Skylar still didn’t answer right away. After a stretch of silence, he finally spoke. His voice carried nothing at all. “You said you want to submit to me?”
Godric nodded so hard it was almost frantic. “Yes, yes, yes! I’m willing to submit. I’ll be loyal forever. I’ll go wherever you send me!”
The corner of Skylar’s mouth lifted. It wasn’t much. Just a thin curve, cold and cruel. Then his eyes turned glacial, stripped of even the slightest trace of warmth, and he said each word slowly. “But I don’t need dogs.”
The words hit Godric like a thunderclap right beside his ear. Everything on his face froze at once. The pleading. The last bit of hope. Even the smile he had forced out locked in place. He stared ahead, blank and hollow, like the line had ripped the life right out of him.
Before Godric could react, Skylar slowly raised his right hand. A thread of black demonic flame rose from his palm, dark as spilled ink. The flame looked weak. In fact, it wasn’t. The moment it appeared, the air around it started hissing as it burned. Space itself gave a faint, warped twist, and a pressure with the force to wreck the world rolled across the entire place in an instant.
“The Lord of the Basilica. A True Immortal Realm expert…” Skylar repeated the words softly. There was a faint trace of mockery in it, and less than that of respect. “You think someone like you is worthy of submitting to me? You think you even have that qualification?”
All color drained from Godric’s face. He shook harder than before. His mouth moved, trying to beg. His body strained, trying to get up and run. But under Skylar’s pressure, every part of him had locked solid. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t even force out a full word. Only a thin, broken whimper slipped from his throat.
“Senior! Spare me! Please spare me! I… I won’t dare again!” Godric forced the words out with everything he had left. What came out was a last, shredded plea.
But Skylar never gave him the chance to finish. His gaze stayed flat as his right hand flicked lightly through the air. In that instant, the black hellfire in his palm erupted like a volcano. It turned into a black sea of fire that crashed out with a force like it could burn the sky dry and boil the sea empty, swallowing Godric and the more than 200 disciples behind him in one shot, without leaving a single blind spot.
“N-No!” Godric let out a scream so sharp it sounded like his whole chest had ripped open. He drove every last scrap of spiritual power left in his body into resistance. It melted on contact with the black hellfire like ice thrown under a blazing sun. There wasn’t even a trace of a fight in it.
The black hellfire tore through both his body and his spirit. Wave after wave of pain rolled over him until he thrashed across the ground, screaming and rolling like he was trying to crawl out of his own skin. But the flames clung to him like something that had burrowed into the bone. No matter how hard he struggled or beat at himself, he couldn’t put them out. They only burned harder.
The more than 200 disciples behind him had it even worse. Most of them barely got a few cries out before the fire swallowed them whole, and their bodies and spirits vanished into nothing in an instant.
In only a few breaths, Godric’s screaming cut off completely. After that, there was nothing. The black hellfire slowly died down and scattered away. On the open ground in front of the mountain gate, only a stretch of scorched black marks remained. The hard dark-red earth had split and melted from the burning. Other than that, nothing was left.
Godric and those 200-plus disciples didn’t leave behind a single bone or even a wisp of spirit. They had turned completely to ash and scattered between heaven and earth. From that moment on, there was no longer any Lord of the Basilica named Godric in this world.
Darian stood where he was, his whole body locked stiff. The color drained out of his face, and his legs nearly gave out under him. His mouth opened, but his throat had gone dry and no sound came out. A moment ago, he had taken in Godric as a gift dropped from the sky, one more True Immortal Realm fighter for their side. Only now did it hit him that, in front of Skylar, that little bit of strength wasn’t worth a glance.
In Skylar’s eyes, Godric had never been more than an ant he could crush at will. Barely worth noticing. An ant trying to throw itself at his feet meant nothing to him. If anything, it was unpleasant to look at, so he erased it with a casual wave.
Darian stood there with the aftermath still crawling up his spine. He was lucky he hadn’t taken it on himself to shelter Godric a moment earlier. If he had, he might have been dragged into it too. He kept his head bowed hard, not daring to look at Skylar’s back. Cold sweat kept pouring out of him until even his inner shirt was soaked through.
Skylar slowly lowered his right hand. His face stayed calm, as if what he had just done was nothing worth mentioning. Not a ripple crossed it. He turned to Josephine beside him and said in that same even voice, with only a trace of softness, “Senior Sister, let’s go. There’s no need to waste time here.”
Josephine gave a slight nod. Her cool gaze swept over the blackened marks on the ground. Something faint and hard to read passed through her eyes, then it was gone, and the usual distance returned. She didn’t say a word. She turned with Skylar and walked deeper into the Demon Dragon Hall, and before long, both of them disappeared behind the hall doors.
Darian stayed where he was and watched their backs disappear. Even after they were gone, he didn’t dare move for a long time. Only after a long while did he slowly come back to himself. He raised a hand and wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and neck, then said to his men in a shaking, lowered voice, “Quick… Clean this place up. Don’t leave a single trace behind. And nobody speaks of this outside, understood? Remember that!”
After saying that, Darian didn’t dare linger. He turned and hurried after Skylar toward the depths of the hall. What was already there in his chest toward Skylar deepened by several more layers, and from that moment on, he no longer dared hold even the slightest stray thought.
***
At that same moment, 100 miles away from the Demon Dragon Hall, on top of a pitch-black mountain peak, a figure was plastered behind a massive boulder. The body there shook violently. The face had gone white, and the eyes were filled with naked terror. The figure didn’t even dare breathe too hard.
It was the scout the Celestial Basilica had sent out specifically to track Godric. He had followed Godric all the way from the Luminous Sanctuary, careful every step of the way not to expose himself. The plan had been simple: to find out where Godric was heading, pin down where he would settle, then return at once to report everything to Hall Master Aurelius. What he had never expected was to witness something this horrifying with his own eyes.
That young man in black, Skylar, had only lifted a hand and waved it once, and Godric, a True Immortal Realm cultivator—along with more than 200 disciples—had all been turned to ash. Not even a bone was left behind!
The scout thought back to the black hellfire filling the sky and to Godric’s shrill, tearing screams. His scalp went numb. Cold spread through his whole body, and what remained of his nerve nearly gave out on the spot. He knew it with brutal clarity. That young man named Skylar had reached a level of power too monstrous to measure, something no human strength could stand against. Calling him a butcher who killed without blinking still felt too light.
He forced himself to move. Using both hands and feet, he crawled out from behind the boulder as quietly as he could. He did not dare linger for even a breath. He squeezed every last trace of spiritual power out of his body and tore off toward the Luminous Sanctuary, running like a madman, wishing he could sprout wings and fly straight back to the Celestial Basilica.
Only one thought stayed in his head: he had to report this to Hall Master Aurelius word for word. An enemy like this had to put the Celestial Basilica on guard in advance. Otherwise, sooner or later, the Celestial Basilica would end up exactly like the Celestial Palace. He raced the whole way without stopping.
After several days of that desperate sprint, the scout finally made it back to the Luminous Sanctuary and reached Saintlight Peak, where the Celestial Basilica’s headquarters stood.
