“As for how you avoid being swallowed whole… that will depend on your own ability.”
Baal’s voice faded away, but he had already left Chen Guan with all the information he needed.
“I’ll do it.”
Chen Guan’s voice shattered the deathly silence within the team.
“Have you forgotten how you were thrown back just now?” Long Ao objected. He didn’t want Chen Guan to take the risk.
“That was then. This is now.”
Chen Guan shook his head. To him, this might be another opportunity to increase his strength. How could he let it pass him by?
“My method may not be the best, but it will work. Trust me.”
With that, he stopped paying attention to the others and turned toward the edge of the golden curtain of light.
An Changqing called out to his back.
“Chen Guan, what do you need us to do?”
Chen Guan didn’t turn around. “Adapt to the situation. I trust your judgment.”
As soon as he finished speaking, he stepped beyond the protection of the golden curtain.
The moment he crossed the barrier, that vast will found an outlet. An invisible tide surged toward him—the only foreign presence in the entire space.
The team’s hearts leaped into their throats. Shan Heng was so nervous that his teeth chattered.
Chen Guan raised his right hand. The black mark in his palm began to glow, and the sinister black patterns came alive, crawling outward from his palm and spreading until they swallowed his entire arm and reached his shoulder.
The muscles in that arm bulged, while his skin took on a dark, inhuman hue.
Chen Guan raised the completely demonized arm and stretched it toward the distant Bone Throne as it collapsed.
The entire battlefield trembled. The dark-red light frozen across the sky began to flare wildly.
The lingering psychic echoes released by countless bones converged into an invisible torrent. It was silent, yet carried a terrifying pressure capable of tearing the soul apart. The torrent slammed into Chen Guan’s outstretched arm.
Even the golden curtain of light shook violently beneath the impact, on the verge of shattering.
Chen Guan’s body remained utterly still under the torrent’s assault. His face was expressionless. Only the black patterns covering his demonized arm exploded with dazzling, dark radiance the instant they came into contact with the torrent of will.
Within that radiance, the patterns came fully alive.
They twisted, writhed, and intertwined, transforming into starving beasts that tore into and devoured the invisible will. Yet beneath the crushing force of its immense power, they let out anguished cries as if on the verge of collapse, their forms ripping apart inch by inch.
The arm covered in black patterns began to disintegrate at an astonishing speed.
His skin peeled away like cracked mud. The dark-red muscle beneath was ground into dust by the torrent of will, leaving the pale bones of his fingers exposed beneath the bloody sky.
“His arm is disappearing! Huo Qixing, hold the barrier!”
Qin Wu bellowed as he poured all his qi into the golden formation beneath his feet, trying to ease the pressure on Huo Qixing.
Huo Qixing’s face was as pale as paper. Sweat rolled down from his forehead, evaporating into white steam the instant it struck the ground.
“Captain, the strength of this will is surging.”
An Changqing’s brows drew tightly together as his gaze flicked rapidly between Chen Guan’s swaying figure and the distant Bone Throne.
“We can’t just stand by and wait.” His voice was terrifyingly calm. “If Chen Guan keeps enduring it alone, it’ll grind him to death. We have to divert the will’s attention.”
Su Yuehe nodded and added, “Changqing is right. The core of the psychic imprint is in the throne. Attack it. That will definitely interfere with it.”
Qin Wu nodded in agreement. “Everyone, listen to my command. Use your strongest ranged attacks. Target the throne.”
“Understood!”
“Got it!”
The Huaxia team members responded at once.
“Here we go!”
Long Ao was the first to charge forward. The muscles in his arms bulged, and the crimson flames burning around his body were compressed to the extreme, gathering entirely around his fists.
“Let’s see you turn to scrap!”
Before his words had even faded, he had already thrown a punch containing all his strength. A massive crimson shockwave burst from his fist like a roaring meteor, tearing through the air as it shot toward the throne.
Right behind it, An Changqing’s sword aura and the team members’ various abilities intertwined into a surging flood of energy. Riding upward against the tide, it followed the shockwave and slammed into the evil throne built from countless piled-up bones.
Boom!
The deafening explosion tore across the silent battlefield.
The entire blood-red space shook violently. The Bone Throne was struck head-on by the flood of energy, sending countless shattered bones and clouds of black smoke soaring into the sky.
The terrifying will crushing down on Chen Guan stalled for an instant the moment the throne came under attack.
That brief respite gave Chen Guan the chance to pull back his arm, which had nearly been ground down to bare bone.
He staggered back two steps, then dropped to one knee and gasped for breath as if completely drained. Meanwhile, fresh flesh began to writhe and regenerate at the wound on his left arm, which had been worn away to the bone.
Creation. Regeneration. Steady output.
“It worked!”
Long Ao shouted excitedly.
But before his cry had even faded, the ground across the battlefield began to shake violently, and the frozen dark-red light in the sky flashed frantically.
Qin Wu, Long Ao, and the others’ expressions changed drastically. The concentrated spiritual pressure crashed down on everyone like millions of mountains, meeting no resistance.
Several weaker team members didn’t even have time to groan before blood spurted from their eyes, ears, noses, and mouths. They collapsed on the spot, instantly losing consciousness. Blue teleportation beams flickered and carried them away.
Those still standing could only watch as the black smoke drifting above the throne’s ruins began to converge.
A blurry shadow large enough to blot out the sky slowly took shape.
It was the familiar phantom of the Chicken-Winged Demon God.
The lingering will of Astaroth had been thoroughly enraged.
“Kehehehe…”
Baal’s gloating laughter rang out in Chen Guan’s mind. “Congratulations. You’ve gone and pushed things too far, kid.”
Chen Guan raised his head and stared fixedly at the demon-god phantom formed entirely from will. There wasn’t the slightest trace of fear in his eyes.
Because he could sense just how pure the spiritual energy radiating from the phantom’s core was.
Mine.
All of it is mine.
“Chen Guan, get back here!”
An Changqing’s anxious voice reached him. Wielding his sword, he struggled to clear a space for Chen Guan beneath the pressure that crushed the bones around them.
Chen Guan ignored the shouts behind him.
He slowly rose to his feet. The black patterns once again spread across his freshly regenerated left arm.
This time, they spread faster and looked even more sinister. In the blink of an eye, they covered half his body.
He raised his head and faced those scarlet eyes—eyes powerful enough to make even gods tremble—then deliberately took another step forward.
“I’ve been waiting for you.”
lities. One day, Qi Yuan was buying groceries when he unfortunately came face-to-face with a monster. Just when he thought he was going to die on the spot, he suddenly heard the monster's thoughts... "This aura, he's definitely not an ordinary master!" "So terrifying, so terrifying." "A fight with my back against the wall, I can't take it anymore." Qi Yuan: Ah, no one told me that my awakened ability isn't telepathy, but rather the stronger my enemies imagine me to be, the stronger I truly become. PS: Zhou Hai in the first chapter is not the protagonist.
ts me of treason?" "Correct. The host must return to the capital and gradually build up influence." "Wait—I have half a million soldiers, and you want me to go back to the capital to 'build influence'?" "Host, you are currently the Northern Garrison General, loyal to the Great Xia Dynasty." "Of course I am loyal to Great Xia! Absolutely loyal!" "But you keep referring to yourself as 'We'..." "Never mind the details! Summon all the regional commanders and military officers! We suspect treacherous officials are manipulating the court! They shall march with Us to the capital and purge the corrupt!" "......"
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
