Given Zhou Tian's strength, if he hadn't first used the power of the divine emperor artifact to pull the opponent into the treasure space, he wouldn't have had the qualification to engage in a battle with them.
Thus, at that time, Zhou Tian either would not fight with full strength, or if he did, it would essentially mean that he would have to expose the divine emperor artifact he held.
As for the consequences of exposing the fact that he had a divine emperor artifact, Zhou Tian had known about them long ago. And in such a situation, if there had been other choices, Zhou Tian, for sure, would not have let the fact that he held this divine emperor artifact be exposed.
Especially since, during the two encounters with the opponent, although Zhou Tian was beaten to the point where he couldn't fight back, he still managed to grasp some things through the opportunity of their contact.
