The void blazed with brilliance. Every inch of space crackled with lightning radiance. The earth was scorched black, purple radiance stretched endlessly — converging into a sea of thunder!

The heavenly tribulation had not passed. It had intensified further — more terrifying than before, stretching across the horizon without end.

Across the ground lay charred remains — or rather, human-shaped burn marks. How many had perished here, Ye Fan did not stop to count.

“Ahh…”

Heartrending screams, a scene of apocalyptic destruction. A half-step Great Ability roared, but was powerless to alter his fate. His treasured artifact cracked. He fell straight down.

Moments later, he became tribulation ash within the lightning — not even his bones were left. Every precious artifact on his person was ground to powder. Nothing was preserved.

Ye Fan moved like a death god, the Cauldron of the Mother Qi of All Things floating above his head, his eyes blazing with divine radiance — walking step by step, cutting down survivors without mercy.

Having made his move, he could not afford to show a woman’s compassion. Death was the fate he delivered to his enemies. There was no other choice.

“Ye Fan — I am of the Wind Clan… I was unwittingly drawn into this, deceived by them…” A feeble voice reached him. The speaker was being sustained by some mysterious treasure, though he, too, was on the verge of collapse.

The Wind-Stabilizing Pearl!

Ye Fan was surprised. This was a secret treasure of the Wind Clan — outsiders could not refine it. Though it was named a wind pearl, it could in fact stabilize earth, fire, wind, and water.

At this moment, the fist-sized pearl was covered in cracks, yet it still emitted a soft radiance, blocking the lightning, protecting the man inside.

Even so, occasional bolts still forced their way through. He was already gravely wounded and on the verge of having his form and spirit destroyed.

“The Wind Clan sent people here as well?” The coldness in Ye Fan’s gaze deepened as he looked down at the man.

“No — only I came here, unwittingly. I am Feng Huang’s cousin. We nearly became family.” He seemed to grasp at this as a lifeline.

Thirteen Holy Son-level figures were nearly all dead. He might well be the only one still alive — though the remains of the others were nearly impossible to identify, most having been reduced to ashes.

Ye Fan glanced at him briefly, said nothing more, and continued walking toward the next. How could this person have come here by accident?

Pop!

The Wind-Stabilizing Pearl shattered. The man let out a cry, and five bolts of thunder rained down on his crown. No bones remained. He was gone.

Ye Fan’s gaze was deep as he pressed forward through the thunder sea, searching for the one who had spoken with such venomous hatred. That individual was most deeply connected to all of this.

But charred human-shaped marks lay one after another across the ground. There was no way to know what had become of that person, or whether he was among them.

Half an hour later, there was not a single living person remaining in the thunder sea besides Ye Fan. All had been struck down — far more than he had anticipated, numbering over a hundred charred remains.

Beyond that, in the distant mountain ranges, lightning still flickered intermittently. Some had escaped, undergoing their tribulations elsewhere.

This was the effect of being drawn in — terrifying, inescapable, impossible to shed without enduring one full trial of calamity. This was the bizarre and fearsome nature of heaven’s punishment.

“Ye — demon — ahh…”

Those undergoing their tribulations beyond the perimeter screamed when they saw Ye Fan approaching, carrying ten thousand feet of red lightning and a boundless sea of thunder. Terror overtook them entirely. But it changed nothing.

In that outer zone, Ye Fan appeared again and again, bringing with him a vast electric sea that swallowed everything wherever he went.

He extinguished more than twenty additional lives — all of them in the midst of their own tribulations, without the strength to resist the far more terrifying wind-fire-heavenly-thunder and Chaos lightning strands he brought with him.

“Ye… ruthless one…” The final Supreme Elder-level figure despaired when Ye Fan set his sights on him.

Bang!

Ye Fan extended a single finger, piercing through the man’s forehead. A flash of azure light, and the Yimu Thunder-Essence descended, blowing him apart in an explosion — bones and flesh scattered outward in every direction.

