Given the Titan Giant Ape's incomparably tough Soul Beast physique and massive size, this injury wasn't fatal, but it was enough to temporarily incapacitate it. Every breath tugged at the wound, which was being eroded by the power of disintegration, causing soul-tearing agony.
"Erming!!!"
On the other side, Niu Tian , who was engaged in fierce combat with Raiden Mei, saw this and his face instantly turned ashen, his eyes blazing with towering fury and panic.
He held nothing back. Accompanied by a deafening roar that shook the clouds, a sound that was both a dragon's cry and a bull's bellow, his body suddenly expanded and transformed.
Amidst a burst of dazzling azure light, a divine dragon, over a hundred meters long, with magnificent bull horns atop its head and its entire body covered in Sky Blue Dragon Scales, appeared, coiling and circling in the clouds.
The colossal dragon body was partially obscured, but every scale shimmered with a cold, powerful luster under the reflection of the lightning. Countless Sky Blue Obliteration Divine Thunderbolts—the subjects of its power—frantically leaped and converged in the surrounding clouds, emitting an aura of destruction that made the heavens and earth tremble.
"Sky Blue Obliteration Divine Thunder!"
A cold, majestic dragon roar echoed across the nine heavens.
In an instant, the overwhelming expanse of azure lightning was no longer scattered flashes, but transformed into a literal downpour.
Innumerable bolts of black-and-azure lightning, as thick as buckets and containing the might to annihilate all things, poured down like the Silver River from the Ninth Heaven, indiscriminately covering and bombarding Lu Jingming and Raiden Mei.
"Playing with thunder... in front of me and Mei?"
Lu Jingming's lips curved into an almost mocking, playful smile, his gaze as if he were watching a poor performance.
Without any verbal exchange, the Stigmata of Thunder on his hand instantly brightened. The supreme authority belonging to the Thunder Archon quietly manifested in this world.
The Sky Blue Obliteration Divine Thunderbolts, which were whistling and roaring as they descended with the power to annihilate everything, seemed to encounter their true sovereign. They were forcefully choked by an invisible yet absolute might.
Like docile sheep, they obediently changed direction, defying the will of their caster. They converged like a hundred rivers flowing into the sea, all gathering into Lu Jingming's slightly raised palm. They finally compressed and condensed into a violently pulsating, azure sphere of thunder light, humming with destructive energy that made the heart tremble.
He didn't even spare the sphere a second look, simply tossing it away like trash toward the Titan Giant Ape, which was struggling to rise from the deep crater below.
"BOOM—!!!"
The thunder light sphere instantly exploded upon contacting the Titan's body.
The savage black-and-azure lightning light, like a greedy behemoth, completely swallowed the Titan Giant Ape's massive body.
Screams, even more piercing and painful than before, erupted from the center of the lightning, chilling the listener's heart.
This was undoubtedly adding insult to injury.
At the same time, Raiden Mei on the other side slowly raised the katana in her hand.
Although she had lost most of her Herrscher authority at this moment, as the former Herrscher of Thunder, who once wielded the authority of lightning and triggered the Honkai, her understanding and command over the essence of thunderbolts was far beyond what the Soul Beasts of this world could ever achieve.
She simply raised her left hand, her slender fingers slightly spread. The azure lightning that still pervaded the air, having lost its control, gathered obediently and surgingly onto the blade of her katana as if guided.
The pitch-black blade, which originally flashed with purple electricity, was instantly covered with a deep, dangerous azure-blue glow. The power of thunder was compressed to its extreme.
"Furious Wind—Subside to Me!"
Mei's clear, cool voice carried a hint of long-lost, almost instinctive Chuunibyou grandeur and majesty. She slashed the katana down decisively.
Shing—!
A colossal lightning slash, hundreds of meters long, composed purely of highly condensed Sky Blue Obliteration Divine Thunder, tore through space and sliced the clouds of the firmament. Like a blade of heavenly punishment, it accurately and precisely struck the coiling, massive body of the Sky Blue Divine Dragon.
"Pfft!"
The hard dragon scales were easily sliced open like paper, and azure dragon blood erupted like a waterfall.
A massive wound, deep enough to expose bone, suddenly appeared on the dragon's body. The scalding dragon blood dripping onto the ground seared small, smoking pits into the scorched earth.
Killing the man by wounding his heart!
Lu Jingming and Raiden Mei had simultaneously used Niu Tian's own strongest thunder to inflict severe damage on his brother and himself, respectively.
"ROAR—!!!"
The Sky Blue Divine Dragon let out a deafening roar of agony. A flicker of terror and disbelief finally flashed in its massive dragon eyes.
His natal divine thunder, which he prided himself on for its ability to annihilate all things, was wielded like a toy by the opponent and turned against him, grievously wounding himself.
