Chapter 237 - Glory of the Demon God.

Yao Jun quickly swept his surroundings and took in the entire situation, his mind racing to figure out the best course of action. Yuri Jahad was chasing him because she wanted to fight him, but neither Luosho Li nor this strange tree-type Divine Beast had any reason to act against him, they shouldn't launch any attacks against him. If he played his cards right, he might be able to shift Yuri's attention onto Luosho Li and then flee.

But sadly, Yao Jun did not understand the hearts and thoughts of those hailed as heaven's chosen, the talented and the arrogant. He had the strength to be counted amongst them, but as he always had to fight against opponents far stronger than him, he was more inclined to acting low-key and unassuming, arrogance wasn't ingrained in his bones like it was for people like Luosho Li and Yuri Jahad. So when Luosho Li saw that some nobody had interrupted a battle she had waited several years for, even breaking through the barrier she had set up in the process, her first thought was to wipe away this blemish before it could spread and be used to stain her reputation.

She waved her free left hand in a dismissive manner, invisible walls appearing around Yao Jun, rapidly closing in on him in an attempt to crush him. Yao Jun's expression sank when he saw her actions, she barely even spared him a glance, didn't even say a word, she simply moved directly for the kill. Yao Jun was boxed in by the invisible walls, but escaping was no problem since he had his law of space.

Space around him rippled and he vanished appearing again a few tens of meters away from Luosho Li and the tree, preparing to start running again. He couldn't see the Nine-Tailed Fox here, but there was a chance that she was lurking somewhere nearby, waiting for a chance to strike at Luosho Li, there was also the swiftly approaching Yuri, who was easily spotted by checking where the trees were blown away.

But just as Yao Jun was about to start running again, he sensed a sliver of danger coming from beneath him, hurriedly throwing himself to the side to dodge. A thick root burst out from the ground, piercing through the air where he had just stood. The root was covered in fine barbs that seemed to suck in the surrounding Qi, drawing them into the root.

It didn't take much to figure out who had just launched an attack, Yao Jun casting a backward glance at the nine-eyed and jagged-mouthed tree. He guessed that the root might have sucked him dry of all his Qi and maybe even lifeforce had he been struck by it, killing him and restoring a portion of the beast's energy.

He didn't even get the time to organize his thoughts, another sense of danger coming from above him, an invisible wall quickly pressing down on him. Yao Jun clenched his fist and punched the earth beneath him, a burst of fire and wind blowing a large crater into the ground and giving him enough space to roll away from the wall. If he could help it, he didn't want to use his law of space too much, he wanted to conserve as much energy as possible.

After rolling out of the way of the wall, Yao Jun pushed off the ground with his left hand, launching himself diagonally into the air, just barely dodging another root that shot out from beneath him. He used wind to twist his body into an upright position and hardened the air beneath him, kicking off from it and jumping over a hair-thin invisible wall that moved sideways, likely aiming to slice him in half.

He gave a light wave of his hand after jumping up, space around him rippling slightly just as the earth beneath him exploded outwards, thick shards of stone and small thorns shooting at him. He vanished into the ripple and appeared a few meters to the side, several more hair-thin walls appearing around him and slicing down at him in a star-like shape, sealing off any escape paths. Space around him once again rippled and he vanished, dodging the attack and appearing a few more meters away.

His expression was dark as he looked at Luosho Li and the tree-type beast, who seemed to have temporarily halted fighting each other so that they could deal with Yao Jun. One wanted to absorb him while the other wanted to kill him so that no one would learn about him breaking her barrier, their motivations were different, but both wanted him dead.

Luosho Li turned her head slightly, finally sparing Yao Jun more than just a simple passing glance. He had managed to avoid not only her attacks but even the attacks of the tree-type beast, he clearly wasn't as simple as she first assumed, he could even use the law of space alongside the law of fire and wind. Her desire to kill him waned slightly, having her barrier broken by someone who was seemingly somewhat special like Yao Jun would not blemish her reputation.

She waved her hand once more, countless hair-thin walls appearing around Yao Jun, blocking any path he could escape, if he ended up being able to dodge even this attack she would simply drop the matter and leave him alone. At the same time as the walls appeared, the earth beneath Yao Jun started to roil and change, turning into thick roots covered in fine spines, the roots spinning around each other like a massive grinder.

