I Couldn't Give a Single Damn About You

The sword light sliced with deadly precision along the thick joints of the Golden Lion's four limbs!

Empowered by Xiao Bai's stat bonuses and stacked buffs, the lion's scale armor—supposedly impenetrable to blade or spear—was torn apart like wet paper, instantly leaving deep, bone-exposing bloody gashes!

“Roar!!!”

The Golden Lion let out a painful, agonized wail.

Whispers erupted among the audience below once more. Clearly, many disciples were seeing this style of fighting for the very first time, their mouths wide open in shock.

One must understand that while a demon beast with a Tier Four bloodline was only one grade higher than a Tier Three bloodline, its strength was more than double.

Besides awakening innate divine talents, Tier Four demon beasts possessed far stronger souls. The difficulty of forming a contract with one skyrocketed, so typically only Foundation Establishment cultivators could endure it.

Thus, even if some Qi Condensation disciples of Beast-Taming Peak managed to contract a Tier Two demon beast early on, they wouldn't dare claim invincibility among their peers.

Because in the eyes of true geniuses, contracting low-tier bloodline beasts was nothing extraordinary.

Hiding far off, Gao Jinli watched the scene unfold, his face instantly souring as if he had swallowed ten dead flies raw!

This brutal yet eerily familiar scene...

Wasn't this a bloody carbon copy of his beloved Bolt-Striking Tiger being bled to death alive?!

Gao Jinli made a split-second decision and roared with bloodshot eyes:

“Golden Lion!! Forget about defense!! Use Golden Flash directly!!”

Hearing this extremely chunibyo-style move name, Jiang Ye almost broke character.

Damn, he couldn't tell before, but this guy was a total character with plenty of antics up his sleeve.

The heavily wounded Golden Lion's massive body suddenly stiffened.

A look of fierce struggle flashed in its eyes.

However, suppressed by the low-grade treasure tool...

...it ultimately let out a roar of unwilling frustration.

“Boom—!!”

The purple-gold flames enveloping the Golden Lion compressed violently!

Its entire body seemed to transform into a blinding purple-gold fireball in an instant, hurtling toward Jiang Ye with terrifying power!

However...

Under the gazes of several thousand onlookers...

Jiang Ye stood calmly in place. Right as the purple-gold fireball was about to touch him...

Perfect Dodge resurfaced once again!

He executed a side-step dodge, turned his back to the Golden Lion, and finished by flipping his hair in a cool flourish.

Missing its target, the purple-gold fireball abruptly doubled back and charged fiercely once more!

He casually back-stepped out of the way again, skillfully flipping his hair to look cool!

The purple-gold fireball turned back for a third frantic impact!

Back-step, hair flip, pose!

...

Fifth impact!

Back-step, hair flip, pose!

In that single instant, the entire arena...

...fell completely silent.

Several thousand disciples stood frozen as if struck by a paralyzing spell.

Aside from the rustling sounds of toes cringing inside shoes, not a single sound could be heard.

This "five-hit combo" dealt a massive shockwave of trauma to the innocent minds of these several thousand immortal cultivation natives!

Even the disciples who had previously witnessed this move at Sword Peak couldn't hold back their disbelief.

Meanwhile...

High above...

The four sect big shots, who had originally watched with relaxed expressions and a spectator mindset...

...all wore grave expressions—except for Nangong Yue—and could not hide their utter shock!

Because...

...with their Nascent Soul vision and divine sense...

...even they failed to understand the strange, five-consecutive sideways shifting movement Bai Zhirou had just pulled off!!

The three exchanged looks and instinctively turned to Nangong Yue. Their fingers rapidly moved as they attempted to calculate karmic cause and effect. Having reached the Nascent Soul realm, they possessed a subtle sensitivity to heavenly secrets and could deduce karma to a certain degree.

Yet, even after rubbing their fingertips so fast sparks almost flew, they couldn't deduce a single trace of karma. With their cultivation levels, such a failure was mathematically impossible when calculating a junior in the Qi Condensation stage.

There were only two possibilities: either a master of supreme power had shielded her heavenly secrets, or she carried a high-grade treasure capable of obscuring karmic ties.

Even Sun Qiming, the usually taciturn Peak Master of Dao Mystic Peak, couldn't help asking:

“Nangong Yue.”

“That Bai Zhirou... could she really be related to you??”

Sect Master Song Changfeng, Sun Qiming, and Wei Zhaoyuan turned their gazes back to Nangong Yue, who was dressed in green robes.

However, Nangong Yue merely sneered from behind her veil.

She didn't even bother to respond.

...

Down on the arena stage, the battle continued.

