The heavens changed!
In an instant, the entire space seemed to freeze solid.
To be honest, Ye Ling had no clear sense of how strong he really was. He had never gone all out before, nor did he have anything to measure himself against.
After all, he had only been cultivating for five days. There was simply no standard to compare with.
Leng Qingqiu's techniques looked impressive, but in Ye Ling's eyes, they fell short.
In his view, a true expert should control their power to the absolute limit, not recklessly squander True Qi the way Leng Qingqiu did.
That was why, although it seemed as if he was dispersing his aura, he was actually drawing every last bit of strength into his fist, planning to decide the outcome with a single blow.
His fist hardened.
The moment he fused all his True Qi and Mental Force into one, the world around him fell completely silent.
Leng Qingqiu stood where she was, motionless, like a wax statue.
The Void Sword, which had been spiraling through the air and stirring the currents, distorted the light under its own immense power, finally revealing its true blade.
The only one still able to move was Bai Yiyi, standing off to the side. When she noticed Ye Ling looking at her, she even gave him a cute little wave.
This was a sight Ye Ling had never experienced before. It was like the bullet-time scenes he had once seen in movies. But very quickly, that overwhelming power began to surge like a beast slipping its leash, gradually falling beyond his control. He had no choice but to throw the punch.
Heaven-Shattering Power!
Ye Ling didn't dare aim this punch at Leng Qingqiu. This was a strike unleashed with his full strength, and once thrown, there was no taking it back.
At the same time, he had no intention of colliding head-on with the Void Sword. So his target was—
The instant Leng Qingqiu caught the divine glint in Ye Ling's eyes, her Spiritual Awareness sensed something terribly wrong. But by the time she could react—
The sky and ground before her were filled with Ye Ling's fists. Countless fist shadows surged forward like a colossal wave, crashing toward her.
The Void Sword of Unity in front of her shattered the moment it touched that wave. After that, all she could see was an apparently endless sea of fists.
Space. That was Ye Ling's true target.
Since Leng Qingqiu had never intended to kill him, he naturally had no desire to take her life either.
The overlapping fist shadows diluted the power of his strike, ensuring he wouldn't accidentally beat Leng Qingqiu to death.
Even so, the strength contained within each individual fist shadow was enough to instantly kill an ordinary cultivator at the early Foundation Establishment stage.
And if they were only fist shadows, then no matter how unreliable Bai Yiyi might be, she should still be able to rescue Leng Qingqiu before the storm of fists reached her.
But if Ye Ling had condensed that wave of fist shadows into a single blow, he was afraid that even a moment of distraction from Bai Yiyi would be enough for her to miss the chance to save Leng Qingqiu.
Sigh, why are you so weak?
Seeing Leng Qingqiu's Void Sword shatter without even a chance to struggle, crushed apart by his own fist shadows, Ye Ling couldn't help but shake his head in disappointment.
If he had known this would happen, he would have gone all out from the very beginning and saved himself all this wasted time.
Next time he ran into a situation like this, he would just overwhelm his opponent with full power right away.
Now that he understood his own strength, Ye Ling turned to look at Bai Yiyi. He couldn't rein in his force anymore, but he trusted that Bai Yiyi had the ability to stop it.
But—
In the instant he turned his head, his Heavenly Fate Eye foresaw a blaze of white light, while his Spiritual Awareness sensed an aura of extreme danger.
No!
Before he even had time to turn back, an incomparably monstrous force slammed toward him.
If his earlier fist shadows had been a massive wave, then this power was a tsunami.
"No! Stop!"
At the same time, Leng Qingqiu's voice rang in Ye Ling's ears.
The jade pendant hidden in Leng Qingqiu's embrace seemed to trigger some kind of mechanism. The Tribulation Transcendence Stage power stored inside it surged out all at once, condensing in midair into an incomparably sharp killing move that shot straight at Ye Ling.
A jade finger took shape in the air, stabbing directly toward Ye Ling's forehead.
Azure Heavens Diagram · Sacred Finger!
A bleak, desolate aura swept across the entire Training Ground. The Tribulation Transcendence Stage power even tore through the void itself, black patterns swirling around the jade finger.
These black patterns were true spatial fissures, fundamentally different from the Void Sword Leng Qingqiu had formed earlier. Being caught by even one of them would be enough to take the life of a Golden Core Stage cultivator.
Not to mention that Ye Ling had just finished unleashing his punch, leaving his Mental Force drained and his Dantian completely empty of True Qi. Even if he were at his peak, he would still have no way to withstand this finger strike.
It's over. It's really over.
Big sister, can you at least keep your artifact under control?
Why are you just letting it loose to attack people like this?
Yet despite the curses racing through his mind, Ye Ling was strangely calm.
This move was meant for Master, right?
At the moment of life and death, Ye Ling instantly pieced together what had happened.
Such a terrifying technique could never have been aimed at an insignificant nobody like him. And judging from Leng Qingqiu's expression, it was obvious she wasn't acting of her own will.
That meant there was only one possibility.
He was taking the hit for Bai Yiyi.
But realizing it now didn't really help. This was a killing move meant for a Nascent Soul Stage great expert. All he could do was hope Bai Yiyi would be a little more reliable than usual.
Before the thought had even finished forming, Bai Yiyi moved in that bullet-time-like stillness, trotting cutely all the way to stand in front of him.
Then came a flash of somewhat familiar white light.
When the light faded, he finally saw what was glowing.
A blade.
Its shape resembled a Tang sword, though it was slightly shorter, perfectly suited to Bai Yiyi's figure.
The blade had no scabbard. One side was engraved with a five-clawed golden dragon, while the other bore a phoenix with multicolored feathers.
Holding the blade, Bai Yiyi tried her best to put on a fierce expression. Unfortunately, with her petite body and adorable face, the result was only a sort of milk-fierce cuteness.
She leveled the blade at the jade finger and shouted,
"Hyaa!"
In the next instant, a blade aura that seemed capable of splitting heaven and earth came crashing down toward the jade finger.
Faced with that world-destroying blade aura, even the jade finger, wrapped in spatial fissures, was unable to withstand it.
If cultivators outside had witnessed this scene, their jaws would have dropped.
The power contained within the jade finger was a full-force strike from a Tribulation Transcendence Stage powerhouse, and the technique itself was among the very best.
By comparison, Bai Yiyi's terrifying-looking blade aura wasn't even a proper attack. It was merely the pressure of her presence.
A Nascent Soul Stage cultivator defeating a Tribulation Transcendence Stage opponent was already something utterly unscientific, let alone comparing the force behind their attacks.
None of this, however, registered with Ye Ling. All he knew was that his Master was still reliable.
Master, I love you to death!
Bai Yiyi, standing in front of him, had never seemed so imposing.
On the other side, Leng Qingqiu stared at the jade pendant in her hand, now split cleanly in two, and fell into deep thought.
Even in my nightmares, it wouldn't be this ridiculous.
Ye Ling didn't understand the sheer gap in strength between them, but she understood it perfectly.