Yao Jun's step froze, his brows stealthily furrowing when he heard Yuri's telling him to stay behind. He cast a glance at Jesob and the two others but all he got from them were slightly apologetic stares before they each gave him a short nod to wish him luck, quickly leaving the area. They had only sworn an oath to not betray or attack each other, there was nothing about helping each other face against freakishly strong people like Yuri Jahad.
Yao Jun looked at the three of them leave but didn't call out to them, they had no need to stand with him now. If their situations were reversed, he would likely have left them too. His mind quickly started racing, trying to come up with the best possible way to deal with the current situation. After a split second, he turned around and tilted his head slightly at Yuri, speaking in the most polite voice he could muster.
"I'm sorry, Miss Jahad, but I don't think I understand what you mean. I'm afraid my cultivation and strength are far too normal to create any fun for you."
Everyone who had the strength to enter the top 10 had already reached the very peak of the early stage of the Earthly Deity realm, with the strength to fight people above their own level. Someone like Yao Jun, who only had cultivation at the middle stage of the Immortal Rebirth realm, should not be able to even stand a single punch from a person like Yuri Jahad. After throwing out his flimsy excuse, Yao Jun continued to do his best to avoid any confrontation.
"With that said, Miss Jahad, I'll bid you fare..."
Before Yao Jun got to finish his sentence, he saw a black blur flash in front of his eyes. Practically before he had seen her make the slightest of movements, Yuri had arrived in front of him. There was now a pair of golden brass knuckles adorning both her hands, a blurry punch that caused space around it to distort heading directly for Yao Jun's face.
He reacted on instinct and quickly leaned back as far as he could, the punch just barely going over his head as he did a backflip from a standing position. His left leg was raised slightly higher than his right, the tip of his foot smashing into the bottom of Yuri's chin and unleashing a wild torrent of fire, lightning, and wind that formed a flaming blue pillar surrounded by azure lightning that engulfed her head and stretched into the sky. The moment his left foot made contact with her chin and unleashed his attack, he planted his right foot on her chest and kicked off of it to launch himself backward and put some distance between them, completing his backflip and landing in a crouched position.
His gaze landed on Yuri, his expression sinking as he cursed his own terrible luck. He didn't want to cause too much of a scene just yet, but with Yuri Jahad attacking him, there was nothing he could do. The fire and lightning around Yuri's head were suddenly compressed into a tiny orb, which she then stretched her left arm out towards and grabbed onto, crushing the orb in her palm. She used her right hand to lightly rub her chin, her lips cracking open into a grin as she looked at Yao Jun.
"You still wanna say that your strength is normal? I may not be the smartest one around, but I'm never wrong about fun people."
Yuri Jahad's eyes were practically blazing as she looked at Yao Jun, her grin growing wider and wider. There were few things Yuri Jahad loved more than battling other people and finding strong opponents, this was why she had received the title Fourth Queen of Violence. Yao Jun's expression was still a bit dark, the corners of his mouth twitching slightly when he saw the grin on Yuri's face.
"You're fucking mad. What a shitty way to test your own hypothesis."
There were only two outcomes to her test, either Yao Jun was strong and dodged her attack, or he was weak and was killed with a single punch. The four people who had been following Yuri originally shook their heads when they saw that Yuri attacked Yao Jun, but their expressions turned into ones of curiosity when they saw that Yao Jun actually managed to dodge and even counterattack. Yuri didn't say anything against Yao Jun's statement, cracking her fists while laughing.
"Ey, as long as it works. And that's quite the shift in personality, you were so polite just a few seconds ago. Then again, I prefer more direct people like you."
Right after she finished her sentence, Yuri's entire body vanished once more, appearing directly in front of Yao Jun again. Her brass knuckles had turned into a pair of black gloves, both her arms swinging out as she moved to clap her hands. Yao Jun felt a crushing pressure squeeze at him from all sides the moment Yuri moved her hands, the pressure growing stronger and stronger the closer she got to finishing the clap.
A black light flashed in Yao Jun's right palm, his sword appearing in his grasp and his black robe appearing on his body, all five channels he had carved for the Crumbling The Nine Heavens technique immediately opening. Holding back against someone like Yuri Jahad was the same as asking to be killed, he couldn't hold back no matter how much he wanted to.