Across the vast expanse, not a trace of lightning remained. The boundless snowy mountains were wrapped in the dark of night — and only one thunder sea still raged!

Ye Fan’s heavenly tribulation was far from over. It had entered its most terrifying stage. He was forced to stop and begin expending every ounce of his strength to endure it.

Earth, fire, wind, water — the tribulation lightning of all four elements descended in succession. It was an awe-inspiring spectacle, like the creation of the world itself.

Wind rent the void, earth veins surged upward, water flooded the heavens, fire moved within — four kinds of world-ending punishment, and the lightning radiance shook the nine heavens.

Earth, fire, wind, water cycled together, carving out a small world within the void, manifesting endless tribulation, one bolt after another.

Ye Fan was sealed within it. Chaos mist surged, manifesting the myriad heavens — a vast ocean of destroying lightning swallowed him.

He seemed to have arrived at the most ancient of ages — the time of initial things, everything just taking shape, heaven and earth just being opened, Chaos not yet dispersed.

Within this ownerless small world, heaven’s punishment fell without mercy, striking without end!

Seen from afar, the spot was terrifying — a boiling ocean of electricity, utterly alarming.

“What a creature,” the great black dog muttered from a distance, his whole body trailing black smoke, even his ears and mouth not excepted.

He was carrying Yiyi on his back, gripping the Ancient Emperor Token, having endured his own tribulation. Now, coughing once sent electric sparks flying from his mouth — his indignation was immense.

But the benefits he had gained were equally enormous. Having successfully passed the tribulation, the Black Emperor’s combat power had risen substantially.

Earth, fire, wind, water manifesting a small heaven and earth, tribulation without end, thunder shaking the ears — Ye Fan sat cross-legged there and began to quietly temper himself.

He opened his mouth and inhaled. Ten thousand strands of lightning descended like a heavenly river from above — all of it drawn into his body, illuminating his bones, his organs, and his flesh until they shone with perfect clarity.

Boom!

Thunder shook the nine heavens, boundless and without edge. He sat cross-legged at the center, still in the void, motionless — divine lightning tempering the body, heaven’s punishment forging the cauldron!

Both his flesh and the Cauldron of the Mother Qi of All Things were transforming. The cauldron especially was being etched with pattern after pattern of heaven and earth — this was the Dao taking form.

As for the small golden figure that emerged from between his brows — it was even more extraordinary. It rose up into the thunder, away from Ye Fan, exhaling and inhaling within the terrible lightning radiance formed by earth, fire, wind, and water.

This was Ye Fan’s divine sense, condensed into human form — walking through the small worlds that had been carved open, drawing in boundless lightning, absorbing the primal thunder energy.

The small golden figure was unblemished and radiant. Though the lightning blasted it to near-shattering more than once, it endured every time, receiving an inconceivable baptism.

Gradually, Ye Fan’s flesh, the Cauldron of the Mother Qi of All Things, and the small golden figure condensed from his divine sense formed a cycle among the three of them. As all manner of tribulation lightning rained down, it flowed among the three, continuously refining each.

Before long, the Scarlet Dragon Elder, the Peacock King, the Crow Daoist, and several Supreme Elders of the Jade Pool arrived. Upon seeing this scene, every single one of them was dumbstruck.

“Those people… they are all dead!”

“There are burn marks all over the ground — every one of them was caught in the tribulation!”

“Unbelievable — he actually drew down the heavenly punishment himself.”

The commotion here had been felt more than a thousand miles away, prompting the Scarlet Dragon and the others to rush over. Every one of them was shaken to the core. Now, looking at the sight before them, all were speechless.

“He resolved everything on his own…”

The group was truly stunned — standing in a daze, some unable to find words.

“What a monster,” the Crow Daoist finally muttered.

Half an hour later, eighty-one consecutive strands of Chaos lightning descended — these were not mere wisps, but a supreme-level divine punishment!

In the distance, the Scarlet Dragon, the Crow, and the Peacock — three great demon kings — all changed color. One could only imagine how terrifying a tribulation of this magnitude truly was.

