The world, for a few heart-stopping seconds, seemed to have been hollowed out, its contents replaced by a single, overwhelming presence. The air in the valley did not just grow heavy; it curdled, becoming thick and suffocating.
The very spiritual energy of the world, which the Titled Douluo commanded with impunity, now cowered, refusing to answer their calls.
It was a primal, instinctual fear, a feeling of being a small, insignificant creature before an ancient and indifferent god of destruction.
The four remaining Titled Douluo—the Diamond Golem, the Thorned Empress, the Earth Gauntlet, and the Lightning Douluo—were frozen, their triumphant charge stopped dead.
Their souls, honed by centuries of cultivation and battle, screamed a single, terrifying truth. This was not a beast they could hunt. This was an existence they should have fled from on sight.
The colossal head of the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King, scales as black as the abyss itself, emerged fully from the swirling vortex of torn space. His horn seemed to scrape the sky, and his golden eye, larger than a carriage wheel, fixed upon them. It was a gaze devoid of anger, devoid of hatred. It was a look of pure, absolute, and chillingly casual authority, the look a king gives to insects that have crawled into his throne room.
"No…" the Earth Gauntlet Douluo whispered, his voice a choked, horrified rasp. His powerful, earth-encased hands were trembling. "Those scales… that eye… the legends… it can't be…"
"Di Tian," the Lightning Douluo breathed, the name a curse on his lips. The arrogance and fury on his face had been wiped clean, replaced by a mask of stark, bone-white terror. "It is the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King… Di Tian! The number one Ferocious Beast in the world!"
The name, spoken aloud, shattered the last vestiges of their courage. This was not just a powerful beast. This was the Beast God, a living legend, a creature whose power was said to rival the gods of old. The fortune they had come to hunt had revealed itself to be their executioner.
Desperation, raw and wild, clawed its way past their fear. Flight was their only thought. Survival, their only goal.
The Diamond Golem Douluo, a being whose entire philosophy was built on overwhelming force, was the first to react. He roared, not in challenge, but in a desperate bid to carve an escape route.
"Seventh Soul Ring: Diamond Golem Avatar!"
Nine soul rings—two yellow, two purple, five black—erupted from his body. The seventh, a profound, abyssal black, flared with blinding light. His already massive form swelled to over fifty meters in height, his stony skin transforming into a shimmering, translucent diamond that refracted the pale northern light in a thousand directions. He had become a walking fortress of nigh-indestructible power.
"Eighth Soul Ring: Tectonic Slam!" he bellowed, his voice booming across the valley. He raised his colossal diamond arms, now armed with a pair of massive, Class 8 Soul Tool gauntlets, the 'Mountain-Crusher Fists', and slammed them down.
The entire valley floor convulsed, a wave of shattered ice and rock surging towards Di Tian. It was an attack that could level a small mountain, a desperate show of force meant to buy a single second of escape.
Di Tian watched the cataclysmic attack approach, his golden eye holding an expression of profound, almost bored, indifference. He did not roar. He did not unleash a grand technique. He simply… moved.
One moment, his colossal head was emerging from the spatial rift. The next, his entire, unimaginably vast draconic body was free, and he was before the Diamond Golem. It was not a spatial blink; it was pure, impossible speed, a movement so fast it seemed to break the laws of physics.
A single claw, larger than the Diamond Golem's entire body and wreathed in a whisper of Ultimate Darkness, casually swiped forward.
The wave of shattered earth and ice dissolved into nothingness as it touched the darkness. The Mountain-Crusher Fists, powerful Class 8 Soul Tools, shattered like glass upon impact. The Diamond Golem Avatar, a defense thought to be absolute, cracked, splintered, and then imploded under the casual, irresistible force.
The Diamond Golem Douluo, his human form revealed within the shattering avatar, had only a single moment to register the look of utter contempt in the dragon's golden eye before the claw continued its unhurried path and simply erased him from existence. No blood, no scream. Just a silent, absolute annihilation.
Huo Yuhao watched from the side, his heart pounding with a mixture of terror and awe. This was true power. The raw, untamed might of the world's strongest being. But even as he watched, a memory surfaced. The memory of his future self, in this very body, meeting Di Tian's power and casually dispersing it, beating the great dragon king into submission.
'So this is the difference,' he thought, a new, profound understanding dawning in his soul. 'Lord Di Tian is a king of this world. He commands its physical laws. But a god… a god stands above them. My future self's Divine Consciousness wasn't stronger in raw energy, but its quality, its authority over reality itself, was on a completely different plane. The gap between a king and a god… it is truly as vast as the heavens.'
