The huge, crimson sword wheel barreled through the city, smashing through everything in its way.

The crimson knight-general's face changed.

He could feel the lethality of that attack, even for him.

What had the kid done?

The crimson knight-general did not dare disrespect the attack. Opening his mouth, he pulled out a rose-silver stopwatch from within himself. With each chime of the piece, a ruby sonic wave pulsed out.

The rose-silver stopwatch had runes on it that absorbed worldly natural energy, causing it to pulse even more strongly.

There was also a golden eye mark on the back of the piece, marking it as a gold-eye treasured artifact.

The rose-silver stopwatch rose in the air to meet the crimson sword wheel from Li Luo.

SWOOSH!

The collision shook the entire city. Dusty walls brittle with neglect crashed down into dust, raising a cloud all across the city that hung like fog.

The aftershocks were awesome and terrible to behold.

Li Luo was duly impressed by himself. When would he have such power for real, he wondered. At the same time, he was closely watching the clash of attacks.

The crimson sword wheel spun at great speed, producing a fearsome cutting power that the rose-silver stopwatch did its best to defend against.

Li Luo could sense that the defenses of the rose-silver stopwatch were failing. The cycle of swords had no end, and the slashes were relentless. The stopwatch would soon fail.

"What a powerful Kingmark!"

With the Three-tailed Heavenly Wolf's power alone, he would only have been level with the crimson knight-general, barring his acquisition of the Heavenly Libation Chant's second half that would unlock the full power of a Greater Heavenly Resonance cultivator.

But he was winning this battle hands down all because of the Kingmark that was inscribed on the Golden-Jade Onyx-Elephant Blade.

The additional layer of golden power that had turned his crimson sword wheel from good to epic.

Clang, clang, clang!

The urgent smashing of knives against the rose-silver stopwatch continued, and a satisfying crack rang out a moment later.

The crimson knight-general paled. His eyes widened and then narrowed in realization.

He had spotted the golden aura around the attack.

"That's... King qi?!" he screamed shrilly in disbelief.

King qi was, as the name implied, produced by Kings. “How could a mere Resonant Master have such power?! Is this kid the progeny of a King or something?! No wonder he is so strong!”

𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

The crimson knight-general turned to flee now. This was no place for him to linger. He had thought about killing off all of the students after creating his true form, but now it seemed like the last part of his plan had gone awry. There was a big, bad wolf hiding among the students!

"I just need to get out. Now that I have my true form, I just need to return to Thunderpeal Mountain and devour the Thunderpeal Tree, and I might well make it to Duke in the future!"

The temptation of reaching the Duke Stage in the future incentivized him to let the Red Clay Province go. Now that all the schools had their attention on it, it was time for him to flee anyway.

Li Luo was taken aback by the crimson knight-general's choice to flee, and he inhaled sharply, his killing intent still rising within him.

He had paid such a heavy price to activate the power of the Three-tailed Heavenly Wolf and even the Kingmark on his weapon. If his foe got away, wouldn’t that be a loss?

Li Luo's face was already badly ravaged by the corruptive power of the Three-tailed Heavenly Wolf, but he continued to dig deep and take more power, sacrificing the flesh of two fingers so that they became nothing but white bone.

Beads of cold sweat dripped down his forehead from the exertion.

Swoosh!

Forcing more power into the attack, it finally broke through the rose-silver stopwatch, which fell from the air.

Li Luo reached out to pluck it from its fall, then he stuffed it into his pocket sphere.

Hey, a gold-eye treasured artifact was quite valuable. The young lord of House Luolan had to watch his finances properly.

With the blocking artifact out of the way, Li Luo's attack continued on its forward path, and it caught up to the crimson knight-general in a trice.

The crimson knight-general swore. If he had known such a danger awaited him, he would have escaped after merging with the Bloodtailed Other.

Still, no point in crying over spilled milk.

He knew what he had to do. He reached down into his chest and pulled the face right off his flesh.

The demonic face struggled and screamed in pain.

He hurled the Bloodtailed Other's essence out behind him with a vengeance. All these years of plotting to merge with it, and now he had to sacrifice it.

The demonic face was thrown directly into the path of the sword wheel.

“EEEK!”

The painful screams of the Bloodtailed Other, now reduced to a passive face, rang out loudly and miserably as it was cut to pieces by Li Luo's attack, although the attack was stopped as well.

Finally, the attack had been defended against, although the price had been almost too high to bear for the crimson knight-general.

He could not care about it at this time. Removing the Bloodtailed Other from his body had scrambled his own internal flow of power, and the remaining vestiges of corruption were wreaking havoc within him.

He had to flee.

He cursed Li Luo all the while. He would remember him well. After he left the Red Clay Province, he would report this up and get more information on the kid. The little bastard would pay in the future!

Li Luo would have loved to finish off the crimson knight-general and tie things up, but he was already losing control of his body. If not for the Thunderpeal Avatar, he would have already been reduced to a skeleton.

He could also feel that the wolf's power was overtaking him, and the animalistic instinct was starting to rule his body.

He wanted to kill. Had to kill.

His eyes turned red.

He tried to close them. He could pay no more attention to the crimson knight-general.

As his eyelids drooped down over the crimson knight-general, he saw a brilliant flash of light in the air. Nails of light and fire, blazing down to smash into the crimson knight-general. BOOM!

A howl of misery from the enemy.

"Demonbane Nails... Qing'e's recovered!"

Li Luo relaxed and let himself fall.

He did not land. Inches from the ground, he was caught in a tender and fragrant embrace.

"Don't... don't touch me."

Through the remnants of his blurred vision, he knew who had come for him. He was afraid that he would hurt her in his madness, and reached out weakly to push her away from him.

The person did not leave, and he saw a blurry face lean over his own.

A cool sensation near his lips.

And then a wondrous burst of energy flooded into his mouth and then the rest of his body.