The instant the Vacuum Divine Detonation went off.

Space first fell into a sudden silence, as though the world had frozen time itself.

Then space heaved violently — more terrifying than the shattering of the void itself. In the stretch between Chitian River and Yue Yang, the air, the ice energy, even the sky above, all crumbled in a heartbeat and blasted outward in a frenzy, everything reduced to nothing, annihilated…

Even Chitian River, the one who had unleashed it, could not easily withstand that kind of power.

He threw both hands up to shield his face and staggered backward.

Chitian River wasn’t worried about his own body being destroyed — he possessed an indestructible divine body, and short of a god, no one could possibly unmake it!

The frenzied shockwave swept out in an expanding ring to thirty kilometers away and still showed no sign of settling. The solid ice on the ground was pulverized into powder, caught up in the hurricane of the blast wave, spreading until it blotted out the sky. Princess Qianqian, who had already retreated to an extreme distance, raised the Prison Emperor’s divine sword to block, yet still couldn’t keep her footing. She held tight to Xiao Nu behind her, and the two of them slid a full kilometer backward before she barely managed to hold the line.

The Storm Valkyrie, who had been about to charge in to help, was hurled through the air. She slammed into an ice peak first, then, along with the collapsing peak, was flung hundreds of meters away, buried beneath a sky’s worth of ice and snow, vanishing without a trace.

A full three minutes passed.

And still the shattered void could not knit itself back together.

The shattered ice and snow-froth farther out, like an ice storm, veiled the sky and plunged everything for a hundred li around into pitch darkness.

“What an insufferable little ant!” Chitian River snorted, half-smug and half-irritated. He’d killed his enemy in an instant, yet he still felt sour about it. A victory like this couldn’t bring him much pleasure. On the contrary, using a forbidden technique of this caliber against a lowly human ant was practically a disgrace.

Still, at least he’d won in the end.

Otherwise he’d have been in an even fouler mood.

Chitian River mused: should he go after those two women first, torture them to death by the cruelest means the world had to offer, then absorb the divine power in their bodies and seize their divine artifacts as well…

As for the Storm Valkyrie buried under the ice and snow, Chitian River figured there was no point in killing her.

Because she was a life-guardian war beast, and killing a Divine General was an exceedingly, exceedingly difficult thing to do. Defeating her was possible, but killing a Divine General who was gradually condensing a unique godhood was a goal all but impossible to achieve. What was more, in a frozen wasteland of ice and snow, a Storm Valkyrie in terrain like this was practically an undying existence!

Just as Chitian River was about to take to the air and chase down the distant Princess Qianqian and Xiao Nu.

He suddenly noticed, at the spot where the shattered space was mending itself.

That human man who should have died — and somehow hadn’t — was still alive. Before he could stop himself, he cried out in shock: “That’s impossible!”

The power of the Vacuum Divine Detonation would make even a god knit his brows to take it head-on. Without a divine body, it was simply impossible to resist that kind of destructive force — so how on earth had this ant of a human man endured it? Even space itself had been blasted apart, everything annihilated and reduced to nothing, so how had this brat survived? And the most important point of all: Chitian River realized the boy wasn’t just alive — he wasn’t even hurt. He looked as if he hadn’t lost so much as a single strand of hair. Being blown apart, limbs torn off and guts flung into the sky, would already have been unbelievable enough — but a result like this, a body without a single scratch on it, how in the world had he managed it?

Yue Yang wasn’t wounded, but his face was twisted with pain.

And amid the pain.

There seemed to be a kind of unbearable, almost pleasurable comfort as well.

Just like the feeling of an ordinary person walking barefoot down a little path paved with small sharp stones, giving the soles of their feet a good massage!

Blasting him and failing to kill him — and it could even make him feel good? Chitian River couldn’t begin to imagine it. All he could do was deny it, and deny it again — impossible!

