Perspiration dripped down Sha Chen"s face as he watched the multiple black tornados whip around, surrounding me like a barrier.

Staring into it, he was reminded of a black hole, something that sucked everything into its core. Nothing could esape from it, not even light. Just a bottomless abyss of darkness that continued to devour everything until all creation was destroyed.

Or whatever happened to something after it got sucked into a black hole. Given the tremendous gravity it exerted, I guess anything caught within its wake would be crushed down into an atom or something.

"Ugh!"

Stones and rocks flew past the staggering Dark Sage as he was buffeted by the violent winds. He swayed unsteadily on his feet, unable to hold his ground. His eye twitched as he watched in disbelief, still trying to comprehend what was going on.

"I can"t believe that a brat who"s not even twenty is capable of unleashing such power!" he growled. Then he shook his head as he a.n.a.lyzed the reversed flow of qi that was unfurling back toward him. His qi. "No…this isn"t even his power. He"s using my own power against me!"

He narrowed his eyes, but could hardly make out anything other than my shadowy silhouette. My figure was mostly covered by a swirling black hole that was the source of all the whirlwinds around me. My lenses shone demonically, the only part of my figure that was not black.

"d.a.m.n it!"

Sha Chen dug his feet into the ground obstinately, refusing to allow himself to get blown off and sucked into the vortex. Exerting his qi, he crushed two deep footprints into the dirt in an effort to anchor himself.

Whoosh…!

"Are all disciples…no, all members of the Heaven and Earth Sect monsters?" he murmured to himself as dread suffused him. "No wonder the Martial Arts Alliance was so desperate to destroy them. If they allowed a sect of monsters to run free like this…eventually the whole world would have succ.u.mbed to them!"

Gritting his teeth, the pale Heavenly Venom King snarled. A few seconds later, however, he began to chuckle sinisterly.

"Heh…ha ha ha ha!"

Curling his lips into a sneer, he studied me.

"But even the Absolute One never would have thought that his last surviving disciple would be unfortunate enough to encounter me!"

Krack!

An ominous noise ripped across the valley as Sha Chen flexed his ocean of qi, crushing down the gravitional forces that were distorting the environment and devastating everything. He began to grin, excitement filling his aged heart.

"I"ll use my ultimate technique this time," he declared resolutely, his eyes wide with rage and glee. "Watch how I annihilate all traces of Heaven and Earth Sect…forever!"

I rolled my eyes. "Can you stop being so dramatic?" I complained. "If you want to kill me, just do it. Why talk so much?"

Sha Chen took my advice. Instead of retorting or telling me to shut up, he raised his left hand and began conjuring a vortex of flames.

"Ma.s.s Incendiary Ball," he growled as the ever-expanding conflagration began to block out his majestic but battered figure. Trails of embers danced around him like fireworks in a summer festival, blinding, colorful, and powerful. I couldn"t help but be mesmerized by his impressive display of force. His mana was also spreading out like an ocean, threatening to drown us in superheated flames. "Ultimate Explosion!"

"Oh, so you"re learning from the Crimson Demonic Mage who specializes in Explosion magic now?" I grumbled. Unfortunately, it was disturbing to see an old man use an explosion spell instead of a crimson-eyed girl with black hair who was dressed in red. Too bad I wasn"t Kazuma or I would have been able to come up with a better tsukkomi.

SSSSSwish!

The colossal conflagration expanded exponentially from Sha Chen"s body, incinerating his surroundings and blowing a crater into the ground. They swallowed up even my black tornadoes, racing to devour me and the poor forest nestled into the little valley.

Boom!

"Argh…!"

Wincing as my tornadoes were blown back, nonetheless I stood my ground and a.n.a.lyzed the flow of qi. I could see the maelstroms colliding against each other again, the golden lightning that danced from their merciless clashes. Gritting my teeth, I dug one foot into the ground before swinging Azure Lotus Sword with all my might.

"Heaven and Earth Reversal!"
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Veins were throbbing and bulging over my face as I panted heavily, struggling to cope with the enormous exertions my technique was placing on me. I faintly recalled a single warning from my master. Heaven and Earth Reversal was extremely powerful, but if I didn"t use it right, it as well as my opponent"s attack would kill me.

My will had to overpower my opponent"s. In other words, in order for my ultimate technique to succeed, I had to be more determined than my enemy.

