BTTH: From Genius to Invincible-Chapter 568: The Curtain Falls

Word Count: 2,897 Words

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"Hm?"

Xiao Yan froze for a heartbeat. The hand he had raised to hurl the Eight-Colored Fire Lotus and deliver Yao Ming a ’big surprise’ halted in mid-air.

The situation left him rather dumbfounded. Throughout his journey, he had encountered all manner of opponents. There were those like Chen Xian, the son of the Profound Xuan Sect’s master, who resorted to pulling out his background connections to plot against him after being defeated. There were others like Feng Qing Er, who remained stubbornly defiant even in loss. But a ’hero who understands the times’ like Yao Ming? This was a first.

In truth, Yao Ming faced certain defeat!

Although he possessed the strength of a late 2-star Dou Saint, being sealed for so long meant he couldn’t fully recover his power in such a short time. At present, he had only regained around sixty percent, barely reaching the 2-star threshold.

By contrast, Xiao Yan possessed the Xiao Clan’s Divine Grade bloodline and the power of the Grade 9 Clan Mark, which could easily raise his Dou Qi cultivation by a full star. His actual Dou Qi foundation was even faintly higher than what Yao Ming currently possessed.

More importantly, Xiao Yan’s Flame Mantra had already reached High Tian Class!

A High Tian Class Qi Method. What kind of concept was that?! Even the Hall of Souls’ highest-ranked reward Qi Methods only reached Intermediate Tian Class! Hall Chief Hun Mie Sheng himself cultivated nothing higher than an Intermediate Tian Class method. It simply couldn’t go any higher.

The Hun Clan possessed several High Tian Class Soul Training Methods, but Dou Qi cultivation methods of that level? They might not have any at all, and even if they did, no more than three could possibly exist.

Qi Methods were even rarer than Dou Techniques. This was precisely why fighting above one’s level became increasingly difficult after reaching the Dou Venerate and Dou Saint realms. Not only did the cultivation gap widen enormously, but everyone had already pushed their Qi Methods and Dou Techniques to their limit. Across the entire Dou Qi Continent, such high-tier methods were nearly impossible to find.

Especially now. With no Dou Gods on the Dou Qi Continent, virtually no one could create new High Tian Class Qi Methods. Not even Gu Yuan or Hun Tiandi possessed such capability.

It was similar to how a high-level Dou Ancestor could cultivate a High Di Class Qi Method, yet even a peak 9-star Dou Ancestor would find it nearly impossible to create one. The creation of such methods required, at minimum, a Dou Venerate. The same principle applied.

High Tian Class Qi Methods were typically the work of Dou Gods, and so they were extraordinarily rare.

Yet Xiao Yan simply happened to possess one!

The Yao Ming standing before him was already a once-in-a-millennium genius of the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe, possessing extremely high bloodline strength. Hundreds of years spent tempering his body at the bottom of the Nine Serene Yellow Spring had pushed that bloodline to yet another evolution, his cultivation reaching 2-star Dou Saint. But even so, his bloodline strength merely equaled a relatively powerful Qi Method within the Low Tian Class range. It still fell short of the Intermediate Tian Class, let alone the High Tian Class!

As for Yao Xiaotian and Yao Ce, they were even weaker. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have been overwhelmed by Cai Lin and the Nine-Headed Heaven Serpent.

The gap in Dou Qi quality between Xiao Yan and Yao Ming was, in truth, enormous. Even without activating his Clan Mark, Xiao Yan could have crushed him at just his 1-star Dou Saint cultivation alone. This was the qualitative transformation brought about by their disparity in Qi Methods.

Dou Saints could almost never fight above their level, but Xiao Yan was the exception!

Xiao Yan glanced at Yao Ming and nodded inwardly. He genuinely appreciated people who understood the situation.

The stronger a magical beast, the keener its instinct for danger. After exchanging just a few moves with Xiao Yan, the instant Yao Ming witnessed that Clan Mark and the fire lotus, he understood: even at full strength, he could never defeat this human.

