Chapter 712
"I... I h-have nothing to say about it! Go ahead!" Beigong Mengmeng stammered.
They had been on the brink of despair, only for all their enemies to be wiped out without a single death on their side, and it was all thanks to Tianming. The Triflair disciples were even more flabbergasted when they saw him dive back into battle without saying another word.
"What’re you blanking out for? Help out!" Ximen Xuanzi said as she gave Beigong Mengmeng's head a slap.
"Dammit!" She almost fell from the slap and cursed again.
"Senior Beigong, help us break our hell barrier formations!" cried some disciples who were trapped within.
"Are you all daft? Once the barrier formation is broken, someone can kill you for real!" Beigong Mengmeng said as she fought.
"Don't be naive! If the Quadform Sea Sect already dares to try to kill us, we'll be sitting targets if the other sects come!"
"That's right! Not to mention, Tianming is facing so many of them on his own. We can't just sit and watch him take the blows for us! We have to fight too!"
"Xuanzi, help me break my hell barrier formation too!"
More and more of them clamored to be freed.
"Fine! You're right. The Triflair Celestial Sect isn't full of cowards!" Beigong Mengmeng rather capably took down her opponents before turning to free the disciples from the hell barrier formations. The ones who were free helped free others too.
"The next time, our deaths are certain," Beigong Mengmeng said, worried.
"So what? Without Tianming's help, we would've died all the same," Ximen Xuanzi said.
"The lowly Quadform Sea Sect dares to cross us by killing us, huh? I've had enough! It's time for revenge!"
"That's right! How many of our disciples have they doomed in the past summits?"
"Go!"
The most hated sect was no doubt the Quadform Sea Sect.
Tianming went even harder on Long Xiaofan, as many Quadform disciples had managed to break through Meow Meow's Misty Hellthunder and began approaching him. At the same time, more than twenty lifebound beasts unleashed their abilities in his direction, making him feel rather pressured. Had the Quadform disciples known that Long Xiaofan would be in trouble so soon, they would've come sooner, but now it was too late. Tianming's lifebound beasts had returned to his side.
"Is that all the people on your side?" He smirked and kept the Grand-Orient Sword away, swapping it for Archfiend. The chain of eyeballs hummed as Tianming sent it swiping. With the chain in his right hand, he opened the third eye on his left hand and pointed it at the Quadform disciples.
"You're dead, Li Tianming!"
"You killed Xiaofan! There will be war! We’ll attack from the sea to exterminate your sect!"
"You're in big trouble!"
The Quadform disciples were already convinced of how powerful the disciple of the goddess was. They already feared the goddess enough, so what kind of terror could her disciple bring? Was the goddess really as weak as the rumors suggested? Her disciple started off at the Empyrean Saint stage and could now crush fourth-level death phase samsarans, something that had never been seen before.
"Stop with your tall tales. You already said you’d break and humiliate us before the Nether Battle. What happened to that?" Tianming didn't want to bother talking to them too much. The only lingua franca during the Number One Summit was his fists! Having dealt with Hexapath, Quadform would be next.
Ying Huo, Meow Meow, Lan Huang, and Xian Xian joined the chaotic melee. For now, Long Xiaofan's four seadragons were trapped within their hell barrier formations.
Tianming executed the Eight Desolation Fienddragon Whip, Centurius Dragonslay, causing Archfiend to dance through the air like hundreds of roaring dragons. Working in perfect tandem with the Radiant Vines, it struck the many lifebound beasts around him and caused their hell barrier formations to trigger.
Then, he used the Soulshaker Eye, blinding many of his enemies at once. Before they could regain their sight, the chain wrapped around their heads and triggered their hell barrier formations. Without those, their heads would've come off.
The entire battlefield was in abject chaos. The Quadform disciples had thought they would be able to rely on their superior numbers to avenge Long Xiaofan, yet they hadn’t expected that the Triflair disciples would be so fierce. Even though they had been disqualified after their hell barrier formations had triggered, they willingly asked others to break them out of them so they could help Tianming in the fight at risk of death. Gradually, the Quadform disciples' numerical advantage began slimming down as Tianming's chain pierced through all corners of the battlefield like an ethereal demon.
"Don't let even a single one of them leave."
"Alright!" Xian Xian spread its roots and formed a net that surrounded the entire battlefield once more. Lan Huang then charged and pushed away many lifebound beasts singlehandedly.