He channeled his Monarch Essence, the body equivalent of Qi, into his left arm, stretching it out and grabbing a hold of Yuri's left wrist, a crushing pain spreading through his entire left arm as his bones felt like they were on the verge of shattering. He grabbed onto her wrist, but she was so strong that he wasn't able to stop her arm from moving, he could only slow her. But right now, slowing her for just a bit was enough for him.
He stabbed out with his sword, gathering all his energy in the tip and giving the sword a slight spin to increase the force behind it. The sword was aimed directly at Yuri's chest, it would pierce her heart if it were to connect. Yuri glanced at the incoming sword, forcibly altering the direction of her right arm and placing her palm in front of the tip of the sword, the crushing sensation on Yao Jun's left arm quickly growing stronger.
Yao Jun ignored the pain in his left arm for the moment, the tip of his sword making contact with Yuri's palm. He felt like his sword had hit an immovable piece of iron, his right hand aching slightly from the reverberations of the impact. All the energy he had gathered in the tip of his sword was unleashed, a thunderous booming sound rocking the forest as a pillar of black light soared into the sky, all of Yao Jun's laws unleashing at once and gathering together to form the pillar of black light.
Yao Jun could feel Yuri's body move backward, so he quickly released the grip he had on her left wrist, allowing her body to be sent flying backward. He cast a quick glance at his left hand and saw that three of his fingers had shattered, all three of them looking like they had been caught in a vice that crushed them together. He ignored his fingers for now, launching another attack at Yuri.
Stolen novel; please report.
His sword dissolved into the surrounding air, merging into his laws and spreading through the area, just like it had done when he used it back on his own home planet. He didn't want to do this during the competition, just in case someone saw it and warned Peyton about it, but what other choice did he have right here?
He stretched out his right arm, locking onto Yuri by merging his mind into the surrounding space. With his sense fully locked onto her, he stretched out his finger, pointing at her as he unleashed his attack. His sword appeared right behind the flying Yuri, stabbing at her and unleashing a thick pillar of blue flames that engulfed her. His sword merged into the pillar of fire and started to rapidly stab at her, each stab unleashing a new element to add onto the pillar, quickly forming an iron maiden out of various elements as well as his sword.
It cost a large amount of Qi to attack like this, but thanks to having acquired Monarch Essence to aid him, it had become quite a bit easier to unleash attacks like this freely. Yao Jun mostly only fought people above his own cultivation level so one of his greatest weaknesses had always been that he didn't have as much energy as them, he simply couldn't keep battling as long as them. Having acquired Monarch Essence, one of his greatest weaknesses had been patched up somewhat.
Before long, the now multicolored pillar had grown five kilometers thick and several tens of kilometers tall, visible from everywhere in the forest. Yao Jun clenched his outstretched hand, the entire pillar immediately shrinking and compressing into a small orb around Yuri, the various elements turning wild as they clashed against each other. The orb exploded with a thunderous roar that once again shook the entire forest, the earth around the orb disintegrating and forming a large crater. The people following Yuri had already retreated the moment Yuri launched her second attack, so they managed to avoid getting caught up in the attack.
Yao Jun looked at the center of the crater, his expression still as dark as it was at the start of the battle. Unleashing that many strong attacks in a row had drained him quite a bit, even his appearance changing technique had dissipated, revealing his normal appearance. The reason his expression was still dark was because he could see Yuri standing at the center of the crater.
Her robe was tattered and torn, several smaller cuts covering her body and causing blood to stain her body. But Yao Jun could tell that none of these wounds were even close to fatal, they were mostly superficial ones that left practically no damage. His expression couldn't help but turn somewhat bitter, so this was the strength of an Earthly Deity holding a fragment of a Supreme Law fragment.
With Yuri being this resilient, Yao Jun didn't have too many other options. He had one finished attack that might be able to harm her, as well as one unfinished attack that he was still developing, neither were things he wished to unleash before killing Peyton. Despite being covered in blood, Yuri's mouth formed a wide grin, her eyes blazing with joy and excitement as she looked at Yao Jun, her loud and excited laughter ringing out.
"Hahaha, I fucking knew it! I knew you would be fun, I could feel it the moment I saw you and felt that chill run up my spine. I am Yuri Jahad, the Fourth Queen of Violence and the one who holds the fourth fragment of the Supreme Law of Attack, the one carrying all the crushing power. Go on, gimme your name and title, I really look forward to continuing having fun with you!"