It sounded unbelievable, but his beast instincts told him it was undeniable truth.

"Yao Ming! What are you doing?!" First Elder Yao Ce, now transformed into a massive dark-red python, shrieked. He was already losing ground steadily against the Nine-Headed Heaven Serpent. That thing was feared even by Ancient Heaven Serpent Kings, let alone someone like him who merely carried diluted Ancient Heaven Serpent blood.

The gap in bloodline strength was enormous.

Yao Ming hadn’t yet spoken when Xiao Yan cast a sidelong glance at Yao Ce and said flatly, "Noisy."

Swoosh!

Following the thought that since I already made it, might as well not waste it, Xiao Yan flicked his finger, and the Eight-Colored Fire Lotus launched forward, spinning at blinding speed. Wisps of beautiful flame danced around it like silk ribbons as the lotus shot straight toward Yao Ce.

Terror instantly flooded the First Elder’s aged face. He hurriedly unleashed a bizarre clone-type Beast Technique. His body exploded into countless fragments, each becoming a separate serpent clone, while spatial rifts tore open in every direction as he attempted to flee!

If Yao Ming truly abandoned them, the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe was finished. Freeing him had been nothing more than a desperate final gamble, a hope that he could protect them.

Yao Ce’s fleeing Beast Technique drew only a faint smile from Xiao Yan. Thanks to the Bodhisattva Heart, though not yet fully refined, he already possessed a certain ability to see through false illusions.

An emerald light flickered across his eyes. He narrowed them slightly, a cold smile tugging at his lips. The next instant, the fire lotus flashed with black light and vanished, crossing the void in a spatial teleport to reappear directly before one specific snake clone.

The moment the fire lotus materialized, that clone—identical in every visible way to the rest—revealed a distinctly human flash of terror and shock in its eyes. Xiao Yan had seen through it. This was the true body!

BOOM!!

The Angry Buddha Lotus Flame’s explosion was a spectacle beyond belief. For a moment, everything seemed to slip from reality, as if the world itself had been replaced.

First came a blinding white light, like a dozen suns rising simultaneously, dyeing the entire sky a pure, searing white. That white glow condensed into a gigantic fire-lotus tidal wave, surging skyward and spreading across the heavens in every direction.

In an instant, the cloud layer expanded outward like a living thing, as if determined to swallow the entire Nine Serene Yellow Spring region into its belly.

A deafening roar followed. The whole Yellow Springs Mountain Range shuddered violently. The explosion’s shockwave swept outward, obliterating countless plants and structures in its path. Yao Ce’s many clones, the spatial rifts he had torn open, and even several Nine Serene Snake Guards who had been too close were all were swept up and annihilated.

Then came a massive fireball, like a savage beast unfurling its claws, raking out in all directions and turning everything it touched to ash.

The scene was enough to make one’s blood run cold, as if witnessing the end of days. A monstrous surge of air rolled outward at supersonic speed, scouring everything in its path. Almost nothing could withstand this power. Mountain forests and vegetation were uprooted and flung away in the blink of an eye, leaving nothing but barren wasteland.

Flames painted a terrifying mural across the world. Everything submerged within them vanished without a trace. Nothing could resist that heat. The fire lotus’s temperature was beyond imagination.

The instant the lotus detonated, sheer horror twisted Yao Xiaotian’s face. His eyes bulged, pupils blown wide. His mouth gaped open as if to scream, but no sound emerged. Sweat seeped from his brow. His entire body trembled, muscles locked taut.

Clearly, Xiao Yan’s fire lotus had utterly surpassed anything he could have imagined.

Xiao Yan’s cultivation, Qi Method, and Spiritual Strength were all incomparably stronger than when he had faced Tian He Zi outside the spatial auction. Even though this was merely an Eight-Colored Fire Lotus, its destructive power vastly exceeded the eleven-colored lotus that had instantly obliterated Tian He Zi back then!

A sharp snap rang out as a completely charred figure dropped from the sky. Yao Ce wasn’t dead, but after being ravaged by the Eight-Colored Fire Lotus’s explosion, he had completely lost the ability to fight and now lay half-dead on the ground.

