Pa! Pa! Pa!

Flesh meeting flesh echoed endlessly on repeat.

Two figures stood in mid-air, clashing rapidly or slowly, it was incredibly difficult or, better yet, impossible for any spectator to determine which. The two seemed to exist in their own time zones, to the point where they were even overlapping amongst each other.

In one moment, Yan Zaizen was before her, striking out a fist. In the next, there was a thousand of him, kicking at a thousand of her figure's head fiercely. A blink later, two palms met a fist and elbow aiming for the vitals.

If anyone saw this slugfest, they would assume it was a fight between rapidly moving Fiendgod experts trying to strike the other dead. In actuality, they were both trying to utilize their own understanding of time and personal energy to disturb the others flow of time!

Yan Zaizen was deeply interesting in her close combat skills. In previous battles, outside of using Sky Shatter, his Warhammer obtained from the Sirius Titan Realm's trial planet, he had very little actual engagement experience. As one goes further into cultivation, especially as a cultivator who uses energy and not their fleshy body, the act of clashing with long-range waves were common.

This was exciting to him!

He could feel his movements become refined, each strike delivering a stronger burst of temporal energy that could easily dislocate the time flow. He felt that, if he wanted, he could cut into the timeline with his fist, and pull something or someone out of it! However, it was only a feeling, and he would never attempt to try something that may collapse the timeline.

The grey-robed woman was clashing and matching each strike, but her attack wasn't improving. In fact, she was being worn down by Yan Zaizen's constant strikes. For Celestials, they cultivated their own energy sources and didn't draw fuel from the heavens to empower their essences. However, Heavenly Cultivators use their essence energy, even the most basic form, to interact with the heavenly laws and draw immense power from it!

This became all the more obvious for those who reached the Sovereign-level in their realms. One of the known reasons why Seventh-Floor Cultivators are called Heavenly Monarchs is because they can, nearly infinitely, draw power from the heavens. As long as this energy isn't contested, it was limitless. While their heavenly energy may not be, they can construct shrines that store an unbelievable amount of energy!

Each floor containing far more than the previous one!

They could also absorb the essence of the world to replenish their own heavenly might, slowly fueling themselves further.

A battle of attrition was not beneficial for a Celestial, but beyond so for a Heavenly Cultivator!

Pa!

A clash happened once more, but this one was different. It created a wall of time that seemed to segregate their timelines, and a figure shot further back, distancing themselves away from the other. This figure was the grey-robed woman!

"I've played with you enough," the grey-robed woman coldly announced.

Yan Zaizen allowed the separation, interested in her next moves. He was only JUST beginning! There were many more moves he wanted to test out on her, and that was just regarding the law of time. He wanted to see how her essence of time would interact with his Imperial Law of Spacetime.

The grey-robed woman calmed her stance, her arms spread out, and her legs straight. She was like a figurine of a snow angel. There was a beauty and elegance to her stance.

"A battle art? Could this be a Celestial Art?" Yan Zaizen hadn't been exposed to high-level arts for quite a while. His heart beat in anticipation, and his battle intent continued to rise.

Despite being unable to see her face, Yan Zaizen had the feeling her eyes were closed. He could faintly hear faint words that seemed to be very ancient in nature. His brows twitched slightly, unable to ease his heart, but the battle intent rose even further!

"I'm waiting."

After a short period, the surrounding hundred miles seemed to freeze! This time, it was truly frozen! The very timeline was frozen!!!

If a thousand years were to pass in this hundred miles, not a single second would go by on the outside! Not. A. Single. Second.

Yan Zaizen felt his body freeze for a split second, but his heavenly shrine erupted with a dense heavenly might containing pure time power! It reinstigated his flow of time almost immediately, but he was sweating fiercely! That time, that fraction of a fraction of a nanosecond, was scary beyond belief! His flow of time had been affected briefly!

WOOSH!!!

His eyes widened as he saw a grey longsword piercing towards his forehead! It was mere inches away!!

He couldn't dodge!

His entire body exploded violently in an inky, black aura! A black shroud of ever-wanting, all siphoning, and filled with death covered his body instantly. While that happened, his internal body became a sea of white flames! It exuded a burning energy of life and unyieldingness!

The grey longsword ignored the black shroud and pierced deeply into Yan Zaizen's skull!

It split it like a melon meeting an executioner's blade!

Splurt!!

Blood gushed outwards unendingly as his head went from one whole to two halves! His pink, soft brain matter spewed out, and some of it even shot out from the back of his skull. A cultivator's physical body was nearly unimportant to their survival, but if it's crippled, it's remarkably challenging to retain peak combat strength.

The sword also carried an essence of time that seemed to rapidly flow forward, causing his brains, skull, and flesh to decay from old age. A rich deathly aura continued to emit itself from the split halves of his head.

"Argh! My soul!" Yan Zaizen's soul form was cut as well, a flowing trickle of time seemed to penetrate intending to age it to completion! This was terrifying beyond belief, as if you're being forced to the end of your life!

"Rebirth! Rebirth, Rebirth, Rebirth!!!" All he could think about was rebirth, as his body's life and death energies that had previous erupted merged into one whole. They contained the essence of rebirth, and the willing to restore all things to its peak! Before the time it takes for light to travel an inch, his head had healed, and his form regained its normalcy.

As for his soul, there was still a surging flow of power with intent to age.

"Samsara! Samsara!!!" He roared mentally, a soft, gentle flow of spiritual life entered his soul form from his heavenly shrine that determined the aspects of soul life, rejuvenating the damage his soul received. With a surging force of soul energy from his Astral Soul, he pushed out the time energy immediately.

He didn't take a single second to analyze his current state, but roared ferociously at the sky like a demonic monarch! An ever-siphoning presence of death flowed from his pores like ghastly smoke as it started to devour the time domain that seemed to have been erected.

The grey-robed woman was shocked! If one could see her face, they would see beads of sweat that nearly drenched her entire face. It was as if she had just gotten out of the rain, and her breathing was incredibly heavy!