The Black Knight swung its massive sword once more.
A concentrated beam of light extended forward, carving out a new path through the chaos.
The crowd surged toward the forcibly opened passage.
In desperate times like these, when hope flickered to life, no one hesitated to flee.
Some even wished their parents had blessed them with an extra pair of legs.
But this time, Yun Huang couldn’t shake the feeling that the beam seemed shorter than before.
It was a clear sign—the Black Knight’s soul force was depleting rapidly, making it impossible to maintain its peak form.
If the Black Knight could no longer clear the way, they would all be trapped in the ashes!
Twelve kilometers—just over ten thousand meters.
Based on the first phase of the martial exam, a full-speed sprint would take barely over ten minutes.
Even accounting for the delays caused by waiting for the Black Knight to open the path, it shouldn’t take more than half an hour.
But.
Would the journey really be that smooth?
The group had barely been running for two minutes when—
A soul-shaking roar erupted from the ashes!
Then, an overwhelming pressure, like a collapsing mountain, crushed down upon them!
The air froze.
Everyone gasped for breath, suffocating under the weight.
Even through the swirling ash, they could make out a colossal, indistinct figure slowly approaching.
Though "slow" was relative—given its sheer size.
Another thirty seconds passed.
At the two-and-a-half-minute mark.
The Source Realm creature finally came into full view.
Mountainous in stature, its body was encased in thick, jagged rock, its eyes pools of molten lava pulsing with an eerie, intelligent glow.
Its mere presence made the Black Knight falter for an instant.
After a brief hesitation, the Black Knight unleashed another beam of light at the molten behemoth.
But this time, the once-unstoppable attack barely made a dent.
A small crater formed on the creature’s body, dislodging a few boulders half a meter in diameter.
Yet…
Compared to its twenty-story-tall frame…
It was nothing more than a scratch.
"T-Tenth tier…"
Yun Huang trembled as she uttered the words, her eyes filled with despair.
This was one of the "Tenth-tier Source Realm creatures" marked as a black spot in official surveys!
With just a few strides, it covered hundreds of meters.
Its target? The Black Knight.
No—more precisely, Liu Yuan behind the Black Knight!
The oppressive aura of a Tenth-tier creature forced everyone to their knees, paralyzed with fear.
This was true desperation!
A fifth-tier Card Wielder, even armed with an absurdly powerful card, stood no chance against a Tenth-tier beast.
This wasn’t a battle—it was a massacre.
"Run!"
"Split up! Run as far as you can!!"
Yun Huang knew the Black Knight, no matter how strong, couldn’t win.
The most it could do was buy time—time for the others to escape.
The Tenth-tier creature let out a guttural growl, its massive stone hands grinding together with a screech.
Then, they began to glow red-hot.
With a devastating swing, it brought one down toward the Black Knight—
To crush it, and Liu Yuan behind it, into dust!
The Black Knight’s sword blazed with unprecedented brilliance.
It raised the weapon high, fearlessly meeting the molten fist head-on!
This was a hopeless clash.
This was defiance against the inevitable.
But it was also—
Hope.
Yun Huang watched, breath caught in her throat.
She didn’t know if the Black Knight could withstand the blow.
She only knew that if it fell in an instant…
They would all be buried in these ashes forever.
BOOM—!!!
A cataclysmic collision shook the entire Source Realm!
The molten fist, radiating pure destruction, filled Liu Yuan’s vision, threatening to consume her whole world.
The Black Knight roared, pouring every ounce of its power into the sword. The blade shone brighter than ever before.
"BOOM—!!!"
An unimaginable force collided.
There was no struggle, no resistance.
The moment the Black Knight’s sword met the molten fist—
The radiant light snuffed out.
Then, hairline cracks spiderwebbed from the tip, spreading across the entire blade in an instant.
"CRACK—!"
A crisp, heartrending snap echoed.
The sword shattered into pieces!
Shards of black metal and searing magma exploded outward!
The Black Knight’s massive frame convulsed violently, its chest plate caving in, fissures tearing through its armor.
An unstoppable force blasted through it.
Blood sprayed from its mouth, vision drowning in ash and crimson.
Consciousness—fading.
Yet, even with its blade gone, the Black Knight didn’t retreat a single step.
Its broken hilt, still clutched in its iron grip, and its unyielding arm, held firm against the crushing weight of the molten fist.
"SCREEE—!"
