"Four Symbols Heavenly Sun—Vermilion Bird Possession!"
In the blink of an eye, a towering inferno erupted around Su Min. Brilliant crimson wings unfurled, and scorching winds swept across the plains.
In the blink of an eye, a towering inferno of serene, azure flame erupted around Su Min. Brilliant, semi-transparent crimson wings of pure energy unfurled from her back, and a scorching, supernatural wind swept outwards across the plains, withering grass and forcing men to shield their faces.
"So this... this is her true power?" one of the young cultivators stammered, his face ashen. "Just touching the edge of those flames would leave us half dead..."
The four cultivators who had so often sparred with her felt a cold dread settle in their stomachs. Ever since they reached the Qi Refining stage, she was the only one qualified to instruct them. Yet never, not even once, had she revealed the full, terrifying extent of her strength.
Now, the difference was unmistakable. It was terrifying.
The truth was, even though Su Min had not gone all out in their spars, she had not been holding back completely either. The effects of the Tiger Soul Possession were simply too subtle, its enhancements to her raw speed and strength too difficult for their senses to grasp. They had not realized just how vast the gap between them had already become.
Boom!!!
A moment later, the controlled firestorm around Su Min detonated outwards among the closest enemy ranks. Dozens of grassland soldiers caught within the radius were instantly swallowed by the blazing inferno, their screams lost in the roar of the flames. This was the raw, destructive might Su Min could unleash now that she stood at the very peak of Qi Refining.
This time, she did not waste words. Earlier, she had allowed the elders a chance to merge, to face her with their full, combined strength. But now that every escape route was cut off and their defeat was inevitable, there was nothing left to say.
"Damn it...!"
Even the seasoned, hardened hearts of the fused Flame and Earth Elder trembled. If they were in perfect condition, perhaps they would not have feared a direct confrontation. But to clash head on with Su Min now was to invite certain death. Their situation was dire:
*Their shared form was crippled, legs mangled from her earlier strike.
*The Vermilion Bird's corrosive flames still sizzled within their meridians.
*There was no room for even a single mistake.
Escape was impossible. The only reason they could still stand and move was by forcibly channeling spiritual energy into their damaged limbs. But against a foe who could take to the skies, there was truly nowhere to run.
Clang.
Their forces collided again in a shower of spiritual sparks.
Now that the old men had fused into one being and temporarily stepped into the Foundation Establishment stage, they could finally breach Su Min's layered defenses and land a few solid, resonating blows against her armor. Yet, after dozens of frantic midair clashes, despair only grew in their hearts.
Su Min fought with an unnerving, preternatural precision. She seemed to understand their attack patterns, their ingrained techniques, even the slight, almost imperceptible delay in their fused movements. She seized every tiny weakness, her sword striking exactly where it would disrupt their spiritual flow most, as if she had studied them for a lifetime.
"Who the hell are you?!" the fused entity roared, its voice a distorted blend of two.
With one final, shattering impact, Su Min slammed them out of the sky. They hit the ground like a falling meteor, cratering the earth. Gasping for ragged breaths, the two old monsters within the form shouted again, raw panic bleeding into their voices.
"A passing Kamen Rider."
"...What?"
Their confusion barely had time to register before Su Min blurred into motion again, the Galeburst Pill's effect still lingering. She appeared directly in front of their kneeling form.
"DIE!!!"
They both cried out in unison, hurriedly raising their massive, mountain like earthen shield artifact. But at that exact moment—
ROAR!!!!
A deafening, purely bestial roar exploded directly in their minds, a spiritual attack from Su Min's Tiger Soul Possession that shattered their concentration and focus.
"You—you actually have a mid grade Yellow rank spiritual weapon, you—"
Before the fused elder could finish the sentence, Su Min was already upon them. Not with her sword, but with the dark, unassuming gourd she pulled from her ring. It slammed into the shield.
In the blink of an eye—
BOOM!!!
A thunderous, earth rending explosion tore across the battlefield as a blinding, vengeful bolt of black lightning surged out from the gourd. The devastating strike swallowed the two men whole, then continued on, cleaving a deep, smoldering trench across the battlefield, cleanly splitting it in two.
Tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides froze in place, their fight forgotten.
Even atop Yongzhou's high fortress wall, the soldiers and Prince Yong himself stood utterly stunned, unable to speak.
"She... she split the entire battlefield with one strike?" someone finally whispered, their voice trembling. "How is that possible?!"
It was the Demon Slaying Thunder.
After absorbing the essence of the two powerful late stage Qi Refining beasts, it had been building up immense, cataclysmic power. Combined with Su Min's peak cultivation at the moment of release, its power was apocalyptic, silencing the entire war in one single, terrifying instant. The Flame and Earth Elders were completely, utterly annihilated, leaving not even ash behind.
Even Su Min was slightly taken aback by the sheer scale of the destruction. But thinking it over, it made sense. The last time she had used it, the gourd had only contained the giant clam demon. Now, it had digested two powerful late stage Qi Refining beast corpses. Its stored power had multiplied many times over.
"Looks like even if I had not softened them up beforehand," she mused, "even at their peak, one full blast of the Demon Slaying Thunder would have left them on the brink of death."
True Foundation Establishment cultivators were no joke, and Su Min had been wary of a desperate self detonation from the fused entity. So she had seized the perfect opportunity and struck first. The only real downside?
There was not even a corpse left to loot.
"Good thing the main spiritual artifacts survived the blast. The essence of two peak Qi Refiners—what a boost for my foundation."
Muttering to herself, she waved her hand and used her spiritual sense to summon the two core artifacts—the earthen shield and the fiery root—back to her hand. It was their misfortune that the earth type artifact could not endure a direct strike from her sword, and the fire type weapon was completely useless against her own superior flames.
With her Golden Bell Barrier, her enchanted armor, and her Nanming Lihuo protecting her, Su Min's defensive and fire resistant capabilities were nearly absolute. As she calmly collected her spoils, the entire battlefield sank into an eerie, profound silence. With her flaming wings still spread wide, she hovered in the sky, silhouetted against the sun, like a divine being descended from the heavens to pass judgment.
As she slowly descended towards the churned earth, the hundreds of thousands of enemy soldiers who witnessed it began to take slow, trembling steps backward.
She could not possibly kill them all, of course, but that no longer mattered. Every single person on that field had seen what she was capable of. No one doubted that she could kill any one of them in an instant, personally, and without any visible effort. The black lightning that had torn the world apart was proof enough.
When death itself descends from the heavens, the human spirit breaks. Even the legendary Flame and Earth Elders, their paragons of power and prestige, had been reduced to less than dust before their eyes.
And now?
She was no longer a person in their eyes.
She was a goddess of vengeance and flame.
"She's a god—RUN!!"
No one knew who shouted it first, but that single, terrified cry triggered an avalanche of pure panic. The front ranks broke formation entirely, fleeing in a chaotic, mindless rush, cutting down anyone who blocked their way. Even the officers and soldiers meant to suppress deserters were swept up in the tide and forced to retreat or be trampled.
The cavalry had horses. Those behind—the slaves, the porters, the old and the weak—had nothing. Within seconds, they were trampled and buried beneath the stampede of their own army.
A living, breathing nightmare of humanity's worst instincts unfolded before Su Min's eyes.
"Everyone—CHARGE!!!"
Prince Yong's voice, raw with triumphant fury, roared from atop the wall.
The massive city gates burst open. Ten thousand elite cavalry surged out, their hooves pounding the earth, led by the four Qi Refining cultivators and a legion of vengeful Body Forging warriors. The enemy had no will, no formation, and no leadership left to resist.
It was not a battle.
It was a slaughter.
The moment the two forces met, it was no longer a clash of armies—it was butchery.
"War..." Su Min sighed softly, shaking her head as she watched the grim aftermath unfold.
With that, she turned her back on the carnage and soared gracefully back to the walls of Yongzhou. She had no more interest in this massacre. The outcome had been decisively decided the moment the black lightning fell. There was no need for her to lift a finger anymore.