Chapter 278: The Phoenix Falls
The spatial barriers of Zhou Garden began to show signs of collapse.
This was an inevitable consequence of this battle. Xu Yourong and Nanke possessed bloodline origins too powerful. Now, burning their lives to the extreme, the aura they released had long surpassed the peak of the Tongyou realm, reaching the upper limit permitted by Zhou Garden's rules.
Of course, Zhou Garden would not be destroyed, because the rules governing this world's operation would directly annihilate any threat—namely, the existence of Xu Yourong and Nanke.
The weapons used by Zhou Garden's world were those fragments of shattered spatial barriers.
Those spatial barrier fragments left the night sky, transformed into meteors, and crashed down toward the summit of Muyu Peak!
If Xu Yourong and Nanke did not stop fighting and continued to elevate their auras, they would surely die, reduced to powder by countless meteors along with this Muyu Peak!
They would die.
Nanke understood this very clearly. Earlier, when she thrust the Southern Cross Sword at Xu Yourong, she had already caused the space within Zhou Garden to warp, which confirmed for her the limit of what Zhou Garden's world could contain. What she needed to do was push her own strength to the limit, force Xu Yourong to do the same, and then surpass that limit!
This was her battle strategy.
It represented her absolute will to fight!
Why had her teacher, the infallible demon strategist Black Robe, entrusted her with the heavy task of killing Xu Yourong? It was because Black Robe knew full well that she was willing to die alongside Xu Yourong.
Her fate had been determined by Xu Yourong, so she invited the other to walk with her toward the end of fate—joyfully, because it meant she could also determine the other's fate.
Thus, Xu Yourong would surely die tonight in Zhou Garden. Though the human girl certainly wouldn't accept it, there was no way around it. If she continued to burn her Phoenix True Blood, Zhou Garden's world would rain down countless meteors, bringing death. If she stopped, she would be killed by Nanke even faster.
This was a battle of fate, an inescapable battle. The outcome had been predetermined from the start—so sorrowful, so bewildering.
It seemed no one could change any of this.
But atop Muyu Peak, there had always been an observer.
The old man playing the zither remained silent, watching the battle until now, unable to endure any longer.
He was certain that Princess Nanke's battle strategy had been approved by Lord Black Robe, but he was even more certain that His Majesty the Demon Lord knew nothing of this.
He couldn't bear to watch Princess Nanke die before his eyes, because he didn't want to endure the Demon Lord's boundless wrath afterward, nor did he want the remnants of the tribal survivors, barely clinging to life in Xuelao City, to be cast into the abyss by that wrath, never to rise again.
So his fingers fell upon the zither strings, and with great seriousness and gravity, he plucked a single note.
Hearing this note, a flicker of anger passed through Nanke's indifferent eyes, but after a moment, it gradually returned to its usual apathy—this battle between her and Xu Yourong allowed no interference. But at this moment, all her spirit and will were focused on Xu Yourong, leaving her unable to stop the old zither player from helping her.
What couldn't be changed had to be accepted.
What calmed her was that there was another unchangeable thing tonight: Xu Yourong would surely die.
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The zither's notes flowed gently, soft at first, then laced with hidden killing intent.
As the notes entered her ears, Xu Yourong's face grew even paler. Her sea of consciousness churned with countless towering waves, and she nearly failed to hold the Wutong Longbow, allowing Nanke's sword edge to strike her body.
The mental attack from that elder of the Zhuyin Wu tribe was terrifyingly powerful. Her mind had to contend with the even more fearsome Nanke, and she was gravely wounded in a single blow!
A trickle of blood slowly seeped from the corner of her lips.
Unlike the blood flowing from her fingers gripping the longbow, this blood did not come from her will—it was not the result of actively burning her life, but of injury.
Her gaze remained calm, her expression still focused. She looked quietly at Nanke, not even glancing at the old zither player. Her left hand rose against the night wind and fell into the darkness.
It wasn't some mystical technique that could injure enemies from afar without contact; she simply slapped her hand into the night.
There was nothing in the night—what was she slapping?
The next moment, a black square plate suddenly appeared in the darkness. It hovered silently in the air beside her, as if it had always been there, unnoticed by anyone.
This was Xu Yourong's Fate Star Plate.
Her left hand landed at the very center of the plate.
No gentle plucking—at a time like this, there was no opportunity to deduce or calculate what her fate might be.
What she had to do, what she could do, was simply try to grasp her own fate.
She channeled all the vast true essence she had been silently accumulating for a long time, preparing to deliver a fatal blow to Nanke, into the plate with that single slap!
A dull, heavy sound rang out!
It sounded like a gong—more like a broken gong—unpleasant and muffled.
