On the vast plain as if baptized by a nuclear blast, only deathly silence remained.
Corpses of soul beasts lay piled like mountains, but even more had been annihilated so completely that not even bodies remained.
Charred limbs, shredded viscera, blood-soaked fur and chill scales were strewn everywhere.
The grievously wounded soul beasts that hadn't yet died let out cries of pain and despair, the sound especially jarring and mournful on the silent battlefield.
The once-surging, unstoppable beast tide was now reduced to a few scattered survivors, trembling in panic along the fringes of the battlefield. They had lost all will to fight; their eyes held nothing but primal terror.
The backbone of the Star Dou Great Forest, accumulated over countless years, the elites of innumerable soul-beast clans, suffered catastrophic losses in this senseless calamity, their vitality grievously wounded—more tragic by far than the combined toll of all previous bloodbaths against Shrek City's defenders.
"Oh? A few slightly sturdier ants managed to avoid being crushed."
Phantylia yawned lazily, as if she'd just completed a trivial task.
She casually extended a finger. At its tip, that heart-palpitating purple-black power of destruction condensed once more, precisely locking onto the surviving fierce beasts below—Bi Ji, Bear Lord, and others—as well as the terrified remnant of the soul-beast army farther away.
Her original intent had been to erase the city and everything unsightly around it in one sweep.
The self-sacrificing interceptions by Yan Shaozhe and the others, though tragic, were ultimately like a praying mantis trying to stop a chariot; they only managed to dampen the Star of Destruction's power by a negligible sliver, allowing Bi Ji and the fierce beasts to barely cling to life instead of being obliterated on the spot.
In a sense, they might even owe their survival to the humans' dying struggle.
As that terror of power—like Death's gaze itself—locked onto them again and condensed at high speed, Bi Ji's eyes filled with utter despair. Bear Lord roared in unwilling fury but couldn't move. The Ten Thousand Monster King's spiritual fluctuations brimmed with fear. All remaining soul beasts froze, awaiting the final, inescapable end.
The finger of annihilation was about to fall again.
At the very moment the soul-beast race was about to meet total extinction—
Vmm—!!!
From afar, at the bottom of the Lake of Life in the very core of the Star Dou Great Forest, an aura forcibly suppressed for a long time—and in no way inferior to Phantylia's current might—erupted.
A dazzling silver-violet pillar of light tore through the lake surface and speared into the heavens, dyeing that sky in magnificent, awe-inspiring hues.
Within the beam, a breathtaking silver figure ripped the firmament. The space around her folded and was crossed as if a flimsy curtain; in an instant, she traversed myriad miles and appeared above the abyssal crater where Shrek City had been.
She wore a silver gown flowing with a moonlit sheen; her graceful form carried supreme majesty.
Her violet eyes were like the purest crystal, limpid and deep, yet now burned with a soul-freezing, boundless fury and killing intent.
Silver hair streamed wildly in a wind of its own. Around her coiled the seven most primal elemental forces—water, fire, wind, earth, light, darkness, and space—circling her tamely, as if she were the sovereign of all elements under heaven.
Space subtly warped and dimpled near her, testament to the overwhelming strength she wielded.
It was the Sovereign of Soul Beasts, the Silver Dragon King—Gu Yuena.
With her own immense power, she had finally smashed through the strange seal Phantylia had set by leveraging the Lake of Life's unique environment. The instant she broke free, she tore space and rushed to this blood-soaked battlefield.
Her gaze fell upon the ruins below—utterly erased, leaving only a gigantic abyssal black hole where Shrek City had stood.
Her spirit sense took in Phantylia's evil aura, suffused with cold death and a lust for annihilation; Di Tian frozen in ice; Bi Ji and the other fierce beasts gravely wounded and dying; and a soul-beast army reduced to a tenth of its numbers.
All of it seared Gu Yuena's heart like a branding iron, fanning her fury to its zenith.
"Controlling Di Tian, using my people, trampling life… You deserve death a thousand times over!"
Gu Yuena wasted no words. Her violet gaze locked onto Phantylia above; she lifted a jade hand and gave a seemingly casual sweep forward.
In an instant, the seven base elements circling her fused at unprecedented speed—not a simple stacking, but a roaring torrent of chaotic energy that seemed capable of resetting earth, water, and flame.
That torrent became a colossal sword, carrying Gu Yuena's wrath as it cleaved toward Phantylia's annihilating radiance that was about to lance down at Bi Ji and the others.
Boom—!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Two god-level powers in the truest sense collided once more.
The detonation dwarfed any before it.
The sky seemed torn open with a rift that could not heal, revealing the churning chaos beyond.
The earth, already heaving like waves, was ravaged again. Massive cracks spiderwebbed outward. Shockwaves carved new, ghastly scars into a world already laid waste.
