“DIE!” Gu Yang roared and stamped on the ground. The entire land shook as he charged at Long Chen.

His power was so great that people could see shockwaves flying off him as he passed by. That was a sign that his power had reached a definite pinnacle.

Long Chen took a deep breath. Gu Yang’s power had already surpassed his expectations. He couldn’t afford to hold back any longer.

Space buzzed as his huge divine ring appeared behind him. A terrifying wave of qi soared into the air.

The divine ring’s appearance was causing constant shocks within the air. Space had already become unstable.

Almost everyone present had already seen Long Chen summon his divine ring before. But this time, his divine ring was even more powerful and terrifying than before.

A heaven-shaking roar came from Long Chen as his bone blade slashed down on Gu Yang.

When Long Chen’s bone blade and Gu Yang’s fist collided, an immense explosion rang out. A terrifying wave of power split the ground, sending the earth rolling out.

“Not good!” Everyone hastily raised their defenses. Those who were closer hadn’t even had the time to circulate their qi to protect themselves and were sent flying by that wave.

Hundreds of people began to cough up blood as they were sent flying, their eyes filled with horror.

Just the aftershocks of their battle were able to cause such injuries to them. If they were actually fighting against them, they would have definitely died. It was too terrifying.

Broken fragments of stone shot through the air. The ground surged as if it had turned liquid and a wave was rolling through it, only fading once it was far off into the distance.

BOOM BOOM BOOM!

The crowd was no longer even able to see the two of them. They could only see the ground being blown into the air and shooting rocks. Intense collisions continuously rang out, the ground shaking along with it.

“How terrifying!” Even Song Mingyuan and the others had paused by now. That was because now their battles were all meaningless. The ending was already set in stone.

No matter how strong Gu Yang was, there was no way he could defeat Long Chen, Tang Wan-er, and Ye Zhiqiu if they fought together. Now that Long Chen was fighting Gu Yang on his own, that meant this Faction Competition had already lost all its meaning.

Right now, Long Chen wasn’t fighting for victory, but revenge.

Everyone retreated to watch from a distance. From there, they could only vaguely see two figures constantly attacking the other. That was an absolutely fierce battle.

The disciples from the Heaven Earth Faction watched on excitedly. They all knew that now that Long Chen had returned, the Heaven Earth Faction would definitely soar to the peak. No one would be able to stop them.

There were already two experts who had awakened their ancestral marks in their alliance. Now that Long Chen, a genius that had already surpassed the monster-level classification was back, it would be impossible for them to not soar.

BOOM!

Finally with another intense collision, one person was sent flying back dozens of meters before stabilizing.

“It’s Gu Yang!”

“He was forced back!”

People let out startled cries as they saw that as soon as Gu Yang was forced back, Long Chen had already charged over with his bone blade.

The current Long Chen was just like a wild dragon. Brandishing his bone blade ruthlessly, he forced Gu Yang to retreat over and over again.

“Gu Yang is about to be defeated. He’s actually weaker than Long Chen even in terms of pure power!” exclaimed one person.

Gu Yang’s most powerful forte was his brute power. When that brute power was added on to the power of his ancestral blood support, his fists could even destroy Tang Wan-er’s wind blades easily. It was obvious how frightening such a thing was.

But even such a powerful genius who used brute power to suppress all others was actually losing despite Long Chen fighting him head-on.

“Hmph, that’s just because Long Chen is relying on his weapon. If Long Chen also dared fight bare-fisted, senior brother Gu Yang would crush him to death with a single punch,” said one person from Gu Yang’s faction icily.

Although they were no longer fighting, everyone was still standing at the edges, glaring at the other party, ready to fight at any moment.

“Tch, weapons are also a kind of strength. Your logic is just a fart. According to that, then Gu Yang also shouldn’t have used his ancestral blood support. If so, then senior brother Long Chen would have crushed his bald head easily,” retorted a disciple from the Heaven Earth Faction loudly.

“What crap! His ancestral mark is his innate talent, a sign of his strength. Why wouldn’t he use it?” raged the first person to speak out.

Someone from the Heaven Earth Faction’s side immediately cursed, “Senior brother Long Chen’s bone blade is something he obtained from the graveyard of the exiled. That’s a symbol of his glory, so why shouldn’t he use it?”

“That’s just Long Chen’s dogshit luck. All he did was find a treasure; otherwise, he would have been turned into Magical Beast crap.”

That person’s words immediately ignited everyone’s fury on this side. Before this, the two figures they cared about the most would have to be the two goddesses, Tang Wan-er and Ye Zhiqiu.

But now Long Chen had become another one of their idols. Their worship of him was not at all inferior to their worship of the two goddesses. They would not allow anyone to insult him. One person immediately charged out and punched that person right in the nose.

“Who the fuck asked you to be so blind?”

That person’s bones broke, and he let out a miserable shriek.

But even after that punch, that disciple of the Heaven Earth Faction still hadn’t released enough of his fury. He shouted to his allies, “Brothers, they dare insult senior brother Long Chen like this. That’s completely intolerable! Do you still remember how they bullied us? Right now, we don’t need to fight over flags, but let us men all fight together to relieve our resentment!”

Following that person’s shout, all five factions in the Heaven Earth Faction’s alliance charged forward. Other than the flagbearers, every single disciple was like an angry bull.