But it was still loud.
This was the sound of the Fate Star Plate.
This was the resounding note of fate.
A fierce wind swept across the peak. The Fate Star Plate blazed with light, and the star tracks and fate lines—unreadable to anyone but herself—spun rapidly, turning into countless dizzying threads of light.
The gentle, flowing zither notes were abruptly cut off by this broken-gong sound.
Several strings on the ancient zither snapped with sharp cracks.
The old zither player's face turned pale, as if struck by a heavy blow, and he coughed up blood repeatedly.
By disrupting fate and gravely wounding her powerful enemy, Xu Yourong's seemingly casual strike was in truth unimaginably powerful. But she paid a great price for it.
Nanke's childish cry rose again, and the Southern Cross Sword pressed three inches closer!
Xu Yourong's hand gripping the Wutong Longbow trembled violently. Her gaze remained calm, but it no longer shone as brightly as before, appearing somewhat dim.
Most striking of all, the blood seeping from the corner of her lips grew ever more abundant.
The old zither player unleashed his immensely powerful divine sense, forcibly suppressing the severe damage to his sea of consciousness and instantly calming the violent true essence in his meridians. Ignoring his injuries, he let out a long howl and struck again!
He drifted away from the ancient zither, his hands descending straight toward Xu Yourong's crown. In the night, his ten fingers glowed with a faint, eerie white light, as if they had lost all flesh and become nothing but bone.
After Xu Yourong's left hand struck the Fate Star Plate and produced that resounding note, she smoothly grasped one corner of the plate.
She didn't know what was strange about this Wu tribe elder's hands, but she suspected they were poisonous. Without a second thought, she flipped her wrist and swung the Fate Star Plate at his face.
This strike seemed simple, like a child's brawl, but it was far from simple.
It was the last form of the Radiant Light Sword from the Heavenly Academy.
The Radiant Light Sword of the Heavenly Academy was renowned for its speed and sharpness, and this final form was so fast it was unimaginable—so fast that it appeared utterly simple.
Xu Yourong's Radiant Light Sword was better than any student at the Heavenly Academy.
Her strike was faster than any student's final form of the Radiant Light Sword.
So fast that even the old zither player couldn't dodge.
A dull impact sounded. The old zither player failed to evade, meeting the Fate Star Plate directly with his hands. In an instant, his fingers snapped and bones cracked. He retreated over ten zhang, coughing up blood without cease!
Xu Yourong was also shaken by the recoil of this collision, and her gaze grew even dimmer.
Nanke's eyes remained as wooden and indifferent as ever, but they blazed with unprecedented brightness.
The old zither player had suffered a miserable defeat, but he had bought her the best opportunity of the night.
A clear, childish cry once again echoed across the cliff.
Nanke's form suddenly blurred. Her sword screen retracted. Ignoring the dozen or so Wutong arrows, she brought her hands together, merging the Southern Cross Sword into one, and thrust it at Xu Yourong!
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—the Wutong arrows pierced the night sky!
Thud, thud, thud, thud—over a dozen arrows sank deep into her body!
Nanke's expression didn't change, as if she felt no pain at all.
Two blindingly bright sword lights, like twin rivers of stars, slashed toward Xu Yourong's face.
A scraping sound arose—the base of the Wutong Bow breaking through the cliff rock.
In the end, the Wutong Bow couldn't withstand the power of the Southern Cross Sword and left the ground!
A bow without roots, like a parasol tree without soil, instantly showed signs of wilting.
The bright sword light broke through the bow and struck Xu Yourong's left chest, bursting forth with a spray of blood!
Even at this critical moment, Xu Yourong's gaze remained calm. She flipped her wrist, holding the longbow horizontally to parry Nanke's sword, and drifted swiftly backward. Her white sacrificial robe spread in the night wind, stained with blood, like a wounded white crane—still elegant and otherworldly.
How could Nanke let her escape? She followed, like a shadow.
The Wutong Bow and the Southern Cross Sword clashed, carving countless turbulent streams in the night sky!
Nanke was covered in blood, but her eyes grew even brighter. She released the sword hilt and shot her hands forward like lightning!
The tips of her fingers glowed with an eerie green light!
A peacock has one tail feather—the most poisonous, the sharpest, the fastest in the world.
This was the Peacock Feather, the true Peacock Feather!
Nanke's ten fingers plunged into Xu Yourong's shoulders, deep into the bone!
Blood splattered everywhere, and the golden light seemed to become marked with countless black stains!
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Pain—so much pain—truly unbearable pain.
Xu Yourong had never felt such pain.
So she was furious, more furious than ever before.
With a tearing sound, the white sacrificial robe shattered into countless fragments.