His features were twisted in agony. Groans of pain continuously escaped his gaping mouth. His eyes clenched shut from torment, then forced wide with terror and despair.

His gaze sought Yao Ming, silently begging for rescue, a desperate hunger for life shining in his eyes. That look was shot through with bitter regret. He simply couldn’t understand. How could Xiao Yan be so impossibly strong?!!

An ordinary cultivator needed at least a hundred years to progress from Dou Venerate to Dou Saint! Yet Xiao Yan’s power already surpassed common Dou Saints by an unfathomable margin!

Yao Ming knew he had made the right choice. Yet even with his mental preparations, the sight of Yao Ce, a late 1-star Dou Saint, reduced to such a wretched state by that terrifying Fire Lotus still filled his heart with cold dread.

’An Intermediate Tian Class Dou Technique... and a top-tier one at that! I wasn’t mistaken. That truly is the Xiao Clan’s Clan Mark! That clan hasn’t perished after all!’ His heart surged like a storm-tossed sea. At first, he had thought he might have been wrong. After all, the Xiao Clan had supposedly been destroyed long ago.

Meanwhile, Yao Xiaotian, still locked in his bitter struggle against Cai Lin, wore a face full of fear and unease. His eyes darted erratically. His breathing grew rapid and shallow, as though a giant invisible hand were squeezing his chest.

Cai Lin’s bloodline pressure had already reached the level of a Heaven Swallowing Python King. To Yao Xiaotian, whose Ancient Heaven Serpent bloodline was mixed and diluted, it was like a commoner standing before an emperor. He was suppressed in every regard.

Xiao Yan had just declared he wouldn’t let him off! If even the First Elder couldn’t escape Xiao Yan’s grasp, what hope did anyone else have?!

Yao Xiaotian’s heart pounded faster and faster. He felt himself on the verge of collapse, desperately trying to cling to composure even as his emotions spiraled beyond control.

And it wasn’t just Yao Xiaotian. The Beast Region experts watching from the sidelines found themselves equally shaken. Even as mere spectators, the scene left them feeling as though invisible hands had closed around their throats, robbing them of their very voices.

"So this is the Yan Alliance’s Xiao Yan..."

"Damn... when Yao Ming first appeared, I truly thought the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe had won."

Many nodded in agreement. That had been a 2-star Dou Saint, after all! Countless among those present had speculated about how this war would end. Some had imagined Yao Ming ignoring Yao Xiaotian entirely and walking away as a bystander. Others envisioned both sides fighting until heaven and earth collapsed before settling on a bitter peace. Some had even pictured a drawn-out, catastrophic battle ending only when one side was utterly defeated.

But no one, not a single soul, had expected Xiao Yan to end it all with a single move!

And so swiftly at that!

"Big Brother, save me! I know I was wrong! Don’t let them kill me! I’m your own brother!" Yao Xiaotian crashed to his knees with a heavy thud, hands clasped tight in desperate supplication, his body folding forward as his face twisted with despair and frantic pleading.

Xiao Yan’s terrifying Fire Lotus had completely shattered the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe’s will to resist. The tribe members, Elders, and Nine Serene Snake Guards alike had lost every shred of courage.

What truly crushed them wasn’t just the display of power; it was Xiao Yan’s state afterward.

After unleashing that devastating Fire Lotus, he still looked as relaxed as someone out for a casual stroll. There wasn’t the slightest hint of Dou Qi depletion, as if he could casually hurl several more without breaking a sweat. A single move had been enough to defeat a Dou Saint First Elder. How could anyone still harbor thoughts of resistance?!

Yao Ming looked at his groveling brother, and the blazing anger that had filled his chest slowly gave way to a quiet sigh. He had been plotted against by Yao Xiaotian and Yao Ce, sealed beneath the Nine Serene Yellow Spring for hundreds of years, never once seeing the light of day.

But as fate would have it, the very two who had cast him into darkness had offended someone they could never afford to provoke, bringing catastrophe crashing down upon themselves.