Yao Jun's thought drifted away for a split second after hearing Yuri's words, curious about what she meant when she said that her Supreme Law fragment was the one carrying all the crushing power. His guess was that the Supreme Law of Attack was, in fact, the name of Yun Yantian's Sword God's Gate, so it shouldn't have any crushing power to begin with. But he quickly shook his head, focusing on what was in front of him. He looked at the excited Yuri, quickly making up his mind.
"Fuck this."
Space around Yao Jun rippled shortly before he vanished from the area, fleeing away as far as he could. Doing something like this here was rather risky, it could alert others, like the Nine-Tailed Fox or Luosho Li, to his position as well as the fact that he had the law of space. This was why he hadn't just used his law of space to flee the moment Yuri called out to him, but now he was left with little other choice. He could unleash his last attacks, but he would prefer to keep at least some of his cards and strength hidden until he killed Peyton.
Yuri's eyebrows furrowed when she saw Yao Jun choose to flee, but her eyes grew brighter when she learned that he could use the law of space. He had brought out so many different powerful laws that Yuri almost felt her eyes spin, and now he had even unleashed a supreme law like the law of space. He also had strong instincts and was clearly skilled in battle, he was the perfect sparring partner, he could likely provide her with endless amounts of fun. Her grin grew so wide it looked like her face would split apart, her sharp canine teeth dripping with a bit of blood as she chased after Yao Jun.
"Don't think that I'll just let you get away from me that easily! You're coming with me!"
Every time Yao Jun moved through space, he would inevitably leak out a bit of his Qi, allowing Yuri to easily track him as he fled, chasing after him at full speed. She tore through all obstacles in her path, tossing trees aside and punching her way directly through the larger hills, she was like an unstoppable bull. Yao Jun cast a few glances behind him and continued to flee, switching from his law of space to his law of lightning once there was a sizeable distance between them, conserving as much of his energy as he could while simultaneously popping pills to hasten the speed of his Qi recovery.
Neither of them were quiet, it was already too late for something like that, so they attracted a great deal of attention as they ran, one fleeing and one chasing. Upon seeing that it was Yuri Jahad that was chasing someone, the others could only offer a silent prayer to the one who had been so unlucky as to somehow anger her so much that she would chase them.
Yao Jun continued to flee for several hours, occasionally switching back to his law of space whenever Yuri managed to close the distance between them. But even after an entire day passed, Yuri showed no signs of slowing down, on the contrary, she seemed to grow more intent on catching him the longer he fled. But how could he know just how much of a battle maniac Yuri Jahad was? Seeing that he was able to continue fleeing and eluding her like that, Yuri only got more and more certain that she had to catch him and bring him along as a sparring partner.
After another day passed, the chase having gone on for an entire two days already, Yao Jun noticed a slight distortion in space a few kilometers to his side. The distortion was very faint, but there was no doubt that it was there. Someone had created a barrier there in an attempt to hide that part of the forest. Yao Jun cast his eyes over his shoulder, a tree flying through the air telling him that Yuri was still hot on his trail.
He turned his head back to the distortion in space, switching direction and heading directly for it. Since Yuri was so intent on following him no matter where he ran, he might as well bring her over there and hope that the Nine-Tailed Fox or something else strong was hiding over there, anything to distract her. Yao Jun sped towards the distortion, using his own law of space to tear it open and crush the barrier the moment he touched it. But the moment he entered the area beyond the barrier, his expression grew even more bitter than it had been when he first saw Yuri chase him.
"You have to be fucking kidding me, I refuse to believe that my luck is this terrible."
Standing a short distance in front of him was a massive tree surrounded by thick and thorny vines, nine round eyes and a jagged mouth visible on the front of the tree. The tree unleashed an aura Yao Jun was very familiar with, the aura of a Divine Beast, one that had reached the middle stage of the Earthly Deity realm. But this Divine Beast aura was mixed with something else, it felt somewhat stronger than a normal Divine Beast.
But right now, Yao Jun's eyes were locked onto the person standing in front of the tree, holding a spear that had a spear tip on both ends. Waist long hair as golden as the sun, eyes as blue as the sky, and a curvaceous body that radiated pride and power. He had only tried to flee from Yuri Jahad, but in doing so he had ran directly to Luosho Li, such luck could only be considered calamitous.