Jin Xi, in contrast, felt no such philosophical conflict. A cold, satisfied smile touched her lips. "One down," she murmured, her ruby eyes gleaming with a fierce light. "They deserved far worse for their greed."
The death of their strongest defender shattered the morale of the remaining three. The Thorned Empress and the Lightning Douluo shared a desperate look.
"We split up!" the Lightning Douluo screamed. "He can't chase us all!"
"Seventh Soul Ring: Thorned Empress Avatar!" the green-haired woman shrieked, her own set of nine rings flaring. She transformed into a monstrous, sentient thicket of writhing, venomous vines, covering a massive area. "Eighth Soul Ring: Forest of a Thousand Stings!"
Tens of thousands of razor-sharp, poison-tipped thorns shot out in every direction, a 360-degree attack designed not to kill, but to create chaos and obscure her escape.
At the same time, the Lightning Douluo activated his own avatar. "Seventh Soul Ring: Thunder Titan Avatar!" He became a towering giant of crackling, violet lightning. "Ninth Soul Ring: Heavenly Thunder Movement!"
His ninth and most powerful Soul Ring, a terrifying black ring tinged with a faint red that signified it was from a beast approaching 100,000 years, flared. His lightning form dissolved into a thousand streaks of pure electricity, all shooting off in different directions, a perfect escape technique.
Di Tian let out a soft, contemptuous snort.
He opened his mouth, and a wave of pure, absolute darkness flowed out. It wasn't a breath weapon; it was a tide of his Ultimate Darkness attribute. The darkness washed over the valley, and the tens of thousands of venomous thorns simply… vanished, their energy, their poison, their very physical forms consumed and nullified.
The Thorned Empress's avatar, now exposed, tried to burrow into the ground to escape.
Di Tian didn't even look at her. He simply flexed a single claw. The space around the writhing vine-monster warped, compressed, and then twisted. A pained, gurgling scream was cut short as the Thorned Empress's avatar, and the woman within it, were contorted and crushed by raw spatial force, reduced to a pulp of green mush.
As for the Lightning Douluo, Di Tian merely raised an eyebrow. The thousand streaks of lightning scattered, seeking freedom. But the space around the valley had become a cage. Each time a streak of lightning reached the valley's edge, it would simply reappear on the opposite side, trapped in a localized, looping spatial distortion.
After a few seconds, the thousand streaks coalesced back into the terrified, panting form of the Thunder Titan. His ultimate escape technique had been turned into a hamster wheel.
"Please! Mercy, mighty Beast God!" he begged, his powerful voice now a pathetic, trembling whine. "We were wrong! We were blinded by greed! We will offer you anything! Our treasures, our servitude! Just spare our lives!"
The Earth Gauntlet Douluo, seeing his comrades defeated so effortlessly, fell to his knees, his face ashen. He knew escape was impossible. He knew begging was useless.
"Lord Di Tian!"
Huo Yuhao's voice, clear and steady, cut through the terrified pleas.
The great dragon king turned his immense golden eye towards the boy. A hint of inquiry, of curiosity, replaced the cold indifference.
"Please," Huo Yuhao said, bowing his head respectfully. "Could you leave one of them alive? I have… questions I need to ask. I need to know who sent them, how they found this place."
Di Tian considered this for a moment. The boy's request was logical. Information was a valuable weapon. He let out a low, rumbling grunt of assent.
The Earth Gauntlet Douluo saw a sliver of hope. "Yes! Me! Spare me!" he cried, his voice cracking. "I will tell you everything! I am a Titled Douluo under the Sun Moon Empire's Imperial Family! I have information! I have status!"
Di Tian's gaze shifted to him. The hope in the man's eyes died, replaced by a dawning horror.
"You are too loud," the Beast God's voice rumbled, not in the air, but directly in the minds of everyone present.
With a flick of his tail, a whip of pure spatial energy, faster than thought, lashed out. The Earth Gauntlet Douluo's head simply… vanished. His body remained kneeling for a second before toppling over, a silent, grim testament to the king's casual, absolute power.
Now, only the Lightning Douluo remained. He was floating in the air, his Thunder Titan Avatar flickering weakly, his will to fight completely shattered.
Di Tian drifted towards him, a predator savoring the final moments of the hunt. "You live," the dragon's voice echoed. "But you will wish you had not."
He did not kill him. He began to dismantle him.
A casual wave of a claw. The Class 8 Storm-Caller Lance the man wielded shattered into a thousand pieces.
A focused glare from his golden eye. The Thunder Titan Avatar flickered and died, revealing the terrified, pale man within.
Another flex of a draconic finger. A pulse of spatial pressure. The sound of bones snapping echoed through the valley. The man's arms and legs were broken with surgical precision.
