with supreme Xuan Gong, landed precisely with three heavy strikes!
The power of one Venerable and the might of one Supreme combined upon a single blade—what divine weapon could withstand the mutual crushing pressure of these two forces?
The answer is, essentially none. At least, not Lei Wubei's treasured blade.
Three forces acting simultaneously upon a single point meant the precious blade instantly turned to scrap metal.
Therefore, to be accurate, the Cold-Blooded Supreme's treasured blade was destroyed by the combined effort of him and Supreme Venerable Mei.
Venerable Mei clenched her left hand into a fist, and a fine crimson thread of blood trickled down from her grasp.
Even with her Xuan Beast physique, which was exceptionally resilient, she was ultimately still flesh and blood. Throughout the struggle for the blade, she had held onto the edge, and sustained some injury. But this minor wound was utterly insignificant compared to the price paid by Shi Changxiao and Lei Wubei… truly, laughably insignificant.
Because this single strike predetermined the final victory.
While Lei Wubei stood frozen in shock, even if only for a fleeting moment, Venerable Mei’s body rapidly dropped to the ground, perfectly evading a desperate, returning strike from Li Chuntian. Her body then slid rapidly across the floor as if on a chute, kicking both feet savagely toward Lei Wubei’s tibial bones.
Had this kick landed true, Lei Wubei, the Cold-Blooded Supreme, might have needed a new title: the Crippled Supreme. It was powerful enough to completely shatter both of his legs.
Lei Wubei gasped in alarm, lifting his right foot, and his body spun twice in a flash, clearing three feet away. But he immediately regretted it.
Because behind him stood Shi Changxiao, whom he had just blocked from view.
Venerable Mei’s two kicks had driven Lei Wubei away, but in doing so, she maneuvered into position against Shi Changxiao. With a motion resembling an 'Ulong Jiao Zhu' (a spiraling pivot), a rain of kicks enveloped Shi Changxiao.
Shi Changxiao was genuinely shocked by this attack. Having had his vision obscured by Lei Wubei, although he knew the situation was urgent, he hadn't realized Venerable Mei was already within striking distance. Lei Wubei's sudden evasion left him completely exposed to Venerable Mei's assault.
Flustered, he managed a few clumsy blocks, preparing to brace himself for another head-on collision, when he saw that Venerable Mei had somehow already risen, her palm descending like Mount Tai bearing down on him. With no time to gather energy or amplify his power, and nowhere left to retreat, Shi Changxiao gritted his teeth and closed his eyes to meet the blow.
After a deafening impact followed by two dull thuds, Shi Changxiao was struck on both shoulders and sent tumbling away like a batted shuttlecock.
Venerable Mei then recoiled like lightning, covering a distance of nearly eight zhang, causing the descending strike from Ying Bokong to miss its target. She herself was now before Li Juetian, pressing another three palms against the nearly frenzied Supreme Jue Tian.
Sealing off every possible escape route for Li Juetian, delivering three solid, brute-force palms—this was practically bullying. Venerable Mei sustained absolutely no damage, whereas Li Juetian suffered severe internal and external injuries. The consequence of these three hard exchanges was easy to imagine. Li Juetian’s body shot up from the ground like a shuttlecock, vomiting torrents of blood that flowed continuously like a fountain.
The broken bones that Li Juetian had forcefully sealed with Xuan Gong now shattered completely, disintegrating entirely. His entire body resembled a human pincushion; thin blood-arrows jetted out from every pore.
Venerable Mei swept her long sleeve, and a piece of black cloth lashed out like lightning, wrapping around the severely wounded body of Li Juetian and tossing him upward. The timing was perfect, intercepting the third form of Ying Bokong’s Gui Ying Jiu Shi (Ghost Eagle Nine Forms) as he plummeted from the sky.
This move was Ying Bokong's most potent killing strike, the one he had grasped most thoroughly to date. Just as he prepared to utilize this move to secure victory, his vision suddenly darkened. Li Juetian, consumed by grief and fury, had been delivered directly beneath him. Li Juetian opened his mouth, spraying a jet of blood directly toward Ying Bokong’s face.
Ying Bokong was greatly startled. He hurriedly retracted his move and jerked his head aside, dodging the blood-spit. With both hands, he caught Li Juetian’s body, simultaneously shifting three zhang horizontally through the air like lightning—his goal was to evade Venerable Mei’s follow-up attack.
Since Venerable Mei had tossed Li Juetian up, she must have had an objective. Ying Bokong understood this perfectly and moved to dodge quickly! But even though Ying Bokong’s reaction was fast, he was still a step too late.
A piercing pain struck his lower abdomen—it was the result of three strikes Venerable Mei unleashed sequentially. While two palms missed, the third one grazed him. Ying Bokong let out a strange cry and flew off diagonally like a broken kite, crashing down. A flush spread across his face, and despite his strenuous effort to restrain it, he couldn't hold back. With a loud waa, a mouthful of blood sprayed out onto the body of Li Juetian cradled in his arms.