Countless beams of golden light, following the direction of her fingers, struck Nanke's body.
Dull impacts sounded in rapid succession.
Countless finger-sized holes appeared on Nanke's body, and multicolored blood gushed out without stop!
The peacock has its feather.
The phoenix has its plume.
This was Xu Yourong's Ten Thousand Plumes!
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All cultivation had been expended.
All divine artifacts and demon weapons had been used.
All life-saving techniques had been employed.
All true essence had been consumed.
All blood was nearly spent.
This battle was so brutal, so absolute.
The summit of Muyu Peak fell silent. The dust and smoke among the cliffs gradually settled, but the spilled blood still burned, the blazing heat and bitter cold endlessly merging and canceling each other out, blindingly bright.
Xu Yourong stood at the cliff's edge, her face slightly pale, her robe dotted with bloodstains.
Nanke looked even worse, her body covered in wounds, blood flowing without stop.
But she had won.
A clear cry echoed endlessly from the summit of Muyu Peak!
Her voice was so childish, yet so cold.
This cry was cold! Proud! Domineering! In the end, it even carried a hint of madness!
Though there was some regret, victory was what mattered most.
Though a powerful figure had helped, death was the fairest judge of victory.
Both she and Xu Yourong were utterly spent, but in the next moment, Xu Yourong would die.
Tonight, she had finally defeated her fated opponent.
This meant she had conquered her own fate.
The cry of the Yue Bird gradually lowered, then stopped.
Nanke returned to her earlier indifferent expression and said woodenly, "My blood is in your body. Behind you is a bottomless abyss. So you're dead for sure."
Xu Yourong stood at the cliff's edge, the night wind gently brushing the strands of hair by her face.
She lowered her head, lost in thought.
Was she thinking about what posture to use to greet death?
"Please grant me this honor."
Nanke looked at her seriously.
Xu Yourong raised her head to meet her gaze, a hint of relief and mockery in her eyes—like an old person who had seen through the world and could calmly face death, or like a mischievous little girl.
"Why should I make you happy?"
She smiled as she said this, then turned and stepped into the night beyond the cliff.
Staring at the empty cliff's edge, a trace of bewilderment appeared in Nanke's eyes. She muttered blankly, "Are you an idiot? Do you really think you're a phoenix?"
Xu Yourong was the reincarnation of a Heavenly Phoenix, not a true phoenix.
She had no wings, nor had she cultivated to the Saint realm, so she couldn't fly freely.
Stepping into the night beyond the cliff meant falling into the abyss of death.
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A profound silence fell, both on the cliff and elsewhere.
Xu Yourong... the reincarnation of the Heavenly Phoenix, even in this era of blooming wildflowers over the past decade or so, was undoubtedly the most beautiful flower. Regarded by humanity as a future leader, and by the demons as the greatest future threat—had this girl died quietly in Zhou Garden?
Nanke walked to the cliff's edge, gazing down at the pitch-black abyss below, silently thinking: Even in death, you refuse to die by my hand—is this your final pride, or your return to your true self?
The Black Dragon remained silent in the clouds. She didn't like humans—Chen Changsheng was probably the only exception... especially after sensing the tale of her father's heroic spirit in Zhou Garden, her hostility toward human strongmen had only grown, including Xu Yourong, this human girl who might become the strongest. Logically, she shouldn't feel any sympathy or sorrow at Xu Yourong's death, and she remembered clearly that Chen Changsheng had said many times that he didn't like this fiancée. Yet why did she still feel some bewilderment, even unease? If Chen Changsheng learned that she had witnessed Xu Yourong's death without doing anything, would he blame her?
Xu Yourong fell into the abyss of death, her eyes tightly shut. The wind in her ears was so distant. Blood again seeped from the corner of her lips, meeting the night wind and beginning to burn, turning into a trail of bright fire liquid that drifted behind her, but it only illuminated a small area around her, not enough to light the path ahead.
The ground was getting closer, wasn't it? Death was drawing nearer, too. But why was this mountain in Zhou Garden so high? How long would she fall before she found final peace?
No—death was an end, not peace. That was not the other shore Star Sea she sought through cultivation!
She had leaped from the cliff not to embrace death, but simply to avoid dying at the hands of that little girl gathering pigweed!
But how could she avoid death?
With her eyes closed, she pondered this question, but where could she find an answer?
She fell faster and faster, the wind growing more fierce.
And so, the more she thought, the colder she felt—lost and helpless.
Suddenly, she recalled a line the Holy Empress had said to her when she left the capital years ago.
"Phoenix child, it's fine to fear pain, but don't fear death—especially... you."
Then, her eyes opened.
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(With a draft saved, this is the confidence. Written so calmly and powerfully.)