A final, contemptuous exhalation of dark energy. The breath washed over the man, and he screamed, a high, piercing shriek of pure agony as his dantian, the core of his Soul Power, was corroded and destroyed.
The Titled Douluo, now a crippled, powerless mortal with broken limbs, fell from the sky and landed in a crumpled, sobbing heap on the valley floor. His power was gone. His pride was shattered. His spirit was broken. He was a perfect, empty vessel.
Di Tian turned his attention back to Huo Yuhao, his work done. 'The information you seek is yours to take.'
It was at that precise moment that Elder Yi's voice, calm and filled with a rare, academic excitement, spoke in Huo Yuhao's mind.
'Disciple. The moment is perfect.'
'Teacher?' Huo Yuhao projected back, his heart beginning to pound with a new kind of anticipation.
'A battlefield where powerful souls have just been extinguished is a sacred ground for my arts,' Elder Yi explained, his mental voice resonating with ancient, forbidden knowledge. 'Their lingering resentment, their potent spiritual remnants… they are the finest catalysts imaginable. We will not let them go to waste.'
Huo Yuaho's mind raced, connecting the dots. 'You mean… now?'
'Yes. The survivor's body, his own soul shattered by terror and his power core destroyed, is a perfect empty vessel. And the lingering soul fragments of his comrades are the key. In the other timeline, I must have given your future self my own remnant soul to create a third Martial Soul according to that book of fate you possess. But that was a gift born of my own demise. Here, now, with me to guide you… we can perform the ritual as it was meant to be done. We can forge it from the very essence of your fallen enemies.'
A thrill, terrifying and exhilarating, shot through Huo Yuhao. A third Martial Soul. The Necromantic Holy Magic God. A power he had only read about, a key to a whole new realm of abilities.
'I will teach you the first true incantation of my holy necromantic arts,' Elder Yi instructed. 'The Chant of Soul Binding. This will gather the remnant soul energies, merge them with a sliver of your own spirit, and use the empty vessel before you as a crucible. It will create an Undead Servant, a being bound utterly to your will. And in the process, you will absorb the powerful remnant souls of those who have died and the very law of this creation will imprint upon your soul, birthing your third Martial Soul.'
Huo Yuhao took a deep, shaky breath. He felt a flicker of moral apprehension, a queasiness at the thought of desecrating a body, of twisting a soul. But then he looked at the crippled man, one of the hunters who had come to kill him, to kill his friends, to desecrate this sacred place. His apprehension vanished, replaced by a cold, pragmatic resolve.
"Teacher," he projected, his voice firm. "I am ready. Guide me."
He walked towards the broken, sobbing form of the Lightning Douluo. Jin Xi and Di Tian watched him, their expressions a mixture of confusion and curiosity. Why was he approaching the defeated enemy?
Huo Yuhao knelt beside the man, ignoring his terrified whimpers. He closed his eyes, and under Elder Yi's careful, word-by-word instruction, he began to chant.
The words were alien, ancient, resonating with a power that felt fundamentally different from Soul Power. They were guttural, filled with sorrow and command. As he spoke, a faint, grey light, the color of old bones and deep sorrow, began to emanate from him.
Wisps of ethereal, angry red light, the lingering soul fragments of the three slain Titled Douluo, rose from where their bodies had been annihilated. They were drawn to his chant, swirling around him like phantom moths to a grey flame.
He placed a hand on the forehead of the Lightning Douluo.
The man's sobbing stopped. His eyes went wide, and then… vacant. The grey light, carrying the swirling red soul fragments, poured into him. The man's body convulsed once, violently, and then fell still.
A profound change occurred. An ethereal, grey orb of light, pulsing with a power that was neither life nor death, but something in between, materialized within Huo Yuhao's Spiritual Sea, settling quietly beside the Spirit Eyes and the Ice Jade Scorpion Empress.
His Third Martial Soul had been born.
In the valley, the crippled Titled Douluo slowly, stiffly, pushed himself to his knees. His broken limbs moved with an unnatural, puppet-like grace. He lifted his head, and the terror in his eyes was gone. They now glowed with a faint, empty, grey light.
He bowed his head before Huo Yuhao, his posture one of absolute, unquestioning servitude.
Di Tian's golden eye narrowed, a flicker of profound disbelief within it. Jin Xi stared, her jaw slightly agape. What they had just witnessed defied every law of nature they had ever known. What...What was that grey light? And how did Huo Yuhao turn this Titled Douluo into a servant with that dark yet light energy being released from this human?
Huo Yuhao looked at his new Undead Servant, feeling the strange, new connection in his soul. He focused his will and asked his first question, his voice a quiet, cold whisper in the silent, bloodstained valley.
"Who sent you?"