This outcome was already a result of Ying Bokong’s superb lightness skill, which exceeded Venerable Mei’s projections. However, due to forcefully stopping his move to catch Li Juetian earlier, his Xuan Gong had already suffered internal backlash. Coupled with his swift evasive maneuvers, his protective Xuan Qi had dropped to a dangerously low level. Furthermore, Ying Bokong was never known for profound Xuan Gong mastery. Though he only sustained a glancing blow now, he was severely injured.
Venerable Mei, having gained the momentum of the great battle, would certainly not let such an opportunity pass! Her figure vanished from the spot in a flicker, reappearing instantly in front of Lei Wubei, unleashing a furious, tempestuous assault.
At this moment, Ying Bokong was flying diagonally, Li Juetian was injured further, and Shi Changxiao was five zhang away. For the next few breaths, it was effectively a one-on-one duel against the Cold-Blooded Supreme, Lei Wubei!
And Lei Wubei had just suffered shock trauma, and the treasured blade he valued above life had just been destroyed. This was the moment his fighting spirit was at its lowest ebb. Seeing Venerable Mei target him for a direct fight, his heart and courage collapsed. He frantically defended, rapidly retreating.
A series of bangs echoed. For some inexplicable reason, dust and earth suddenly billowed up from the ground, momentarily obscuring everything beyond arm’s reach. Shi Changxiao, who had just arrived, wanted to rush forward to assist, but in the thick fog, he could only make out two hazy figures. Both were wearing black clothing, making it impossible to distinguish whether one was Venerable Mei or Lei Wubei.
In less than half a second of hesitation, a sound of impacts arrived, followed by a pained, muffled grunt from Lei Wubei. A figure tumbled out, spinning, dressed in tight black clothing—it was Lei Wubei!
Blood gurgled out of Lei Wubei’s mouth. His entire right upper arm was bent backward at a grotesque right angle; clearly, his right arm had suffered a severe fracture. This was only because Venerable Mei had shown mercy and hadn't used lethal force. Had she not held back, that section of Lei Wubei’s arm would have either been pulverized into dust or flung God knows where.
At this point, the outcome of the battle was clear and undeniable.
The four Great Supremes besieging the Master of Heaven’s Punishment had been utterly defeated.
Venerable Mei’s victory was clean and swift. In fact, the four Supremes were defeated decisively before any of them could unleash their ultimate, mutually destructive ultimate moves.
In reality, if any one of the four had employed a mutually annihilating ultimate technique, the tide of battle could have been instantly rewritten. While it might not have defeated Venerable Mei, the result would certainly have been far better than what transpired.
This was because Venerable Mei’s Heaven and Earth Cage could, at best, be used on one person! And casting it against a Supreme was even more taxing! Therefore, the instant she deployed the Heaven and Earth Cage, even though her target was completely immobilized, it was her own moment of greatest vulnerability.
Thus, Venerable Mei could not, and dared not, use the Heaven and Earth Cage.
But humans cherish their lives. Moreover, this battle was fundamentally about victory and defeat, not a true fight to the death. Defeat would not exact a massive price from them individually; the only party to suffer a devastating consequence was Blood Soul Manor. It mattered little to the other Supremes.
If Li Juetian himself was unwilling to fight to the death against the enemy, how could the other three Supremes be expected to? Therefore, this result was not entirely unexpected.
Venerable Mei waved her long sleeves, which curled like flowing clouds. A sudden gust of wind arose, causing the dust on the field to scatter instantly and vanish without a trace, revealing Venerable Mei’s tall silhouette. Clad in her voluminous black robe, she stood alone in the center of the arena, her robes billowing in the wind, looking down upon the scene.
Suddenly, someone in the crowd drew a sharp breath and cried out in horror, "Look... look at the ground..."
Everyone rushed to look and gasped collectively: the entire area where the battle had taken place, paved with the sturdiest granite, had an entire layer, three feet deep, scraped away within a ten-zhang radius!
Removing such a layer wasn't difficult; any Supreme could manage that. But the problem was that there were no scattered stones, nor was there any sound suggesting such debris. So where did that layer of stone go?
Did it sprout wings and fly away?
The truth was, even though the five great masters did not engage in a true battle for their lives, all five utilized their strongest powers. Under the intense agitation of their supreme Xuan Gong, the ground layer by layer was scraped away. As the fighting intensified, more and more stone was planed off. And all of it silently dissolved into mist and vanished...
This was only the result of Venerable Mei exerting considerable control. Otherwise, if the full power of the five masters' Xuan Gong had been unleashed without restraint, perhaps even this small mountain would have been leveled today!
Lei Baoyu and Bu Kuang both sighed deeply. Although they had foreseen such a result, they never expected it to arrive so swiftly!
Even Ying Bokong, Lei Wubei, and Shi Changxiao, who had just been in the thick of the fighting, did not anticipate this. Shi Changxiao and Lei Wubei stood there numbly, their expressions shifting wildly.
Ying Bokong gently placed Li Juetian on the ground, took a few steps, intending to speak, but ultimately said nothing, his face suddenly flushing deep red.
The siege by the Four Great Supremes ended in such a crushing defeat.
How could such a result be accepted calmly by these four Supremes who habitually considered themselves at the pinnacle of the world? This battle today not only signaled the complete defeat of the Continental Human Alliance but also dealt a massive blow to the reputations of the Four Great Supremes themselves!
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