Although more than two third of his power was gone with this move, Su Ming was satisfied with himself.
On the ridge, Lin Fan's arrogant smile froze. Panic seized his heart. Su Ming hadn't even struggled. Desperate, Lin Fan tried to channel more power from the Crimson Sword into the formation to attack Su Ming.
But he pushed too hard. The conflicting energies of the Death Formation and the dragon blood essence violently rebounded. A massive shockwave of grey qi exploded from the ridge, striking Lin Fan squarely in the chest. He coughed up a mouthful of black blood and was thrown backward, crashing heavily into a dead tree.
Ignoring the dying cries of the wolf, Su Ming walked calmly near to the formation, stopping before the pulsing Death Seed.
His Essence Sight flared, warning him immediately.
'If I use the Crimson Flame Mantra to destroy it, the heat and life energy will simply feed the death seed.'
Su Ming raised his left hand. Instead of his signature crimson fire, he activated the Nether Flame Art, the technique he had recently comprehended from the Nether Ember Pearl. A deep, violet-black flame bloomed from his fingertips. It gave off no warmth, pulsing with the pure essence of Yin and Death.
With surgical precision, Su Ming swept the violet-black flame over the formation. The Nether Flame seamlessly resonated with the Death Seed, allowing Su Ming to sever its connection to the natural death formation without triggering a violent reaction.
He swiftly sealed the pristine crystal into a specialized jade box and placed it in his storage ring.
Instantly, the oppressive, sluggish atmosphere of the Withered Valley began to lift. The grey fog thinned, and a faint trickle of natural spiritual energy began to return to the basin.
'Mission Accomplished', Su Ming thought, turning away from the altar.
But as he turned, a terrifying surge of energy erupted from the ridge.
Lin Fan, bleeding and maddened by the backlash, had gripped the Crimson Blood Sword with both hands. The rich dragon blood essence within the red crystal, sensing his desperate need, violently surged into his meridians. The sheer density of the ancient dragon blood forcibly elevated his Foundation Establishment cultivation, pushing his aura higher and higher until it temporarily shattered the boundaries of a major realm, touching the pinnacle of the Core Formation stage.
At this moment, even with the cultivation of a Foundation Realm cultivator, Lin Fan's raw strength was on par with a Core Formation realm expert.
His eyes glowing with blood-red madness, Lin Fan launched himself from the ridge, his sword tearing through the air, aimed directly at Su Ming's back.
Nine Desolation Sword Technique : Desolate Earth Slash
As Lin Fan soared through the air, his blade descended in a brutal, horizontal arc.
Su Ming did not retreat. He quickly drew his mystic rank sword from its scabbard, bringing it up in a flawless, structural parry to meet the strike.
CLANG!
The impact rang out like a giant bell. The cracked ground beneath Su Ming's feet spider-webbed outward from the sheer force of the blow.
The power behind Lin Fan's attack was incredibly heavy; his raw physical strength was almost equal to Su Ming's level.
Su Ming, without hesitation, activated his Essence Sight. This was already pushing his Qi to the limit, as he had not fully recovered from the previous fight.
Even more concerning was the aura bleeding from Lin Fan's blade. Through his Essence Sight, Su Ming saw a terrifying, unstable mixture of the Crimson Blood Sword's vibrant red essence grinding against the residual, necrotic black death qi from the formation. The two opposing energies were clashing violently, creating a highly destructive force.
"Die!" Lin Fan roared, completely abandoning defense as he launched into a relentless assault. He rained down heavy, sweeping slashes, each one carrying the decaying weight of the Desolate Earth.
Su Ming did not lose his focus.
'I've already depleted more than two-thirds of my qi dealing with the wolf,' Su Ming calculated, his eyes tracking the frantic blur of Lin Fan's blade. A flashy, overpowering counterattack would drain the rest, which was an unacceptable risk right now.
'This is better anyway,' Su Ming thought, seamlessly shifting his footing.
'I need a practice partner anyway.'
Instead of meeting force with force, Su Ming executed the Cloud Chasing Sword Technique. His movements became light, fluid, and utterly unpredictable.
