Within a dense forest, a bloodied and mangled figure was scrambling away in a wretched state.
It was Tang Hao.
The price of detonating eight spirit rings was immense. At this moment, blood flowed from all his orifices, his Meridians were shattered throughout his body, and he was barely holding on purely by a will to survive.
But he dared not stop.
The oppressive feeling that man gave him was too terrifying.
Right at that moment, a figure appeared in front of him without the slightest warning.
Tang Hao's Soul nearly left his body. He frantically halted his steps. The movement was too violent, aggravating his wounds, causing him to spit out another mouthful of blood.
He looked at Li Yifei before him, his voice trembling violently with fear.
"You... what do you want?"
Li Yifei did not answer, merely watching him quietly. That gaze was like looking at a fly already caught in a spider's web.
Tang Hao gritted his teeth, roaring with a bluster that concealed his weakness.
"You can't kill me! I'm a member of the Clear Sky Sect! If you kill me, the Clear Sky Sect will never let you go!"
Upon hearing this, a hint of an amused expression appeared on Li Yifei's face.
"Clear Sky Sect?"
"How come I remember you saying with your own mouth, just moments ago, that the Clear Sky Sect has already severed ties with you?"
Tang Hao's face instantly stiffened.
He had forgotten. While his mind was being guided and controlled, he had spilled all his secrets.
Using the Clear Sky Sect to threaten the other party was simply inviting humiliation upon himself.
Tang Hao's eyes darted rapidly. Suddenly, he thought of something, as if grabbing onto the last lifeline.
"Right! You can't kill me!"
"You and that rabbit, you're both hundred-thousand-year Soul Beasts who have taken human form, right!"
"If you kill me, your identities will be completely exposed! By then, Spirit Masters from across the entire continent will come hunting you! For a hundred-thousand-year spirit ring and Soul bone, they'll go mad like rabid dogs!"
Li Yifei's brow lifted slightly.
"Oh? You want to use that to threaten me?"
Seeing his reaction, a sliver of hope rose in Tang Hao's heart.
"Exactly! Let me go, I swear, I won't breathe a word of what happened today!"
"We'll go our separate ways, act as if nothing ever happened!"
Li Yifei looked at him, his expression somewhere between a smile and not.
He suddenly spoke, asking a question.
"But if you die, wouldn't this secret be known by no one?"
Looking at the man holding Xiao Wu before him, a fear originating from the depths of his Soul gripped Tang Hao's heart.
He couldn't understand.
He had already detonated eight spirit rings, exchanging them for the fastest speed of his life, so why was he still caught up with so easily?
The other party didn't even show the slightest sign of fatigue. That leisurely, unhurried manner seemed as if he wasn't chasing a Titled Douluo, but taking a stroll in his own courtyard.
Despair flooded over him like a tide.
But he couldn't die.
He hadn't returned to the Clear Sky Sect yet, hadn't washed away the disgrace on his person.
Tang San! He still had Tang San!
As long as Tang San could become a god, he could return to the Sect, make all those who once looked down on him kneel at his feet!
However, Li Yifei merely gave a faint smile.
That smile was very calm, even carrying a hint of pity, as if watching the final, clumsy performance of a buffoon.
Then, Li Yifei raised his hand.
A fist-sized stone slowly rose from the ground, hovering in his palm.
Tang Hao watched the stone warily, his spirit power surging wildly. The faint shadow of the Clear Sky Hammer flickered behind him, ready to launch a thunderous strike at any moment.
But the next second, that stone vanished from Li Yifei's hand.
Vanished into thin air.
Tang Hao was stunned.
What kind of technique was this?
Before he could even think, an indescribable, intense pain suddenly exploded inside his skull.
It wasn't the dull pain of being smashed by a hammer, nor the sharp pain of being pierced by a blade.
It was a... destructive agony, as if a foreign object had been forcibly stuffed into his brain, churning all his nerves, tissues, and thoughts into a pulp.
His eyes widened abruptly, bloodshot, the eyeballs almost bulging out of their sockets.
He wanted to scream, but couldn't make a sound. Only a wheezing, air-leaking noise came from his throat.
He wanted to raise his hands to cover his head, but his body had completely lost control.
His consciousness was rapidly fading. Everything before his eyes began to twist and blur.
In the final moment before plunging completely into darkness, he seemed to see Ah Yin's face, filled with despair and resentment.
So, retribution truly comes.
*Thud.*
Tang Hao's body, like a marionette with its strings cut, fell powerlessly from mid-air, crashing heavily to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.
He died not knowing how he had actually died.
In the live broadcast, everything happened too fast, too bizarrely.
One moment Tang Hao was hoarsely threatening, the next he was falling stiffly, lifeless.
The Chat Group fell silent for a moment, then erupted with a tsunami of questions.
[Worlds Number One Princess: Huh? What happened? How did he suddenly stop breathing?]
Ning Rongrong rubbed her eyes, her face full of disbelief.
[Little Fox Demon: Was... was it Yi Fei brother? But I didn't see anything!]
Hu Liena's pupils contracted to pinpoints. She replayed the scene repeatedly but couldn't find any trace of an attack.
[Ghost Cat: Dead? Just like that?]
Zhu Zhuqing's voice carried a slight tremble. This silent, traceless method of killing frightened her more than any flashy Spirit Ability.
Li Yifei walked to Tang Hao's corpse, confirmed he was thoroughly dead, then bent down and picked up the storage soul tool he had dropped.
He weighed it in his hand, his Divine Thought sweeping through it. The gold Soul coins and some miscellaneous items inside clearly appeared in his mind.
Only then did he look up, facing the empty space ahead as if explaining to all the viewers.
"This is the true application of spatial skills."
His voice, transmitted through the broadcast, clearly reached everyone's ears.
"I just used spatial power to directly teleport that stone into Tang Hao's brain. So he just... went cold."
These words, like a thunderclap from the Nine Heavens, exploded in everyone's minds.
Teleport... teleport a stone... into the brain?
Inside the Spirit Hall's carriage.
Bibi Dong abruptly sat up straight from the soft couch, her purple phoenix eyes filled with unprecedented shock and terror.
As a Peak powerhouse of the Douluo Continent, she had witnessed countless methods of killing.
There were overwhelmingly domineering assaults, unpredictable and bizarre poisons, and assassinations impossible to guard against.
But not one could compare to the scene before her eyes.
This was an execution... that transcended the category of 'combat.'
No contact needed, no aiming needed, not even a Spirit Ability needed.
With just a single thought, any object could be teleported to an enemy's most vulnerable vital point.
Brain, heart, even a Spirit Master's Dantian.
How do you defend against that?
Use mental force to seal oneself? But the other party is the ancestor of mental force masters.