Metal shrieked as the Black Knight’s pauldrons and gauntlets warped, sparks flying from the strain.
Dark green fluid and charred debris gushed from the fractures.
Its knees sank into the earth, the ground beneath it fracturing into a massive crater.
Meanwhile, the mountainous molten beast seemed almost surprised.
Its lava-filled eyes flickered with something like… contemplation.
Then, it casually scooped up a chunk of earth, compressing it into a three-meter-wide boulder.
Aiming at Liu Yuan—
It hurled it.
The Black Knight tried to rise, to block again.
But then—
A hand rested on its shoulder.
"You’ve done enough. Let me handle this."
Truthfully, the Black Knight’s performance had been flawless.
This attack? It couldn’t survive it.
For the first time, the Black Knight spoke—its voice unexpectedly clear and feminine.
"As you wish…"
Almost… relieved.
As the boulder hurtled toward her, Liu Yuan didn’t dodge.
The only way out now lay within herself.
[Special Passive: ‘Abyss’ remains in deep slumber under normal circumstances and cannot be awakened by conventional means. Activation requires meeting any one of the following conditions.]
[Condition 1: It wakes up.]
[Condition 2: The holder faces a lethal threat. If awakened this way, it will only deliver a single, devastating counterattack.]
[Condition 3: Su Qi actively awakens it.]
The flaw in this self-defense mechanism was that it was purely defensive…
It offered almost no offensive capabilities.
She just hoped…
The rock wouldn’t hurt too much when it hit…
And what if it wasn’t lethal enough?
She hated pain.
But there was no other choice.
She never wanted to be a hero…
Yet she couldn’t just do nothing.
Su Qi wasn’t always right.
She refused to let their sacrifices be in vain.
At least do what you can within your power.
reezy rom-com) Good news: Jiang Liu is quite the ladies' man. Bad news: He’s lost his memory. Lying in a hospital bed, Jiang Liu listens to a parade of goddesses spouting "absurd claims," feeling like the world is one giant game of Werewolf. "Jiang Liu, I’m your first love." "Jiang Liu, you’re my boyfriend—she’s your ex." "Jiang Liu, we’re close friends who’ve shared a bed, remember?" "Jiang Liu, I want to have your baby." The now-lucid Jiang Liu is convinced this must be some elaborate scam... until someone drops the bombshell: "The day before you lost your memory, you confessed your feelings—and got into a relationship." Jiang Liu is utterly baffled. So... who the hell is his actual girlfriend?! ... Before recovering his memories, Jiang Liu must navigate this minefield of lies and sincerity, fighting to protect himself from these women’s schemes. But things spiral even further out of control as more people show up at his doorstep—each with increasingly unhinged antics. On the bright side, the memories he lost due to overwhelming trauma seem to be resurfacing. Great news, right? So why are they all panicking now?
Heart] Chen Yi traversed the cultivation world for eight hundred years, charging his way to the Tribulation Transcendence stage. Just as he was outwitting his 81st Heavenly Tribulation to ascend to immortality, he was suddenly pulled into a chat group called the "Multiverse Transmigrators Support Group." To his surprise, the group was filled with nothing but fresh-faced newbies who had just transmigrated. [Help! I transmigrated into a disgraced concubine in the cold palace, and the tyrant emperor is about to execute me!] [I ended up as a cannon-fodder villain, and the protagonist is still chasing me—WTF!] [I woke up as the protagonist’s father, but I’m about to be sacrificed in a ritual! What do I do? Urgent!!!] Chen Yi stared at the chaotic flood of desperate pleas in the group and fell into deep thought. "Seriously? You drag me into a newbie transmigrator chat group… only after I’m one step away from becoming an immortal?"
Cheng's father told him he was getting remarried—to a wealthy woman. Cao Cheng realized his time had finally come: he was about to become a second-generation rich kid. Sure, it might be a watered-down version, but hey, at least he'd have status now, right? The wealthy woman also had four daughters!! Which meant, starting today, Cao Cheng gained four stunning older sisters?? But that wasn't even the whole story... "My name is Cao Cheng—'Cheng' as in 'honest, smooth-talking gentleman'!"
't think I'm that capable, I'm just trying my best to stay alive. I've been kind all my life, never did anything bad, yet worldly suffering spared me not one bit. The human world is a nice place, but I won't come back in my next life. A kind young man, who wanted to just get by singing, but through repeated deceits and betrayals, has gone down an irredeemable path.