After launching five consecutive charges, the Golden Lion's huge body suddenly faltered, entering a brief state of exhaustion.

Jiang Ye's eyes lit up instantly.

Great opportunity!

Like a ghost, he closed the distance in a flash.

Flashing blade lights sliced across the Golden Lion's weakest spot—its belly—carving neat, cross-hatched cuts with practiced skill.

Though the Golden Lion tried its best to dodge, a massive gash was opened across its underbelly, the wound scorched black by lightning and fire.

“Roar—!!”

In excruciating pain, the Golden Lion's eyes turned completely blood-red.

The bloodthirsty brutality rooted in its demon beast nature could no longer be contained!

Rumbles echoed from its chest like thunderous drums, its entire torso swelling rapidly at a visible pace.

“No! Golden Lion! Stop right now!!”

Hiding in the rear, Gao Jinli turned pale as a sheet and screamed in panic.

However, the completely enraged Golden Lion paid him no mind whatsoever.

Drenched in cold sweat, Gao Jinli raised his treasure tool beast-taming ring high, desperately pouring spiritual energy into it like free water to suppress his pet's suicidal rampage.

Tiny cracks suddenly webbed across the low-grade treasure tool beast-taming ring.

Gao Jinli's eyes nearly popped out of his head, his hand trembling uncontrollably as he held the artifact.

The spectating disciples below were thoroughly baffled.

“What's going on? Why is he trying to stop his own demon beast from using its ultimate move?”

“Nonsense, it's obvious the beast is going wild and backlash is imminent!”

Before the words even faded...

...in the center of the arena, the Golden Lion, whose chest had expanded to its limit, suddenly threw back its head and opened its massive, bloody maw.

It unleashed an earth-shattering roar toward the sky!

The Golden Lion's Tier Four bloodline innate divine talent—【Golden Lion Roar】!

Visible golden soundwaves erupted outward like a tsunami, expanding wildly in all directions with the lion at the center.

Everywhere the waves passed, the air distorted, and the hard bluestone ground cracked inch by inch.

Facing this screen-wide AOE attack...

...Jiang Ye had already secretly activated the 【Jasper Mind-Clearing Hairpin】 given by Qi Linger back when the lion's chest started rumbling.

The instant the soundwaves made contact, the hairpin lit up with a soft green ripple shield, blocking the vast majority of the sonic barrage outside.

The remaining fraction of the attack still hit Jiang Ye, directly striking his spirit. He felt a splitting headache, while inside his mind, Bai Zhirou let out a gasp of pain as well.

Evidently, the two of them had shared the burden of the soul attack.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the arena, a comical scene unfolded.

As the demon beast's master, Gao Jinli was currently facing the sonic attack and looked even more panicked than Jiang Ye.

He frantically whipped out a round defensive magic tool, clumsily deploying a barrier.

The sonic wave slammed heavily into it, shattering the barrier in an instant.

Gao Jinli spat out a massive mouthful of blood.

He had actually been attacked by his own battle pet. Combined with the backlash from the beast-taming ring, he was severely injured and sank to one knee.

Shielded behind the barrier, Jiang Ye nursed his splitting headache as his expression gradually grew menacing:

“Alright, alright, alright. Playing like this, are we?”

“Then it's my turn now.”

The instant the Lion Roar's soundwaves ceased...

...Jiang Ye pushed his movement technique to the absolute limit. Taking advantage of the beast being locked in end-lag after throwing out its ultimate, he charged straight up to its face and unleashed a smooth combo of basic attacks.

The Golden Lion howled in pain and slashed out furiously with a claw.

Jiang Ye dodged with a roll.

Right as he got back up, a prominent red crosshair marker suddenly flared above the Golden Lion's massive head!

The execute threshold had been reached.

The corners of Jiang Ye's lips curled up into a grin!

“Sigh... Stop. You win.”

High above, Wei Zhaoyuan's aged, majestic voice suddenly rang out.

Jiang Ye chose to completely ignore him.

Instead of stopping, his pace accelerated by another notch!

“You insolent fool! How dare you!”

Wei Zhaoyuan roared in fury.

A massive palm of spiritual energy that blotted out the sky crashed downward, clearly aiming to forcefully protect the Tier Four bloodline Golden Lion.

“Hmph.”

A cold, clear snort echoed.

An almost transparent blade beam drifted past like a gentle breeze.

The giant Nascent Soul palm—capable of shattering mountains—vanished into thin air in an eerie fashion without making a sound.

“Nangong Yue!!!”

Wei Zhaoyuan's roar resounded, making the sky tremble. The disciples were utterly horrified—this was a true display of powerless rage.