Even more chaos ensued as abilities were unleashed all over. With the help of the Triflair disciples, the delicate balance from before crumbled. Now, nobody could stop Tianming or Beigong Mengmeng and the others.
"Run!"
"They've gone mad! They don't even care if they'll die! We must go to the higher layers for reinforcements! We now know where their hell tree is, so we'll wipe them out with Hexapath, Biritual, Nonahall, and the rest!"
"I didn't think the Triflair disciples would be so dumb as to not know what's good for them. It's over for them! They can't see the big picture at all!"
When Long Xiaofan had died, they still had a chance to escape, but now only four or five of the Quadform disciples hadn't had their hell barrier formations activated. Tianming had his eyes on them the whole time.
"I won't let even one beast leave, let alone any beastmasters!" He, Ying Huo, and Meow Meow gave chase, and sure enough, their hell barrier formations were soon activated. No matter how they struggled, they wouldn't be able to leave from inside. Even then, they hammered at their barrier formations and threw threats Tianming's way nonstop.
"You better think this through! Don't let the innocent lives of the Archaion Sect pay for your sins!" Long Yinfeng cried when Tianming came to him, drawing the Grand-Orient Sword. "The Triflair Celestial Sect were fools, but you still have a chance! If you continue your foolish actions, Triflair will be wiped out as well! You’ll no doubt become public enemy number one!"
"Wipe us out? Who do you Quadform pricks think you are? There hasn't been any real war across the continent for thousands of years, and that's a real difficult feat to achieve. You think peace is easy? Do you even know the cost of war?" Ximen Xuanzi snapped.
"If that means we can swallow your entire sect, we'll pay any cost!" Long Yinfeng argued back. Like Long Xiaofan, he still didn't feel a single hint of fear even though his moment of reckoning was so close. But right as he finished, Tianming shattered his hell barrier formation. "You—"
Off with his head. The deal was sealed before he could even yell. His corpse collapsed, much to the shock of the others. Tianming had actually made the act of taking a life look trivial and easy.
"Umm... Brother Tianming, do we really have to kill them all? Shouldn’t we leave some face for the Quadform Sea Sect? Their divine realm is still rather powerful..." Beigong Mengmeng sheepishly asked.
"Didn't you hear what they said? Once you let any single one of these flies go, they'll bring more to your hell tree. You'll be the ones dying then. Well, you're free to make the choice either way," Tianming said plainly.
"Fine!" She poked her tongue out and turned to Ximen Xuanzi. "This person is so fierce!"
"I think he's fine. He's just cold and rational. Being too soft can bring harm to the ones we cherish," Ximen Xuanzi said.
"Sigh, survival is tough, huh.... We don't really have a choice, given the circumstances."
Neither of them could quite make up their mind as the Quadform disciples kept insulting them from within their hell barrier formations. It was nightmarish, thinking that any one of them could be next. Once a hell barrier formation was broken, that meant the death of one of them!
"Can't we just keep them within the hell barrier formations?" Beigong Mengmeng asked.
"We could’ve done that, but I have to avenge the disciples of my sect that were killed at Skyorigin Battlefield," Tianming said. If others pitied the Quadform disciples, who would pity the dead Archaion disciples? Tianming would never forget that his fellow disciples were still in a dangerous predicament on the ninth layer of the Nether Battlefield. It wasn't even certain they would survive the next ten days. While the Quadform disciples wouldn't be able to leave their hell barrier formations, they might have some way to lead others to where they were, and Tianming didn't want to take that risk.
Being a monarch doesn't mean not killing. The philosophy behind the Animacorpus Eradication reflected this state of mind of his. In the end, he killed all twenty-five Quadform disciples and their lifebound beasts before tossing their corpses into the volcano.
"Now that the trash has been taken care of, I won't disturb you any longer. May we meet again," he said.
The Triflair disciples seemed a little terrified of him, but he merely smiled and left.
"Brother Tianming!" Beigong Mengmeng called out.
"What is it?"
"I wish you all the best no matter what happens!"
"Thanks," he said, then flew off.
"He's a little dreamy," Ximen Xuanzi said.
"That's right! Just, he's a little too fierce. What if he terrifies me into pissing myself when we get it on? It's better to just feast on his looks from afar!"
"Naughty girl! He probably doesn't even know you at all, yet you're here fantasizing about making out with him?!"
"It was a slip of the tongue, I swear!"