A thin layer of hardened air appeared beneath Yao Jun's feet, preventing him from falling into the grinder of roots while he worked on dodging the walls. He wanted to just teleport away, but the moment he tried to move through space he noticed that something was completely sealing off space around him, trying to teleport now would result in him crashing directly into the hair-thin walls coming at him.

His gaze landed on Luosho Li, if anyone here had the ability to seal off space like that, it would have to be her, the one who carried two fragments of the Supreme Law of Defense. From the looks of it, her earlier attacks weren't serious, just something she produced absent-mindedly. A black light flashed in his grasp as Yao Jun's sword appeared, trying to block these things empty-handed would be suicidal. Yao Jun grasped the sword tightly, channeling so much energy into it that it started to buzz slightly. But just as he was about to swing the sword, a thunderous shout caught his attention.

"Don't you fucking dare!"

A loud explosion sound rang out, Yuri appearing next to Yao Jun, a pair of orange gauntlets covering her arms. Yao Jun had been so preoccupied with dodging that he had momentarily forgotten that she was still chasing him. The grinder of thick roots was crushed beneath her feet, each of the roots contracting and twisting, as if they were being pressed together by an invisible pair of hands.

Yuri punched out with her right arm, air and space in front of her fist forcibly compressed together. Her punch landed on one of the invisible walls, all the compressed air and space unleashed at once, a booming sound rocking the entire area as a shockwave visible to the naked eyes blew away all the walls around Yao Jun. Despite being hit by such a strong force, the walls remained unharmed, a testament that they were truly created by the Supreme Law of Defense.

Yao Jun himself had already prepared himself the moment he saw Yuri punch out so he avoided being blown away. After blowing away the walls, Yuri turned to Luosho Li, giving her a vicious glare.

"Lusoho, keep your fat greedy hands off him. You can forget about snagging another sparring partner from me, he is mine."

Yao Jun could agree to Yuri's first statement, but the second one caused the corner of his mouth to twitch slightly. Some people might be flattered if someone like Yuri said that they belonged to her, but he already had Guo Luo so he only wished that she would never say something like that again. Luosho Li raised an eyebrow after hearing Yuri's words, speaking up for the first time since Yao Jun arrived here?

"Oh, he's yours? I was planning on letting him leave if he was able to dodge that previous attack, but since you interferred I'll have to launch a new one to test him."

Luosho Li carried a faint smile as she spoke, but the smile only caused a cold sweat to run down Yao Jun's back. Back when they saw each other in the camps, Luosho Li and Yuri Jahad had given each other a casual greeting, causing Yao Jun to guess that they might be acquaintances. But listening to their words and seeing their mannerisms now, it seemed like they were on somewhat bad terms. And worst of all, he had ended up caught between them now.

Luosho Li pointed her double-headed spear at Yao Jun and Yuri, keeping an eye on the tree-type beast with a sideways glance at the same time. Space around Yao Jun and Yuri turned thick and stuffy, to the point where just breathing was starting to become difficult. Yao Jun could just barely see that an invisible bubble had formed around them, rapidly shrinking and pressing down on them. Hair-thin invisible walls surrounded the entire bubble, ready to pierce into it in case the bubble alone was not enough to crush Yao Jun and Yuri.

Even the fiery and fierce Yuri furrowed her brows when she saw the situation, it would be hard to escape while also protecting Yao Jun. She held him in rather high regard, enough to consider him a sparring partner she could enjoy. But being her sparring partner and being able to resist one of Luosho Li's attacks were completely different things.

Even Yuri admitted that she was far from Luosho Li's match if they should actually fight seriously, Luosho Li had taken a defensive law like the Supreme Law of Defense and mastered it in such a way that she had not only superb defensive abilities but also incredible attacking powers.

The orange gauntlets on Yuri's arms vanished, a pair of violet gauntlets engraved with the image of a roaring panther taking their place. She clenched her fist and prepared to do her best to block the attack, but a slight murmur from Yao Jun caught her attention and caused her to temporarily stop her hands.

"Fuck it. Really, just fuck it."