He dared not use any more lightning power and completely abandoned long-range energy attacks. Instead, he fully unleashed the Soul Beast's most formidable primordial physical strength—the massive dragon tail, like a mountain range, whipped out. With a terrifying shriek that ripped the air, it struck fiercely toward the diminutive figure of Raiden Mei, like a gigantic steel whip carrying immense force, stirring up wind and clouds.
He was determined to tear this hateful human to shreds.
However, in front of Raiden Mei, who transformed her body into electricity and rode the thunder, Niu Tian's massive, mountain-like body appeared somewhat clumsy and slow.
After all, the most core characteristic of electricity, besides its destructive offensive power, was its unrivaled, ultimate speed among many elements.
"CRACK—!"
Lightning exploded again.
Mei's figure instantly transformed into an incredibly agile, pale blue electric light. Instead of taking the hit head-on, she flashed and weaved with near-prescient precision and grace between the trajectory of the massive, sweeping dragon tail attack.
Each tiny shift in position perfectly avoided the terrifying physical impact, which was strong enough to shatter mountains, by mere millimeters.
The dragon tail struck only empty air each time, merely smashing deep, bottomless ravines into the earth and kicking up dust and flying stones everywhere.
Amidst the debris and smoke, Raiden Mei's figure had already appeared a hundred meters away, the katana slanted toward the ground, her posture so composed it was as if she weren't engaged in a life-or-death battle, but casually strolling through her own garden.
Lu Jingming glanced at Mei's masterful, almost performative, dodging movements from afar, a mix of surprise and amusement on his face.
He hadn't expected that the more mature and dependable Raiden Mei, who had shed the awkwardness of her youth, still secretly harbored a bit of that cool, performative flair from her old "Chuunibyou" days.
After all, the young Thunder Queen was a formidable person who could utter "chuunibyou lines" without batting an eye.
But then again, this occasional flash, which contrasted with her usual cool and reliable image, wasn't that precisely the unique charm of Raiden Mei?
Quite cute, wasn't it?
However, in the very instant he let his guard down—
"OOM!!!"
An unimaginable, terrifying gravity suddenly descended, crashing down on his body like countless invisible mountains.
This power was so overbearing, so abrupt, that it violently slammed him toward the ground.
Lu Jingming, caught completely off guard, was pulled off balance by this terrifying force and plummeted toward the earth like a meteor.
"BOOM—!!!!!"
A muffled, colossal crash, heavier than any before, erupted. His body slammed violently into the ground, kicking up tens of meters of smoke and dust.
Not only him, but the air within a radius of several hundred meters centered on his crash site hummed under the pressure of this sudden gravity. The earth, struck hard by an invisible heavy hammer, groaned in pain and instantly collapsed, forming a huge concavity. Dense, spiderweb-like cracks spread rapidly outward at an astonishing speed.
The smoke slowly dispersed, dimly revealing Lu Jingming's figure half-kneeling at the bottom of the crater, propped up by the Abyssal Flower and resisting the terrifying gravity.
Lu Jingming slowly raised his head from the deep pit he had created. Crushed stones and dust slid from his hair. His icy gaze locked onto the colossal, somewhat battered figure nearby.
The Titan Giant Ape was scorched black all over. Its normally steel-needle-like fur was curled and matted from the scorching of Niu Tian's Sky Blue Obliteration Divine Thunder, emitting a foul burnt smell. Clearly, the blow Lu Jingming gave it earlier had not been easy to bear.
Yet, in its enormous, lantern-like beast eyes, instead of fear, a crazier, more ferocious fury burned. It was glaring fixedly at Lu Jingming.
Undoubtedly, this sudden, terrifying gravity that had violently yanked Lu Jingming from the sky was the wounded fierce beast's angry counterattack.
"Tch, a Gravity Domain... how utterly annoying."
Lu Jingming pursed his lips, a hint of impatience in his tone. The next moment, the aura around him suddenly changed.
An invisible yet clearly perceptible gray halo, representing death and termination, silently yet swiftly spread out from his half-kneeling body like a stone dropped into a still lake.
Where this gray light passed, the scene became eerie and horrifying—a few resilient clumps of verdant wild grass withered at a visible speed, turned yellow, finally lost all color, and crumbled into grayish-white dust.
Scattered hard rocks looked as if they had endured ten thousand years of erosion. Their surfaces quickly became rough and grayish-white, then disintegrated into grit.
Even the fine dust floating in the air seemed to lose its vitality, becoming dim... as if the entire world had been forcibly drained of all life and color by some power, leaving only the most primitive, monotonous, and despairing deathly gray-white.
This was the power Lu Jingming wielded, originating from the Abyssal Flower—the Domain of Withering.
The Titan Giant Ape's savage and overbearing Gravity Domain, upon contacting this gray halo, instantly met its nemesis.
The ubiquitous, mountain-heavy pressure was quickly decomposed, melted, and annihilated, as if ice had met the scorching sun.
The terrifying gravity pressing down on Lu Jingming vanished without a trace.
...
-----------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------
I handpick only the finest and most captivating novels for you. Don't forget to check out my other novels!
p@treon HongMengZi