Phantylia's newborn body, formed from the Golden Tree, wavered slightly. Surprise flickered in her eyes, then morphed into thicker amusement and excitement, as if she'd found an unexpectedly interesting toy.
"Oh? You actually broke my seal? I did underestimate you. Impressive."
Her voice held a lazy note of praise, yet her superiority was even more apparent.
Gu Yuena's exquisite figure quivered in the air; solemnity flashed in her violet eyes.
One exchange told her clearly how troublesome this opponent was.
Phantylia's power was bizarre to the extreme, brimming with pure destructive will. Having taken the Golden Tree—the life core of the Douluo Star—as her body and energy source, she now possessed nearly inexhaustible regeneration and vitality.
Gu Yuena herself had just forced her way out of the seal and was not back to her peak. If she fought to the death now, the outcome was uncertain. More importantly… the soul-beast race under her command, devastated as they were, could no longer withstand further losses.
In a single clash, these two god-level beings at the pinnacle of this world had already gained a crystalline understanding of each other's strength and circumstances.
Gu Yuena cast a deep, icy look at that bewitching figure, then rapidly swept her gaze across the miserable remnants below—the soul-beast army decimated to a tenth, the fierce beasts cowed and grievously wounded.
Her decision came in an instant.
"All soul beasts, hear my command—"
Her voice was no longer raised, but incomparably cold and authoritative. It resounded in the deepest part of every surviving soul beast's spirit, carrying an absolute will that brooked no defiance, forcibly suppressing all their fear and chaos.
"Retreat. Fall back to the Star Dou Great Forest at once!"
As she gave the order, she flashed a hand. A soft silver radiance unfurled like a long ribbon, instantly wrapping the ice-sealed titan Di Tian and the grievously wounded Bear Lord, Bi Ji, the Ten Thousand Monster King, and other fierce beasts.
At the same time, the vast, majestic dragon might of the Silver Dragon King spread outward, in an instant cleansing the air of the residual destructive taint and sheltering the terrified survivors below, safeguarding their retreat.
Phantylia hovered above the abyssal pit without moving to stop them, watching at her leisure. A mocking, playful smile curved her strange features, as if she were enjoying an escape drama that had nothing to do with her.
She had just obtained this boundlessly promising new body and needed time to adapt and fully merge with it. Her primary objective had been achieved to perfection; there was no need to clash to the bitter end now with a native powerhouse whose state was unclear but clearly not to be trifled with.
Silver light flared. Gu Yuena tarried no longer. Enfolding the fierce beasts, she turned into a silver meteor that ripped the sky, fleeing toward the Star Dou Great Forest.
The soul-beast remnants who had miraculously survived the Star of Destruction, already scared witless by Phantylia, now seized this lone lifeline. Ignoring pain and exhaustion, they let out ragged cries and, guided by the silver glow, fled in panic toward the forest like a broken dike, leaving behind a field of their kin's corpses and boundless ruin.
Phantylia did not pursue. She simply hung in the void, savoring the oceanic life force within her new body and the godly power of destruction at her beck and call.
She looked down at the colossal black hole below—now in place of the ancient stronghold—like a gateway to hell. The corner of her mouth lifted in a meaningful smile.
"Shrek Academy destroyed by a beast tide… Heh. When this reaches the human world, it should be quite entertaining, no?"
She murmured, her gaze seeming to pierce the distance toward the reinforcements converging from all directions—weak in aura yet great in number.
The continent's Number One academy, the steel bastion of humanity against soul beasts, a city of glory for ten thousand years—was now thoroughly reduced to dust in history, erased without mercy from the maps of the Douluo Continent.
From the distant horizon, Gu Yuena's voice drifted back, ice-cold and searing with wrath.
"Phantylia, today's enmity will be repaid a hundredfold!"
Phantylia answered only with a playful, scornful chuckle. Her form grew translucent and finally melted away like ink into water, vanishing into the twisted void, leaving only a dead, gaping abyss—and the tidal wave about to sweep the continent.
…
"What in the world… happened?!"
On the distant skyline, several streaks of multicolored light tore the sky at astonishing speed and halted abruptly over where Shrek City had been.
The brilliance faded, revealing figures wreathed in surging soul power, strong enough to walk upon the air.
At their head stood a man in the star-crowned battle robe unique to the Star Luo Empire's Royal Worship Hall—Star Luo's Grand Worship, the Rank 98 Super Douluo: Skyhawk Douluo Song Ying.
His hawk-like, piercing gaze locked onto the scene below; his time-worn face was filled with unprecedented shock and disbelief.
What met his eyes was not the expected sight of a mighty city aflame in battle, but a vast, bottomless black crater, as if it opened directly into hell.
The towering walls, lofty edifices, familiar streets… all gone. Only a smooth, glassy-edged depression remained, wisps of black smoke and a dead aura rising from it—and farther out, rock strata melted by unimaginable heat into eerie glass.
An apocalyptic tableau testified to the horror that had unfolded here.