“Hgh— hgh—!“

The vast flood dragon body had tumbled end over end through the air before crashing down, throwing dust in every direction.

Back to human form.

The body covered in black scales, dense with fine dark-red wounds.

The grotesque flood dragon’s head gasped in ragged pulls. The sharp claws reached down and came away slicked in blood — sliced clean through at the waist by that halberd, half a body left. The eyes were full of shock and the shaking aftermath of terror.

It leaned against a tree, a sound like shrieking coming from that wide jaw, the crimson tongue darting out, scaled palms growing scorching hot as they pressed against the wound and sealed it.

From this day forward, there was no longer a Zhang Hengzhou of Qingfeng Mountain. Only the Sixth Prince of the Yangchun River flood dragon clan.

Provided — it could actually make it back to the Yangchun River.

Deep, concentrated venom gathered in those ferocious eyes.

A three-thousand-year Condensate Realm demon — and it had looked so utterly weak against Chen Qiankun.

“Demon Suppression Division. Demon Suppression Division.”

The flood dragon recovered some of its breath, face filling with layered envy.

The Condensate Realm was divided into three stages: condensing liquid into a core, nurturing the core in the qi sea, shattering the core to release the divine. The most important of the three was the second.

The core was like a gestating egg — when it first condensed, it held nothing but pure breath of heaven and earth, an empty vessel. What eventually hatched from it depended entirely on what it was fed during the nurturing stage.

Fed with sword intent, qi and blood, vital essence — you became a grandmaster of the Mixed Origin Boundless path. A demon who reached this level could claim the title of demon king.

But the Division’s generals, the Qingzhou General included — all but one of them had taken a shortcut. They fed their internal cores with the incense and prayer of ordinary people.

When the core finally broke, what emerged was a divine spirit.

This path moved entirely beyond the martial way — nothing like the Mixed Origin method. It had its own name: Martial Immortal.

In close combat, a Martial Immortal was far below a Mixed Origin grandmaster. But the divine spirit could leave the body, travel great distances, perceive across vast ranges.

It was originally the path of mountain spirits and river deities — gathering prayer through acts of goodness, building temples, accumulating devotion until a mountain deity or earth spirit took form.

And then practitioners had stolen it. Using the court as backing, in conditions of extraordinary advantage, they helped themselves to prayer that wasn’t theirs.

Chen Qiankun — how old was he? Eight hundred years, at most.

Simply through the standing of Linjiang Prefecture’s Demon Suppression General, he’d accumulated foundations of this depth.

He couldn’t slay demons at a thousand li’s distance. But he could briefly project his divine spirit outward, drive a blade through the air, and nearly take a life that way. Which meant the Martial Immortal taking shape inside his core was already mostly formed — he only needed time, waiting for the moment to shatter the core and release it.

“Qingfeng Mountain couldn’t hold him.”

Despair entered the demon’s eyes. That boundless sword intent could trap flesh and blood — but how could it trap a divine spirit?

Even that remnant soul of the Zhang family ancestor in the Founding Sword — kept alive across generations on the blood essence of disciples, convinced it was safe from any practitioner’s methods — had probably been cut down the moment Chen Qiankun projected outward.

Run.

The demon had recovered some strength. It pressed both palms to the ground and hauled itself forward.

As long as it reached the Yangchun River — a dragon returned to water — even Chen Qiankun couldn’t touch it there. Even the Qingzhou General herself, a true Martial Immortal, could only stand at the bank and watch.

One step at a time, that swordsman identity had been built. A name, a reputation, the sword pool’s refinement, the Sect Master’s seat within reach — just one more step, and the path to competing for prayer devotion would have been open.

It had clung to Zhang Hengzhou’s identity and lost half its body for it.

And stranded like this, reduced to hiding its tracks, not even daring to show its true form to conceal itself — the humiliation was extraordinary.

The demon smothered its qi signature and dragged itself forward on both palms — moving nearly as fast as it could have through the air. The main advantage was safety.

Then its whole body seized.

It looked up at the expanse of crimson astral force filling the sky ahead.

The sound of quiet footsteps reached it.

“Chen Qiankun — you’ve gone too far!”

The demon spun in near-panic, voice cracking at the edges with something close to collapse.

And then it saw the figure, and venom stirred in its heart.

A sharp-featured young man, breathing hard, the damp hair plastered against a pale face by sweat, ink-black robe edge moving with his steps, hands tight on the hilt, and in the dark eyes — an endless killing intent.

Then he stopped at what was approximately a safe distance.

“You.”

The demon stared. And suddenly found the situation absurd in a way that also hurt deeply.