Gritting my teeth, I ground my feet in and continued to infuse my technique with my qi, refusing to yield. The Heaven and Earth Strike I sent out to form the basis of my Heaven and Earth Reversal met the Ma.s.s Incendiary Ball head-on, and began reversing the flow.

Then the crimson flames began to turn black. However, it didn"t stop. The inferno seemed to grow uncontrollably, spreading out to over a few hundred meters. Then a kilometer. Then two. Then several. And that was in radius.

Boom!

The conflagration rose high up into the sky, almost reaching a kilometer and dwarfing several hills in the vicinity. It was so blinding, so huge that even people outside the Sen Lin Forest could see it billowing upward like a mushroom cloud.

"What"s that!?"

"Holy Throne!"

"Heavens…!"

The people of Duchun Town were among the first humans to witness it, their town being the closest to the site of battle. They watched in awe as the black flames spiraled high into the sky, almost as if it was piercing the heavens.

"What the h.e.l.l is going on?!"

"What"s that?"

The townsfolk were in a panic, running around and milling about. They could see entire swathes of forest wiped out in the distance, incinerated into cinders. Magical beasts, demonic creatures – no matter how powerful they were, they got caught up in the incendiary blast and were consumed by merciless flames, leaving no trace of them behind.

Meanwhile, the Imperial Guard garrisoned there were being mobilized, the guardsmen grabbing their weapons and forming up at the edge of the town, just before Sen Lin Forest. They gripped their weapons tightly as they watched, getting ready to intervene the moment the flames or battle spilled over to the town under their charge.

"That must be the Heavenly Venom King!"

"Is he even human?"

"No," a veteran sergeant murmured. "Even if that"s the Heavenly Venom King…just who is his opponent? For him to force the Dark Sage to unleash this much power…"

Everyone fell silent and glanced at the shaking sergeant. He swallowed and shook his head as he turned to gaze at his subordinates.

"Years ago, I had witnessed the Heavenly Venom King fight. Just once. He was a monster. Still is, from the look of things."

"He"s really not showing any mercy, eh?" one of the privates muttered.

"Probably because he can"t afford to." The sergeant gulped. "That"s Ultimate Explosion."

"What?!" a corporal gasped. "Isn"t that one of the ultimate techniques of the Incendiary Ifrit Sect? Why does he…?"

"Before he left, he was from the Incendiary Ifrit Sect. He was expelled for practicing poison techniques. But that"s not the point."

The sergeant was trembling.

"I don"t know who his opponent is…or how on earth he cornered the Dark Sage into using this move."

"Why? What"s the problem" Another private asked, looking bewildered. The sergeant fixed him with an intensive stare.

"Because Ultimate Explosion is normally used as Tong Gui Yu Jin (basically a Chinese idiom for perish together)!"

"…e?!"

All the soldiers stared at the sergeant, even their relatively young officer. Then they stared into the distance, where the colossal conflagration continued to blossom upward and outward. The grizzled veteran himself couldn"t help but fix his gaze on the ominous fireball as well.

"Is he really going to…?" he breathed in disbelief.

Boom!

A huge chunk of the forest was blown out, disintegrating into nothingness as the immense inferno ravaged it. Black flames crawled around the edges, scrabbling at the white core of superheated plasma.

In the center of it all, a single figure stood, his red cloak billowing up around him. Surrounded by dancing black members, he cut a solitary figure in the devastation around him. His smoking left hand hung from his shoulder almost uselessly, and he heaved. Despite his injuries and exhaustion, sinister gray qi continued to fume from his silhouette in an imposing manner, signifying that he remained a very potent threat.

As they said, the most dangerous animals were the ones who were cornered.

"Ugh…!"

But even so, the battle was taking its toll on the old man. Sweat poured down Sha Chen"s beleaguered face and he grimaced from pain and exhaustion. He bit his lip fiercely, forcing himself to suppress the surge to spit out blood.

In front of him, his flames were disappearing. Instead, they were being drawn into what looked like a black hole…a whirling vortex of black energies that devoured his flames. The more it consumed, the larger the maelstrom of dark qi grew. A tornado was slowly building up again, swirling fiercely as it reversed the flow of Sha Chen"s qi and added his energies to its own.

Slowly but surely, the black tornado grew, becoming denser, becoming darker and become more ominous.

"Argh…this brat!" Sha Chen growled in disbelief. There was a tread of dread in his voice as he stared at the expanding vortex. Come now, I knew that vortex grenades made their return to Warhammer 40,000"s new edition of Apocalypse, but there was nothing to be afraid of. There were no mortal wounds in Apocalypse, at least not yet. It was different from 8th Edition.