"The cycle of the Heavenly Dao... you have your day as well." Yao Ming didn’t want to save him, and even if he did, he had no means to do so.

In truth, Yao Xiaotian and Yao Ce hadn’t done something fundamentally wrong. Had Yao Ming himself learned the Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils had appeared, he too would have used every means at his disposal to eliminate its user. It was only natural for their kind.

But the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe hadn’t fallen to the Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils. They had fallen to Xiao Yan!

They had calculated everything except him!

Whether it was the Pill Gathering Champion’s protective status serving as a life-saving talisman, or the overwhelming strength he now displayed, the one who had truly broken the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe was Xiao Yan!

In the end, neither Yao Xiaotian nor Yao Ce escaped the net woven by Xiao Yan and Cai Lin. Little Fairy Doctor’s Woeful Poison, Qing Lin’s Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils, and Xiao Yan’s Asura Illusion Realm were layered upon them in concert. Under the combined sealing power of these three forces, the two were completely suppressed and imprisoned at the bottom of the Nine Serene Yellow Spring.

Once Qing Lin reached the Half-Saint level, she would enslave them both. Though weakened, they remained two Rank 9 serpent-type magical beasts. If Qing Lin could truly bring these two Rank 9 serpents under her control, she would become virtually unstoppable!

Three Rank 9 serpent beasts under her command, one of which was a Nine-Headed Heaven Serpent!

Two deep, rumbling thuds echoed as the soul-sealed, poison-corroded forms of Yao Xiaotian and Yao Ce slowly sank beneath the surface of the Nine Serene Yellow Spring. Only then did Xiao Yan and the others turn their attention to Yao Ming.

Xiao Yan’s conditions went far beyond merely dealing with the two masterminds. He also demanded all of the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe’s territory, resources, sacred grounds, and inheritances, along with every last Spring Blood Crystal from the Nine Serene Yellow Spring.

Only then would they spare the tribe’s remaining members.

Yao Ming held Xiao Yan’s gaze for a long moment, then shifted his eyes to Cai Lin. His voice was low and heavy. "A Heaven Swallowing Python... the era of the Nine Serene Deep Ground Python Tribe has indeed passed."

He tapped the Nine Serene Profound Scepter once. With a crystalline clatter, a pile of blood-red Spring Blood Crystals materialized before Xiao Yan.

"These are all the Spring Blood Crystals. Every crystal formed at the bottom of the Nine Serene Yellow Spring over these past few hundred years, I’ve collected them all. As for the tribe’s resources and treasure grounds, I’ll have the Second Elder guide you for confirmation."

Winners became kings and losers turned to bandits. On the Dou Qi Continent, no one concerned themselves with ’humanitarian considerations.’ Here, only strength commanded respect.

Yao Ming’s words sent a wave of excitement through the Snake-People tribe leaders and the four Great Elders. Smiles broke across their faces, and some even leaped and whooped with joy.

"We’ve finally returned!"

"So this is our tribe’s ancestral homeland! It’s so beautiful... so much better than the desert!"

"Long live Her Majesty the Queen!"

After countless years of battle, they had finally fulfilled the Medusa Race’s ancient mission. Even Cai Lin’s cold, domineering features softened, a trace of quiet satisfaction blooming in her eyes. She turned to Xiao Yan beside her, her beautiful gaze warming with a glow of deep affection.

"Thank you, Xiao Yan."

The gentle warmth hidden beneath her imperious exterior made Xiao Yan’s breath catch. Cai Lin, already stunningly beautiful enough to topple cities and kingdoms, was now revealing a tenderness meant only for him. The sight stirred something deep within his heart.

Without hesitation, he wrapped an arm around her slender waist and pulled her close. Leaning in, he pressed a tender kiss to her lips before murmuring softly, "What’s this talk of thanks between us? Whatever you need, I’ll help you get it."

Warmth rippled through Cai Lin’s heart. She cast him a look brimming with infinite charm, then, as if still unsated, wound her arms around his neck and drew him into a deep kiss of her own.