Yao Jun's expression was dark as he looked at Luosho Li, the tree-type beast, and the bubble that was quickly pressing down on him. She had simply started attacking him the moment she saw him, she had barely even glanced at him, not even saying a single word. The tree-type beast was just as bad, immediately attacking him so that it could absorb him to restore the energy it lost in the fight against Luosho Li. He had endured at first because he wanted to keep some more of his trump cards hidden, but now he was left with no choice, nor desire to keep staying low like this.

He raised his right hand, a small black seed quickly appearing above his palm. Leaves quickly started blooming on the seed, first a blue one, then a red one, then a violet one, nine leaves of varying quickly grew on the seed, forming a colorful lotus. This was Yao Jun's currently strongest attack, one that incorporated his everything and would grow stronger as he did. He hadn't bothered to come up with a name for it, he saw no reason to do so, but Little Thunder and the others had chosen a name for it among themselves, Glory of the Demon God.

The lotus, while beautiful, felt quite unassuming, normal to the point of being strange. Yet despite this strangely normal feeling, both Luosho Li's and Yuri's expressions changed slightly, even the tree-type beast pulled back slightly, all of them could detect the faint smell of danger from this lotus. But by the time they sensed the power in the lotus, it was already too late to do anything about it, the lotus had finished blooming.

The lotus floated upwards and then rapidly expanded, exploding the moment it came into contact with the bubble around Yao Jun and Yuri. The bubble cracked and shattered as the explosion grew to engulf everything in the area, the faint outline of a black lotus visible in the air above the forest. Not even the hair-thin walls were able to resist the attack, cracks quickly spreading on them.

The trees and earth in the area completely evaporated, even all sound and light was swallowed by the explosion of the lotus, a pitch black light enveloping the entire area. The entire forest was rocked by the explosion, the unleashed force so great that cracks started to appear on the ground several tens of kilometers away, no one in the forest could miss the explosion and the faint black lotus in the air.

This was an attack Yao Jun had already started working on the moment he discovered that he could fuse the law of darkness with the law of space, creating his law of disintegration, he had already spent over two years working on it and perfecting it.

The center of the lotus was a miniature spatial rift that also contained a bit of the law of disintegration, it would swallow and crush anything that came close to it, spitting out what little remained at a point of Yao Jun's choosing. The colorful leaves were tiny domains Yao Jun created out of his various laws, each leaf constantly creating more of the element and sending it into the spatial rift.

The spatial rift would crush the elements and spit what little remained of them back into the leaves they had come from, the remains would mix in with the newly created elements and then once again head into the spatial rift. This cycle continued indefinitely, each cycle causing the small amount of element that survived the crushing process to grow stronger and stronger, much like a cultivators body grew stronger each time it healed from its wounds.

Once the elements grew to a strength he felt was satisfactory, Yao Jun unleashed them and allowed them to freely expend all their power, all the various elements mixing together to form a truly terrifying attack. There were only three problems Yao Jun still had with this attack, it required a few seconds to charge up before it could be used, it required his full concentration to control the spatial rift and the miniature domains, and it drained a ludicrous amount of energy, far more than just teleporting through space a few times.

It was the definition of a trump card, an attack that he could only use when things were as dire as they could get, because after launching it he would likely be unable to launch a single other attack, even with his currently increased pool of energy.

The black light drowned out all other light and sound, but even so, Luosho Li heard a faint voice drift into her ears, causing her expression to sink slightly in the process.

"Luosho Li, I'll remember this. You better wash your neck and wait for me to come and reap it."

Since she had no problem attacking him for nothing and trying to kill him, Yao Jun saw no need to give her any mercy. The black light slowly receded, Luosho Li's narrowed eyes landing on the spot where Yao Jun and Yuri had been standing. But all that remained were her cracked hair-thin walls, both Yao Jun and Yuri had already fled the area. Her motives were sketchy, but Yuri had helped him block one of Luosho Li's attacks, even moving to protect him further at the end. He had made sure that the attack went around her, warning her to flee the moment the black light swallowed everything. Luosho Li looked at the empty area with narrowed eyes, a chilly expression covering her face as she murmured quietly.

"You dare threaten me?"

She couldn't even remember the last time someone had been foolish enough to threaten her. Most people would be very careful and respectful around her, she had the strength to warrant such treatment. But Yao Jun had already fled far away, so he was unable to hear her cold murmur. But even if he did, he wouldn't have cared in the slightest. Since she was so vicious to him, he would have no problem being the same against her.