Was it really this reduced — that even a Jade Liquid Realm junior felt entitled to come after it alone?

It looked at the young man standing still and felt genuinely confused. “You’re just a Commander. Two hundred taels a month. Why come by yourself?”

Shen Yi wiped the sweat from his forehead.

He would swear — from the moment he’d opened his eyes in that room at the Liu house in Baiyun County until now — he had never run this hard for this long in his life.

Fortunately, that faint qi connection between them had let him track the demon even when his legs couldn’t keep pace. He’d stayed on the trail.

He brought his hand down.

The Heavenly Astral Blood-Corruption at full release crashed down across the half-bodied demon.

As he slowly got his breath back, he explained simply:

“Because you looked at me three times.”

The scales on the demon’s back came away white where the astral force hit, the dense wounds splitting further open, the corrupting flames spreading across the flesh.

The flood dragon’s expression didn’t change. “You want to kill me for looking at you?”

“Three times.” Shen Yi pressed his lips together, calm but genuinely earnest. “And it’s not just you I want to kill. I want to kill your entire family.”

He meant every word.

What he’d seen in the flood dragon’s eyes — venom, hatred — but no path out for itself.

So even if there was one thread of a chance for the demon to escape—

He had to cut it off personally.

Otherwise what awaited him was potentially the entire Yangchun River flood dragon clan’s retribution.

“Hah— ha—“

The demon stared at him for a long moment, seemed to see through what the young man was thinking, and began to laugh. The whole body shaking with it, almost unable to breathe, claws pressing hard into the ground.

“At least you have a brain.”

There was genuine commonality between Zhang Hengzhou and the Sect Master who had prized him like a son — the same ferocious protectiveness of one’s own.

And Jiao Feng hadn’t been a half-demon. It had been born of the demon before it left the river — its own child, taken out of the water because it couldn’t leave behind that young one, worried it would be bullied by the others.

That had been its only — its true — child.

And now the dense, achingly familiar scent on this young man’s body was driving it close to the edge of reason.

Even knowing Chen Qiankun could arrive at any moment — dealing with one Jade Liquid practitioner was nearly no effort at all.

“Then what are you waiting for! Come on! Kill me!”

The demon lunged forward with a shriek — and then watched Shen Yi quietly take several steps back, raise his hand, and produce another wave of Heavenly Astral Blood-Corruption.

It moved forward. He stepped back. Exactly as much. Not a fraction different.

“…”

“Don’t come any closer. I’m a little scared.”

Shen Yi stood with his arms lowered, voice even, and stated the plain truth without embarrassment. Then he raised his hand and added a third wave.

He’d watched the exchange between Condensate Realm practitioners earlier and had formed a clear picture of where the ceiling was.

He was genuinely uncertain here.

The blood-corruption astral force that had worked without failure before — it was hitting the demon, but the visible damage seemed minimal.

But Shen Yi was confident that enough of it, accumulated, would produce results. And if it hadn’t, then he simply hadn’t used enough.

In the space of a breath — nearly twenty strikes. His face had gone white.

The output at Jade Liquid Perfection was incomparably greater than before. So was the cost.

Wave after wave came down like a storm, blanketing the demon in impacts until even the sky above took on a dark reddish cast.

Just as the demon thought he was running dry—

Shen Yi drew a slow breath and closed his eyes.

When they opened, the gold had returned to his pupils.

The hand that had just dropped — rose again.

“What kind of demonic technique is that?”

The demon’s expression shifted slightly at something it couldn’t account for. A strange feeling was building somewhere in its chest.

It registered the tearing pain spreading across its back, gaze going cold. It hesitated — then slowly turned and hauled itself away.

Something is wrong. Move.

“…”

Quiet footsteps again.

The demon snapped its head back with fury — then turned forward again with helpless hatred and dragged itself harder.

But the footsteps stayed behind it at exactly the same pace. The only time they paused was when it looked back — Shen Yi ready to retreat the instant anything happened, giving the demon no opening to strike.

And accompanying the footsteps: continuous, unrelenting, storm-like astral force.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Scorching fire spreading across the tough scales of the demon’s back, the dense wounds completely split open, dark red demon-blood running freely across the ground.

Finally it stopped.

It turned and looked at the young man who followed it like a shadow — and blood rose in its pupils. The jaw opened, showing a full set of fangs and a crimson tongue-tip, and the voice that came out was furious beyond constraint.

“You’re scared, you say?! Then get away from me!!”

What kind of practitioner is this. Not a shred of dignity.

Beating up a crippled flood dragon. What has the world come to.

(End of Chapter)