Li Yun walked slowly toward Han Juefeng.
One step.
The battle was over, and nobody said a word.
Naturally, wielding treasures at that level of power was not something ordinary Spirit Manifestation Realm cultivators could manage, since only those at the higher levels of that realm could draw out everything such artifacts contained.
Han Juefeng scraped together every last trace of essence qi to resist, and it made no difference at all.
Lei Xuankong’s face darkened.
Lei Xuankong shot up from his seat and roared furiously.
Wei Cangming was the most anxious of all, since he had lent Han Juefeng two treasures, the Myriad Ghostfiend Banner and the Nether Soul Bell, and the worst part was that Han Juefeng had been beaten before he even got a chance to use them. If Li Yun walked away with both, Wei Cangming’s combat ability would drop considerably.
His defense shattered instantly as the sword pressure slammed into him and hurled him clean out of the arena. He crashed hard onto the ground outside, tried to push himself up, failed, and then collapsed completely.
Crimson Slaughter Sword Intent gathered along the blade.
"You borrowed treasures from several top-fifty geniuses. You borrowed Lei Xuankong’s strongest spiritual artifact. You built a plan you thought left me no way out."
"But all of you made the same mistake." He raised his sword slightly. "You planned around the strength you believed I had."
Around him lay the fragments of the Qianyuan Five Thunder Seal, the Purple Heaven Guardian Bell, the Ninefold Scarlet Flame Battle Armor, and the broken flag of the Thousand Waves Spirit Barrier Formation.
"He’s right. Return our treasures at once."
"Connections are a kind of strength too, was it?"
Li Yun turned away from Han Juefeng without a backward glance, and his earlier words still echoed in everyone’s mind. In front of absolute strength, every trick was useless, and Han Juefeng had gone to extraordinary lengths to prove exactly that.
Li Yun swung his sword one final time, and a crimson light flashed across the arena.
Only then did the crowd realize that the treasures Li Yun had destroyed during the fight had been nothing more than their manifested forms, while the actual artifacts had never taken any serious damage.
Once a cultivator reached the Spirit Manifestation Realm, they could use Spirit Manifestation power to project an artifact’s full manifestation into battle, and breaking that projection only weakened the treasure for a time. Unless the artifact itself was struck, it would not truly be destroyed.
The pressure around him surged again, and Han Juefeng’s pupils shrank violently as the truth finally landed. Li Yun had never been forced into revealing his Slaughter Sword Intent, because he had chosen to show it, and even now what everyone had witnessed was only a glimpse.
Li Yun stood alone on the arena with his robes still clean and his breathing still even, his expression barely different from when the fight began.
"How..." His voice shook. "How can the gap be this wide?"
"Li Yun, what do you think you’re doing?"
"Return them?"
"It never crossed your minds..." His gaze turned cold. "...that what you knew was only what I let you see."
"Fifty percent Xiantian Stage Slaughter Sword Intent... against someone of his caliber, giving him more spiritual artifacts to face doesn’t necessarily improve your odds." The elder paused. "Sometimes it just gives him more things to cut apart."
Li Yun stopped in front of him and looked down calmly.
Even so, Li Yun did not leave the arena right away. Instead, he stretched out his hand, and a powerful force erupted from his palm. All seven spiritual artifacts Han Juefeng had brought into the battle, the Qianyuan Five Thunder Seal included, flew straight toward him, and with a wave of his hand he gathered every one of them into his possession.
Another step, and the crimson killing pressure grew heavier still. Han Juefeng instinctively tried to shuffle backward, only to realize he was already lying inside the crater, and for the first time real fear showed in his eyes. Li Yun had not lifted a hand against him, yet he felt as though countless swords were already pressed to his throat.
Wei Cangming and several others stood up as well, their faces thoroughly ugly. Han Juefeng’s defeat was one thing, and although it displeased them, losing the match cost them nothing directly.
"Then it seems all those connections put together still weren’t enough."
Four treasured spiritual artifacts, several top-fifty geniuses pooling their resources, and an elaborate scheme built specifically to bring down one man. In the end, Li Yun had cut straight through all of it.
Boom.
Several people nearby nearly laughed out loud, and Lei Xuankong’s expression grew uglier by the second.
Han Juefeng clenched his fists.
Li Yun’s expression did not change.
Clang.
An elderly sword cultivator studied Li Yun for a long moment before letting out a sigh.
Bai Yuchen’s smile widened.
If Li Yun kept the spiritual artifacts they had lent out, however, the situation changed entirely, because every treasure they had handed over was extremely valuable and losing even one would noticeably weaken them in a fight.
The crimson world around everyone vanished at once, and the terrifying pressure went with it. Only then did many of the geniuses notice that their backs were soaked in cold sweat.
Bai Yuchen stared at the arena and then laughed, letting his gaze drift pointedly toward Lei Xuankong.
Li Yun’s expression remained indifferent as his fifty percent Slaughter Sword Intent quietly spread out around him. Under the overwhelming weight of the domain, all seven spiritual artifacts fell firmly under his control.
He looked over at Lei Xuankong and the others.
Boom!
On the arena, Li Yun slowly sheathed his sword.
"Put down my Qianyuan Five Thunder Seal. That treasure is mine, and you have no right to take it."
Bang!
The Slaughter Sword Intent pressed down, and Han Juefeng’s breathing caught in his throat.
The sword cultivators around him had nothing to say to that.
"I had no idea these artifacts belonged to you." A trace of mockery crept into his voice. "Throughout the battle, some of them was being used by Han Juefeng and dropped by him too when I defeated him. So tell me, what exactly do they have to do with any of you?"

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