Sha Chen, on the other hand, didn"t" seem to care. He probably played the old versions of Apocalypse, which were more like expansions of the main game than a separate game. Thus he was salty about the changes. Dude, if you hate it so much, go play Epic instead.

"…this brat is still all right even after taking my Ultimate Explosion?!"

Sha Chen roared and raised his left hand again, conjuring a fresh wave of flames. Well…seemed like he wasn"t angry about the new version of Apocalypse after all.

Whoosh!

The Heavenly Venom King unleashed another set of flames, his Ma.s.s Incendiary Fireb.a.l.l.s slamming into the swirling vortex of doom. However, the black tornado merely swallowed up his torrents of flames and then reversed the flow of qi that powered them, boosting its own strength and growing exponentially.

"No way…!"

To his horror, Sha Chen realized that he had just worsened things for himself. What a fool.

As for me, I couldn"t resist capitalizing on my advantage and finishing this once and for all. Gripping my swords tightly, I swung both of them at the same time.

"Heaven and Earth Reversal!"

After shouting, I gritted my teeth. Again, by yelling that out I could picture my technique more strongly, which allowed me to execute it without faltering. My veins bulged in my temple, and my eyes were rolling up in my sockets. My body was trembling violently from the exertion, but I refused to give in. I was going to overpower my foe through sheer willpower. No matter how many dozens of times more powerful he was, as long as I stood strong and reversed the flow of his qi, there was no way he could win.

Boom!

A single mountain was erased from the face of the earth. Literally. A gigantic circle of emptiness replaced where the majestic mountain once stood, leaving crumbs of rock and stone collapsing at the feet of its nearby brethren.

And then a black tornado burst into being, swallowing up the s.p.a.ce and unleashing h.e.l.l upon physical reality.

Woooooo!

The black tornado swept across the valley with a howl, ripping trees up by their roots and rampaging through the soil. Rocks and stones were sent flying in an artificial storm, pelting the ground with such force that they disintegrated.

Amidst the madness, Sha Chen stood resolutely. For a few seconds, at least.

Then he was blown back by the sheer force, his feet leaving furrows in the dirt as he was propelled backward, unable to resist.

"Argh!"

The Dark Sage finally skidded to a stop, digging his feet in. He then looked up and gaped at the black hole that was gradually expanding in front of him.

"…"

At first it was just a little thing, but now it was a monster, a gigantic circle of nothingness that towered over him like an abyss, a bottomless well of darkness that was trying to swallow him. Pure blackness radiated from within.

"!"

For a moment, Sha Chen froze, stunned, as if he couldn"t believe what he was seeing. There was nothing but blackness, a pure darkness that enveloped him. His entire world vanished, replaced by black oblivion.

He couldn"t see. Couldn"t sense anything. There was too much qi suffusing the area, drowning out everything.

Panting heavily, he glanced around, only to find himself unable to see anyone or anything. He looked from left to right, trying to track my location. No, right now he wanted to sense anything, even a single person or living thing.

Right now, there was nothing but oblivion around him.

Finally, he caught sight of me in the distance, my figure half-concealed by the utter darkness.

I charged at him, swinging both my swords down coldly. Using my footwork techniques, I dashed toward him under the s.p.a.ce of a breath.

"Hmph."

Sha Chen snorted. Now that he could see me, he felt no fear. Trepidation, yes. A bit of wariness, of course. After all, I was the one who pushed him this far. He had long since understood that I was not an opponent he could underestimate.

I didn"t care about any of that. I only cared about killing my enemy. So I swung my Azure Lotus Sword forward to stab him.

"Hah!"

Flames wreathing his left hand, Sha Chen swung it forward with a shout. His palm met the blue blade of my Azure Lotus Sword, and the impact from the collision reverberated across the s.p.a.ce of darkness that enveloped us.

My azure blade failed to penetrate the flaming skin of his palm. As expected of the revered Heavenly Venom King.

Even so, I had done some damage with my sword. I could see blood spurting from his mouth as the old warrior suffered a backlash from parrying my strike barehanded. Never mind him, even I suffered some injuries from that.

Like I cared.

Grimacing, I stomped one foot and held my ground. There was no time for hesitation, no time to falter.