As Lin Fan's heavy, corrosive strikes crashed down, Su Ming simply wasn't there. He glided along the edges of the attacks, his plain mystic grade sword gently tapping the flat of Lin Fan's blade to redirect the terrifying momentum into the dirt.
Flickering his Essence Sight on and off for brief, calculated half-seconds to minimize the strain on him, Su Ming coldly analyzed the flow of Lin Fan's chaotic energy.
In those momentary flashes of his vision, he stripped away the terrifying aura of Lin Fan's powerful sword technique and saw the exact structural weaknesses in its execution.
As the frantic exchange continued, a quiet realization settled into Su Ming's mind. The Cloud Chasing Sword Technique was officially graded as a Mystic Grade art.
In the grand scheme of the cultivation world, it was relatively weak. But having mastered the near-impossible Tenth Perfection, the technique's nature had changed.
In his hands, it was no longer an ordinary technique.
His parries were absolute, his footwork devoid of wasted energy. Even against an ancient saint-level technique executed by an amateur like Lin Fan, Su Ming's flawless execution rendered the raw power gap irrelevant.
"Stop dodging!" Lin Fan screamed, his frustration boiling over as his corrosive strikes repeatedly hit empty air. His eyes, completely bloodshot, flared with madness. He shifted his stance violently, altering the flow of his qi.
"Nine Desolation Sword Technique: Evaporated Sea."
Lin Fan unleashed the second move of his technique. A massive, sweeping arc of highly corrosive qi erupted from his blade, acting like a tidal wave of acid designed to dry up rivers and boil seas. It covered a massive area, completely sealing off Su Ming's escape routes.
Su Ming did not dodge.
"There it is," Su Ming noted. He had been biding his time, waiting for Lin Fan's berserk mentality to make an error.
Channeling the last reserves of his core, Su Ming stepped directly in front of the corrosive wave and executed the ultimate move of his perfected technique.
Ascending Serpent Surge
A massive serpent of pure crimson sword qi erupted from his blade. As it crashed into the corrosive wave, the serpent, against the violent wave of Lin Fan's Saint Grade sword technique, evolved, transforming into a soaring, golden-crimson dragon.
The dragon manifestation shattered the Evaporated Sea like glass, roaring as it slammed directly into Lin Fan's chest.
"Gah—!"
Lin Fan's ribcage cracked audibly as he was sent flying backward, the stolen Crimson Blood Sword knocked from his grasp. He rolled across the dirt, crashing into the base of the stone altar.
For a moment, the valley was silent.
Then, with the terrifying resilience of a cornered beast, Lin Fan twitched. Coughing up thick, black blood, he pushed himself up, his eyes entirely consumed by madness as he reached blindly for his fallen sword.
Then, something clicked within his mind. He had an epiphany. The complex pages of the *Nine Desolation Sword Technique* were not meant to be fully comprehended by him yet.
It was too advanced. It was too complex.
But in that moment of absolute desperation, he understood the fundamental flaws in his execution. The essence of the technique was already within him; he had just now realized how to channel it.
The violent realization triggered a chain reaction. He forcibly broke through the limitations of his cultivation realm, reaching the Core Formation stage in an instant as his cultivation base skyrocketed.
Driven by the lingering death qi and the dragon orb, the momentum did not stop until he stabilized at the absolute peak of the Core Formation stage.
All of this happened within a few blinks of an eye. As he regained his composure, brimming with newfound, explosive power, he prepared to rise.
But he didn't even make it to his knees.
All he saw in front of him was the silhouette of a burning palm, and then everything went black.
***
Just a moment ago, while Lin Fan was undergoing his sudden breakthrough, Su Ming had used that exact window to recover his footing and prepare for the final blow. Though he was confident in his Cloud Chasing Sword Technique, he realized he had to keep the boy alive to complete his plan. Thus, he resorted to another method.
Refusing to waste any more qi on sword manifestations, Su Ming channeled his remaining Qi into his right hand and executed the Burning Palm, a highly efficient, Mortal-grade close-quarters technique he had picked up from the sect library.
His palm struck Lin Fan directly on the face. A burst of intense, concussive heat flooded Lin Fan's brain, instantly knocking him out of consciousness.
Lin Fan's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed into the dirt, completely incapacitated.