"The dragon's roar… it's Dan Heng!"
Within the underwater inferno, Ao Guang's dragon form shuddered, his head snapping up. Even through the distant celestial screen, as a fellow dragon, he could sense what Dan Heng was preparing.
His pupils widened almost to the point of splitting, but even so, he was determined not to miss a single moment of witnessing the power of Dan Heng, the Dragon Sovereign, in his next strike!
["Dan Heng… it's up to you now," Jing Yuan spoke, his voice faint as a thread.]
["Mm, leave it to me."]
[With the Dragon Sovereign's calm acknowledgment echoing behind him, the parted seawater on both sides of Scalegorge Waterscape suddenly began to boil, countless bubbles surging upward.]
[Dan Heng leaped into the air, the Abyss Pearl in his hand spinning rapidly. Soon, a water dragon burst forth from the ancient sea, followed by a second, then a third… a total of nine water dragons soared into the sky, weaving together in the air to form a dazzling celestial net.]
["Did you think victory was assured, Phantylia?"]
[With this dragon's roar, an explosion erupted above Phantylia's head. Under the command of Dan Heng's Abyss Pearl, the nine dragons converged into one, forming a colossal water dragon capable of blotting out the sky, crashing down toward Phantylia's head!]
[Cloudsong Raging Tides!]
["—Boom!!"]
[Even Phantylia's massive form was overwhelmed in that instant by the immense force of the water, and as the dragon dissipated, nearly half of her body had been smashed to pieces.]
[Only now did she realize she wasn't merely facing a Dragon Sovereign. Every trickle, every vast current of the ancient waters in Scalegorge Waterscape… they were all her adversaries.]
["Tch—" For the first time in the battle, a trace of pain flickered across Phantylia's face.]
[Large swathes of black mystic lotuses withered almost instantly, replaced by her damaged body rapidly regenerating.]
["An immortal dragon descendant, huh?" Phantylia coldly gazed at Dan Heng, hovering in midair, conjuring another water dragon in his hand. "Have you finally come to fulfill your duty to guard the Ambrosial Arbor?"]
"Smash her good! That's the way to do it! Dan Heng's so powerful, why didn't he act sooner?"
Seeing the water dragon, capable of flooding all of Chentang Pass, crash directly onto Phantylia's head, Nezha was so excited he nearly launched himself out of his chair.
Halfway through his words, he caught a glimpse of Ao Bing, equally stunned, out of the corner of his eye and quickly nudged him with his elbow. "Don't just stare, learn a thing or two from your dragon clan from another world."
"That pearl in his hand…" Ao Bing, seated beside him, kept his gaze fixed on the Abyss Pearl in Dan Heng's hand. "We of the East Sea Dragon Clan have no such treasure."
"Pfft, tools are just aids. Skill is what matters." Taiyi Zhenren, his face flushed from drinking, slapped his wine gourd and let out a loud burp. "Stick with me from now on. Even if you can't learn seven or eight parts of Dan Heng's skill, you can at least pick up one or two."
"That's quite a downgrade…" Ao Bing didn't dare complain too much, as the battle on the screen took a new turn.
["Phantylia, you may see us as mere ants…" Jing Yuan openly taunted, "but to go toe-to-toe with ants like this, you could be called the top among the Lords of Extinction."]
["Heh…" Whether it was Jing Yuan's words that truly broke her or the severe damage from Dan Heng that made it hard for her to maintain her dark form, Phantylia's state shifted once more.]
[Abundance's vines intertwined with Destruction's crimson gold, both divine and grotesquely menacing, like a blasphemous colossal statue. Her pale skin began to crack like tree bark, spreading and healing in a constant cycle.]
[New sprouts of Abundance budded on her surface, only to be carbonized and scattered in the flames of Destruction the next moment…]
[Full of contradictions, yet… brimming with malice.]
[She pushed herself up from the ground, her cold voice echoing through the secret realm. "Does the general wish to meet the others? I'm afraid… you won't get the chance."]
["It's time to end this."]
[As she spoke, Phantylia began to form a small orb in her hand, preparing to hurl the intensely compressed energy at the group.]
Demon Slayer World——
"Eek—!!"
Mitsuri Kanroji instinctively covered her eyes.
The moment Phantylia and a sphere were linked together, the Demon Slayer Corps members would reflexively gasp, then—"snap"—they'd quickly cover their eyes and duck to the ground, not daring to lift their heads.
After all, their eyes had only just been healed by the faint traces of Abundance's power leaking from the screen. No one wanted to go blind again.
Mitsuri buried her head as low as she could, but when they braced for impact, the anticipated massive explosion never came.
Phantylia's attack was surprisingly ordinary, perfectly blocked by Stelle. But soon, she summoned numerous golden mystic lotuses, ready to once again drain the life force of the Astral Express crew and others.
"She can't possibly use the same move three times, can she?" Shinobu Kocho, lifting her head, furrowed her brow in confusion. "Is Phantylia out of tricks?"
"…Unlikely." Obanai Iguro shook his head. "As an Aeon's emissary, roaming the starscape for so long, she probably has more moves up her sleeve."
"The less we know about her trump cards, the more cautious we need to be…"
["Such stale tricks—there's no need to use them again!" Jing Yuan smirked, gripping his formation blade tightly, exuding an intimidating aura.]
[His gilded armor erupted in blinding golden light, and behind him, the imposing figure of the Divine Lord manifested. Amid the thunderous roars echoing through heaven and earth, the entire ancient sea of Scalegorge Waterscape seemed to transform into a boiling pool of lightning.]
["Resplendent Majesty, heed my command—strike without mercy!"]
[Jing Yuan leaped forward, the Divine Lord's giant palm merging with his formation blade. In that blade's light, which seemed to cleave the heavens, one could faintly see the fierce sword intent of a white-haired woman from the past, the galactic starlight of a foxian girl's starskiff, but ultimately… it collapsed into a single, devastating point of searing white—]
"This is… the edge of the Hunt."
Gazing at the blade that seemed capable of severing heaven and earth, Frieren murmured in awe. "So powerful. Even battles between emissaries are this exaggerated…"
As the afterglow of the blade faded on the screen, only the scorched traces of lightning lingered in the air.
"Is it over?" Stark's heart pounded. Though Jing Yuan's strike hadn't hit them, just watching from behind the screen left him drenched in cold sweat.
"Not yet." Frieren shook her head calmly. "That woman is backed by the Ambrosial Arbor. She's hard to kill. Now, she's probably preparing to counterattack, isn't she?"