“Whatever the reason, you — you’re done for. Absolutely done for!” Chitian River, furious and seething, smoke practically pouring out of his ears, his body all but bursting apart, gathered up divine power enough to shake mountains and rivers and shot straight toward Yue Yang.

Fists came down like rain.

Solid, punishing blows hammered into Yue Yang’s body — head, face, vital points, torso, limbs — none of it spared from the downpour of fists.

Yue Yang could do nothing but curl up his body to protect himself. For the moment, he seemed unable to flee, let alone strike back!

Boom boom boom boom boom boom!

Boom boom boom…

Wave after wave of divine-power-laden fists rained down, pounding into Yue Yang’s body like artillery shells.

Chitian River had turned savage inside. Blowing you up won’t kill you? Then your daddy will beat you to death — smash you to pieces, pound you to pulp, grind you to ash, and let’s see if you can still live through that!

There was no telling how long he kept at it — he reckoned he’d thrown no fewer than ten thousand punches.

Even Chitian River, who possessed a divine body.

Felt himself grow faintly weary. After all, he’d first thrown everything into the Vacuum Divine Detonation, then thrown everything into ten thousand hammering fists. Without a divine body, an ordinary martial artist’s frame would have collapsed long ago. In the end, Chitian River condensed a colossal, matchless Chitian Divine Fire ball, slammed Yue Yang whole into it, and — before the Chitian Divine Fire ball could erupt in a great explosion — delivered one heavy final strike.

His two hands struck that enormous Chitian Divine Fire ball with cunning precision, and at the same time, guided by his will, he sent it tearing straight through the void, carrying his enemy’s body to vanish forever inside the emptiness.

Whether it detonated in there in a great explosion, or simply went on burning quietly like this.

His enemy was doomed to die without question!

Because an enemy carried into the void by the Chitian Divine Fire ball could never return to the original world…

This was one of his three secret trump cards.

And also one of his three great forbidden techniques: “Divine Flame Burial!”

The Chitian Divine Fire ball, carrying Yue Yang, smashed through the void and sank into the eternal emptiness like a dying sun, vanishing in an instant. Chitian River didn’t have the same hundred-percent confidence he’d had when he unleashed the Vacuum Divine Detonation. He kept his eyes fixed on that rift in the void, terrified that Yue Yang might still come climbing back out of it. If that really happened, he wouldn’t hesitate to bring out his final — and strongest — forbidden technique to deal with him. If he truly had to use that technique, it would inflict a certain amount of damage on Chitian River himself; but its killing power would, without a doubt, be more than ten times greater than the first two forbidden techniques combined!

His eyes stayed locked on it as the shattered space slowly knitted itself back together.

And Yue Yang, in the end, never came back out.

Only then did Chitian River quietly let out a breath of relief.

Sometimes he really did half-fear that he wouldn’t be able to kill this human man — a man who looked as weak and lowly as an ant yet clung to life with unbreakable tenacity. If word of it ever got out, no one would believe it, would they? That a proper god couldn’t do a thing to one mere mortal?

Boom!

The Storm Valkyrie slammed both fists heavily into Chitian River’s left and right ears.

Chitian River felt a touch of dizziness. Her combat strength — how had it suddenly jumped dozens of times over? A moment ago his body-guarding divine power had been enough to bat her away, so how could this be? Fortunately, his powerful divine body neutralized the damage of the attack, and the dizziness faded in less than half a second. The strength in Chitian River’s body surged and shook the Storm Valkyrie back. He first gave his head — still carrying that faint lingering dizziness — a shake, then snorted with a touch of arrogance: “Get lost. I’ve no interest in doing pointless things. With your strength, you could never hurt me! Tell your master that even if she obtains Youlang’s godhood, in the end she still won’t be any match for me… Now get out of my sight!”

He shoved out hard with both hands, and the Storm Valkyrie was flung a hundred meters back.

Just as Chitian River turned for the second time, about to make a smooth, elegant exit and go hunt down Princess Qianqian and Xiao Nu, out of the corner of his eye he suddenly caught sight of something unbelievable.

