Yuan Shen's face turned completely ashen as he realized Yao Jun's plans, which had gone beyond mad and entered a catastrophic realm. He quickly locked eyes with Qiao Xian Yi, who didn't quite grasp the full extent of everything going on but still knew that the situation was extremely serious. She gave a swift nod of her head, a long lance that resembled a large brown thorn appearing in her grasp, thin yellow veins running along the length of it, pulsating lightly.

Yuan Shen took on the role of getting Yao Jun's attention, a thick pillar of deep-blue flames sprouting from beneath Yao Jun and rising high into the sky, completely swallowing him. The fire was so hot that the earth around it caught on fire and became part of the pillar, causing it to continuously grow slightly. The flames weren't just blazingly hot, they would occasionally freeze their surroundings or flicker with electricity, their erratic nature making it harder to defend against them.

Yuan Shen had a very simple reason for using fire against Yao Jun, it was the strongest element he had right now. It was the easiest to find so it was the one he had absorbed the most of, making it a bit stronger than his other elements. There was also the fact that while he could use multiple elements at once, doing so would spread out his concentration and as a result lower the strength of each element, it was better to focus on one element if he wanted pure power.

Qiao Xian Yi pulled back her arm and channeled all her power into her right arm, hoisting the lance as its veins started to pulsate even faster, a few drops of yellow liquid starting to seep out of them. She threw the lance with all her might, the fire creating a small opening for it so that it could freely reach Yao Jun.

Yuan Shen and Qiao Xian Yi didn't expect this to be enough to kill Yao Jun, it would be enough to heavily wound him so that they could start wearing him down together. But the voice that rang out from within the pillar of flames quickly caused their hearts to sink and realize that the situation had not even once been going as they expected it to.

"Poison, from a very powerful Demonic beast too it seems. But what a shame, it'll never get the chance to invade me like this, not with the two of you being this foolish."

Yuan Shen's body suddenly tenses up, he noticed something that shouldn't have been inside the pillar of flame, a tiny black spark. One spark turned into two and two into four, more and more black sparks spreading throughout the pillar. Before long, the entire deep-blue pillar of flames had turned completely black in color, growing even faster than when Yuan Shen had been controlling it. Even worse, Yuan Shen quickly realized that despite the fact that he should be able to control all flames, he couldn't control these flames once they turned black.

Yao Jun walked out of the flames, the pulsating lance caught in his grasp, the tip dragging along the ground. The lance had been thrown too weakly to even damage his skin when he snagged it out of the air, the yellow poison not receiving any chance to enter his body. He himself had the law of poison, so there was a chance that the poison wouldn't be able to do much to him, but he wasn't really willing to take that risk for no good reason. Yao Jun ignored the tense expressions of Qiao Xian Yi and Yuan Shen, his gaze landing on Qiao Xian Yi while he pointed the lance at her.

"You. So what if you're 'Immortal'? You're so weak that you couldn't even scratch my skin when you exerted all your power, you're nothing more than a punching bag like that."

The moment Yao Jun's sentence finished, both of Qiao Xian Yi's knees shattered and bent backward, resulting in her body collapsing forward. But just as she started to fall forward, something hit her head and caused her forehead to cave inward, knocking her back into an upright position again. Qiao Xian Yi continued to be knocked around by invisible attacks, small spots of frozen space that Yao Jun created, the pain of having her body broken repeatedly leaving her unable to even retaliate or maneuver her Qi.

It was just like Yao Jun had said, she had put all her focus on finding the proper people to control so that she could create this 'immortality' of hers, where was she to find the time to cultivate her body or physical strength? Yao Jun ignored the grunts and moans of agony that came from Qiao Xian Yi, turning his head to look at Yuan Shen.

"Now, you. Element God Yuan Shen? Don't make me laugh, that title is wasted on you. You're just using the special ability of your gate to handle your elements, have you ever even thought about fusing them together?"

Yao Jun opened his left hand as he spoke, the heaven-reaching pillar of black flames shrinking and gathering in his palm, forming his sword. Normally Yao Jun wouldn't even bother saying anything, this was a battle to the death after all, but the loss of Little Thunder made him feel somewhat chatty. Yao Jun stored the lance into his interspatial ring, pointing his sword to the west and pointing at the sun.

"Don't worry, you won't die just yet, neither will I let her die just yet. Your lives, as well as this planet, will set with the sun."

The sun was already approaching the horizon, it would at best only be visible for another 15 minutes. It was a strange feeling to Yuan Shen, knowing how long he would have left to live. But for some reason, he couldn't simply disregard Yao Jun's words, not when he had gotten far stronger than they originally thought, it was to the point that it was suffocating. While Yuan Shen was licking his lips and rapidly trying to figure out a plan of action, a thunderous shout rumbled through the area.

"Unhand my Junior Sister!"

Both Yao Jun and Yuan Shen turned their heads, their gazes landing on a furious blonde man clad in the brown robes of the Merged Heaven clan. Seeing as he wore the same robes as Qiao Xian Yi, it wasn't hard to guess just who the Junior Sister he was talking about was. Yuan Shen's expression lit up when he saw the man, it seemed like all the commotion they caused finally attracted the attention of a big shot. The man had already reached the late stage of the Earthly Deity realm, Yuan Shen figured that it would be easy to kill Yao Jun with the aid of this man.

But just as he turned his head to see how he would react, Yao Jun kicked off the ground and charged directly at the man, moving so fast that it seemed like space itself was shrinking between him and the blonde man. Not only Yuan Shen, but even the blonde-haired man was somewhat caught off-guard by Yao Jun's actions, what sort of early-stage Earthly Deity would willingly charge at a late-stage Earthly Deity?

But when Yao Jun arrived in front of him and threw a punch at his face and simultaneously stabbed at his stomach, the man quickly reacted. He blocked Yao Jun's fist by raising left arm and holding it in front of his face, as for the sword, it was blocked when a part of the man's robe suddenly stretched forward and turned as hard as steel, the man sneering at Yao Jun.

"You, did you not hear wha...!"

The man's words suddenly halted when he felt something sweet enter his mouth as he spoke, the taste of wine spreading through his mouth as the liquid ran down his throat. The moment the wine entered his stomach, the man realized that something was wrong, a horrendous amount of energy was starting to rampage around inside his abdomen.

He cast a horrified and confused gaze at Yao Jun, who had already started to retreat. The man tried to stretch out his arm, but the rampaging energy became too strong for him to handle, his entire body exploding into a cloud of blood and becoming a part of the reddish earth. Yuan Shen was completely shocked by the scene, but Yao Jun simply muttered to himself.

"Huh, so he wasn't kidding when he said it."

Yao Jun didn't have the strength to fight someone at the late stage of the Earthly Deity realm, but he did remember what the strange Chang Yun had told him before he left after their campfire meeting during the competition, he had to wait until the Heavenly Deity realm before he drank the wine he was given, otherwise, he would explode. Yao Jun didn't know exactly how strong Chang Yun was, but looking at the strength of the person who had come to drag him back, he couldn't be weak, so he decided to test out the words right here and now, using up half of the wine he had been given. Yao Jun turned his gaze away from the slowly descending cloud of blood, his gaze once again landing on Yuan Shen.

"No saviors, no salvation, all that awaits you is death."