Sha Chen was gripping my Azure Lotus Sword tightly, and I was unable to wrench it out of his grasp. Left with no choice, I let go of my Azure Lotus Sword and grabbed hold of his left wrist instead. Holding it up and away from me, I spun around and got right in under his defenses, exploiting the opening that he showed.

"…"

At first, the Dark Sage was staring at me in disbelief. As if he couldn"t believe that I would pull off a move as stupid as the one I was executing now.

His lips curled into a smirk.

Even as blood dripped from his lips, even as I relentlessly charged toward him under his defense and forced his left arm away, he smirked triumphantly.

He swung his right arm toward me.

It would have been a flawless strategy. His right palm would have struck my head and totally obliterated my skull and brain. After all, my right hand was occupied with holding his left arm at bay, and my left hand and Shadow Sword were right under me. I was recklessly charging in head-first – literally at that – and had nothing to defend my head from his attack.

That single strike to my head would be fatal. I had exhausted most of my qi in the fight – Heaven and Earth Reversal had forced me to expend most of my qi. My protective aura was waning, and Sha Chen still possessed a formidable amount of inner qi. No longer as impressive as when he first stepped into this fight, but more than enough to overwhelm me.

He would have cracked my skull with that single palm strike, destroyed my brain and taken my life. My corpse would have fallen to the floor, my Shadow Fox hanging uselessly from my hand now that I no longer had a mind to control it.

It would be close, but it would most certainly be Sha Chen"s victory. He was grinning now, even as he imagined it, my blood spurting from my cracked head like a fountain, his right hand raised triumphantly. Just one move – but it would decide the match and end it once and for al.

He would have won by a single move. It would be extremely close, but after all the injuries he had sustained and the tremendous amount of trouble I had caused him, he would take it.

Unfortunately…I had cut off his arm earlier.

Right now, his right arm was nothing but a b.l.o.o.d.y stump. Still bounded by the remnants of his broken Iron Venom Whip, it was nothing more than a stump with no reach and no power. He was completely incapable of launching a strike with his right palm…

…because he had no right arm.

"Ah…"

When the power did not explode from his right hand, Sha Chen glanced at it and realized how sadly mistaken he was. And how fatal his mistake was. The right hand that would bring him victory was missing, cut off by me long ago.

Not that I cared.

It might be dishonorable, it might be despicable of me, this might be a dirty trick, but I honestly didn"t care what people thought of me.

I just wanted to survive. I just wanted to win against this old b.a.s.t.a.r.d, because victory was the only way to ensure my survival, and defeat would certainly guarantee my death.

That was why I mercilessly stabbed him in the chest. The black blade of my Shadow Fox sank deeply into his chest as I swooped under his defenses, took advantage of his helplessness and lack of a right arm, and attacked with all my might.

Besides, I was the one who cut off his right arm in the first place. If there was anyone who deserved to exploit that weakness and steal victory right from the jaws of defeat, it was me.

"Ugh…!"

Sha Chen coughed out blood as he slumped down on my sword, but he was still alive. His silver eyes glared defiantly at me, refusing to yield.

I glared back at him, refusing to relent as well.

From the start, the both of us knew that only one of us would be walking away from this fight. If Sha Chen didn"t die, then I would. I was aware that if the situation was reversed, he would not hesitate to kill me.

So I twisted my Shadow Fox in his chest and unleashed Heaven and Earth Strike at pointblank range.

Boom!

A gigantic red hole opened up in Sha Chen"s chest as I obliterated his heart, both of his lungs, and a good part of his stomach and liver. Blood splattered my face and stained my black Shadow Fox, but I remained very still, watching my opponent until the very end. I wasn"t going to let my guard down until I ensured his demise.

"…"

Blood spurting out of his mouth and what remained of his torn apart chest, Sha Chen toppled over.

Boom!

The gigantic black whirlwind that was rampaging in the s.p.a.ce where a mountain used to be gave off one final explosion before it finally imploded, collapsing back on itself and withdrawing. The violent qi faded away, leaving nothing but a broken valley and a razed forest behind. Further ahead was a wasteland that used to be the Toxic Marshes.

From a distance away, the Imperial Guard and residents of Duchun Village watched in wonder as the gigantic tornado disappeared. They didn"t know whether to feel relief or fear.

"Hu…"

As the maelstrom of destructive qi dissipated, only one figure remained in the remnants of the battlefield.

Standing tall, I glared down at the devastated valley, my hands clutching my swords, and began the search for my fallen opponent.