Previously, none of them had really fought since Long Chen had suppressed all the enemies on his own to the point that they hadn’t even dared to resist.

So much of their anger had already been relieved. However, they still didn’t find it to be that satisfying. Now that someone had insulted Long Chen, they finally had an excuse to beat them.

Amongst cultivators, there were only a few who weren’t battle fanatics. With one person taking the lead, they all exploded, charging at their opponents.

A huge fight immediately erupted between both parties. As for Song Mingyuan and the other core disciples, seeing that they couldn’t participate in Long Chen’s battle, they all began to fight their opponents once more.

Explosions continuously rang out from Long Chen’s side. Qi waves continuously shook the land, but this side also wasn’t inferior either.

Victory was already assured with the flags. With Tang Wan-er and Ye Zhiqiu there, no one could even think about snatching their flags. So everyone could just ignore their flags and fight only for themselves.

On the other side was one core disciple faking that he was injured, as well as Lei Qianshang and Qi Xin who had long since been beaten to the point of being near death. Their morale was already near rock bottom.

Then adding on that Gu Yang’s alliance didn’t even want to fight at this point, they were all beaten like stray dogs, wailing and crying.

The distant Ling Yunzi, who was observing, sighed. “The trash really is intermingled with the good.”

In this generation of disciples, the strong really were much stronger than before, but the weak were also so weak. Most importantly, their actual temperaments were far too lacking. Even that previous life and death trial still didn’t cause them to mature.

Long Chen’s side was all full of vigor with firm determination. Even though they had had to suffer much humiliation before, not one of them had withdrawn from their faction.

In comparison, everyone on Gu Yang’s side was already frightened to the point that they didn’t dare to fight. Their flags had been directly exposed to the enemy without a single person guarding.

At that time, Tu Fang had turned green, wanting to smack those idiots to death. If that had been a real fight against experts of the Corrupt path, not one of them would have survived.

“He really did well to kill them.” Tu Fang gritted his teeth. He was talking about those traitors who Long Chen had killed at the beginning. Only with trust and mutual protection could a squad truly become powerful.

And it was precisely because of that absolute trust that betrayal hurt so much. In fact, if it happened again, Tu Fang wished he could turn Long Chen’s punishment into a reward.

This clearly proved that Long Chen had been right to act as he had. Gu Yang’s alliance had been completely broken down by their own selfishness. Without any care for their comrades, they were blown apart like a pile of loose sand.

“We really have let Long Chen down. We should have rewarded him for doing as he did, instead of punishing him,” sighed Tu Fang.

Ling Yunzi smiled, “Here you go again. Divergents have their own paths that no one can change. And furthermore, do you really think it was a punishment for Long Chen to be exiled to the rubble wasteland?”

When he said that, Tu Fang immediately realized that after being exiled there, Long Chen had actually become many times stronger. Then did that mean that it was all fated to be?

Thinking of that, Tu Fang shut his mouth. His reverence for the Heavenly Daos deepened even further.

Elder Sun was filled with greed as he looked at the divine ring behind Long Chen’s back.

Currently, he had reached a bottleneck in his cultivation. If he could obtain Long Chen’s miraculous technique, there really might be a chance of him breaking through.

That was because Long Chen’s divine ring could crazily absorb energy from the world. If he could obtain it, then by using it while he attacked the barrier between realms, he would have that little extra push that would let him break through.

When advancing, it was precisely just that little bit of strength that was always lacking. It might seem like just a little bit, but it really was like a heavenly chasm that you might never be able to cross in your lifetime.

BOOM! With another explosive sound, Long Chen’s bone blade sent Gu Yang flying again.

“Bastard, I refuse to believe this! My strength is the greater!” Gu Yang furiously roared while charging at Long Chen once more, his fists flying crazily.

“But you have yet to crush me to pulp,” replied Long Chen icily. Once more brandishing his bone blade, he forced Gu Yang back. With this bone blade, he was finally able to properly bring out more of his force which pleased him greatly.

He wasn’t the same as Gu Yang who could use his ancestral blood support to strengthen his fists to the point that they were as hard as weapons. Furthermore, he had never learned any high-class barehanded fighting techniques.

So only by wielding a weapon could he release his full potential. This time, he was able to fight to his heart’s content, giving Long Chen an unprecedented feeling of delight.

But Long Chen really was shocked at how powerful Gu Yang was. Even with his divine ring as support, fighting at his full force was still greatly exhausting.

Having reached the tenth Heavenstage, his power had increased greatly, but his rate of exhaustion had also increased.

However, as for Gu Yang, even after fighting this long, his strength had yet to decline in the slightest. If this continued, he really might end up running out of spiritual qi first.

Stealthily glancing above, he saw that the incense stick was almost completely burned out.

BOOM!

Gu Yang drew back again, grinding his teeth. He was unable to accept such a result.

“With my final blow, I’ll smash you to pulp!” Gu Yang shouted and the countless runes on his fists disappeared. His fists instead turned black, almost appearing like steel.

“I’ll let you taste my Gu family’s Yang Flame Fist!”

A powerful aura immediately locked Long Chen in place. Space trembled as his fist cut across the space, smashing at Long Chen.