In the mending space, a hand suddenly reached out.

First it groped about a little, as though searching for a door handle or a railing. Then a six-pointed star pattern appeared in the void, faintly shimmering, and the next moment that hand seemed to grip something — and all at once pulled open a door out of space itself. Under Chitian River’s disbelieving gaze, Classmate Yue Yang crawled out through the doorway, looking a bit worse for wear, his hair blown out like a bird’s nest and his face smeared black — yet his body, uncannily, without a single injury.

Chitian River’s jaw hit the ground with a ‘clack.’

Classmate Yue Yang’s soot-blackened face broke into a smile. He gave Chitian River a little nod, greeting him like an old acquaintance, then carefully pulled the door of space shut behind him…

“You’re not dead?” Chitian River asked, dumbfounded — a pointless question.

“Not yet, I should think.” Yue Yang nodded, confirming it. “The chaos energy inside the infinite void really is terrifying, but luckily my teacher is a master well-versed in spatial teleportation. I hung around in there for a little while, then groped my way back out. Ah, I understand how you feel — quite a blow, isn’t it? Allow me to express my deepest sympathy and condolences. And, of course, my thanks!”

“Thanks?” Chitian River was even more astonished.

“That’s right. Without your Vacuum Divine Detonation and your whatever-it-was Divine Flame Burial, I’d have had no way to fuse this ancient rune on the spot. It’s an extremely difficult thing to do — as you surely know! With your selfless help, and by sending me off to the infinite void at just the right moment, letting my body and the ancient rune absorb the cosmic source-energy and resonate together completely, I was finally able to see it through to a triumphant finish! Honestly, I really do have to thank you. If not for you, I reckon it would’ve taken me at least half a year — maybe even longer — to fully fuse it, and even then, even if I’d managed the fusion, I could never have pulled it off as perfectly as this!” Classmate Yue Yang made it clear he was deeply, deeply moved — moved enough to want to whip up a great big silk banner emblazoned with the words ‘Shake the Nation’s Might, Guard the Capital’s Peace’ and present it to Chitian River.

As for why he’d use the character ‘shake’ rather than ‘defend’?

The experts had all said so themselves — this ‘shake’ character was no misprint at all. This ‘shake’ character, you see, conveyed real weight and gravity!

And of course, whatever the experts say is right. So long as you don’t rewrite ‘shake’ as ‘regret,’ you’re already showing plenty of good faith — er, no, plenty of weight and gravity!

Chitian River was so furious his nose went crooked.

A mere mortal — and even all that hadn’t killed him. Thrown into the infinite void, and in the end he’d even let the man successfully fuse his ancient rune… this was outright against all reason! Did he really have to use his final forbidden technique to kill this brat?

While a sliver of hesitation still lingered in Chitian River’s heart, it was Classmate Yue Yang’s turn to strike back.

He’d taken ten thousand punches, and though each blow had made the ancient rune fuse a little more, it had, after all, still hurt like hell. Classmate Yue Yang, who never took a loss lying down, decided to repay this ‘help’ to Chitian River — tenfold, a hundredfold! You hit me with ten thousand punches, did you? Good — now it’s my turn to pay you back with a hundred thousand punches. And if you’re not satisfied, well, what’s another few tens of thousands on top?

Yue Yang lunged at Chitian River, and in the instant Chitian River was about to make his move.

The Eternal Wheel flickered into being between the two of them.

Yue Yang, who had already fused the ancient rune, now had the rune’s mysterious power augmenting the Eternal Wheel at the same time… Chitian River discovered that even with his divine body, he was frozen in an instant, utterly unable to move.

The Eternal Wheel, amplified by the ancient rune, had all but reached the realm of ‘god-sealing.’

And this was still without Yue Yang having merged the ancient rune and the Eternal Wheel into one.

Otherwise, Chitian River would have stayed frozen within this Eternal Wheel for an endless eternity — and unless Yue Yang’s will released him, there would never come a day he could break free.

(End of Chapter 915)