Clang!

Even the Cauldron of the Mother Qi of All Things was nearly sent flying. Ye Fan coughed up blood, cracks splitting across his body in multiple places. The small golden figure nearly scattered.

He was gritting his teeth to endure. Multiple bones had broken. Golden blood splattered outward. The divine sense figure struggled desperately within the Chaos radiance.

Boom, boom…

Every strike caused the earth to shudder. Not a single high peak remained in this area — all had been leveled, reduced to tribulation ash.

But Ye Fan endured at last. The eighty-one most fearsome Chaos strands finished descending. His body reconstituted itself with crackling sounds, and from head to foot, his vital energy surged like a sea — brilliant and pure, crystalline and radiant.

The divine sense was resplendent. Having endured the baptism of the lightning radiance, it had grown incomparably powerful and resilient — it condensed into a blaze of blazing light and shot back into the space between his brows.

As for the cauldron — it had taken the first steps toward forming its own laws, beginning the evolution of the Dao. Most significantly, the eighty-one Chaos strands had etched onto it indelible Dao-marks that would never fade.

Four Extremities Grand Perfection!

Ye Fan felt that perhaps it would not be long before he could glimpse the path of Dragon Transformation, stepping into an entirely new realm.

“Truly remarkable…”

Ye Fan had broken the killing trap on his own, annihilated all his enemies — and this moved the Scarlet Dragon, the Peacock, and the Crow, three great powers, to a wave of deep feeling. Even the Supreme Elders of the Jade Pool sighed in their hearts.

“That move… was truly beyond imagining.”

“It was, in every sense, turning death into victory.”

All of them were astonished. This method left even them feeling a chill. He had undergone his tribulation and achieved success by himself — breaking out of a fatal trap — while all others had been buried in the earth.

Ye Fan strode forward to express his gratitude. No matter what, though the group had not been able to intervene directly, their intent had been there — and that counted for a great deal.

“Ye Fan…” Liu Yiyi had already awakened. Her clothes were tattered, blood-stained, heartbreakingly frail — she walked over with the great black dog, haggard but deeply moved.

“It’s over now.” Ye Fan smiled brilliantly to reassure her. Years had passed since they last met; he, too, had much he wanted to know — where Liu Yiyi and Zhang Ziling had gone.

“Let us leave this place,” the Scarlet Dragon Elder said, his gaze fixed on the distant sky.

Ye Fan nodded. He had no desire to linger — who knew if anyone remained lurking in the shadows? Even figures from the mortal world and the underworld might be watching unseen.

The battle at Fire Demon Ridge had not been hidden from the world. By that very day, word had spread, shaking the entire Eastern Desolation!

Ye Fan’s first thought was that some people must have escaped the tribulation — slipping away and carrying the news outward.

“What — how is this possible? The Sacred Body killed even half-step Great Abilities?”

“You’re talking nonsense. He finished off two Great Abilities? Pure fantasy!”

“Fighting alone against a host — Ye Fan cut down thirteen Holy Sons and looked down on his entire generation… This is preposterous. Completely impossible!”

…

When the news first broke, almost no one believed it. It was too absurd, too terrifying.

In the days that followed, Fire Demon Ridge was no longer still. Countless cultivators arrived to verify what had occurred.

“Heavens — this is truly a fragment of a Great Ability’s weapon, destroyed here!”

“So many burn marks on the ground — just how many powerful experts died here?”

Everyone stood frozen. The scorched earth, the leveled mountains, the devastation stretching in every direction — what they witnessed made their hearts seize, every face draining of color.

Ye Fan’s act of drawing down the heavenly tribulation to annihilate his enemies spread throughout the Eastern Desolation, triggering a massive upheaval!

These battle records left everyone aghast — especially the great powers who had been involved. For a long while, not one of them could find words.

“What the hell — what a monster! He managed to turn everything around from that position and kill them all!”

The Eastern Desolation was shaken. A great uproar arose. Every major faction could no longer remain seated — one by one they stepped forward to voice their opinions.