According to the rules of the faction battles, no one was allowed to use anyone else's Scarletflame Tome. Fang Bihan's Scarletflame Tome had already been torn up by Tianming, depriving her of a chance to surrender. The rules were drafted like this in order to make the faction battles even more savage, greatly increasing the intensity of the fights.
Tianming had to end this fight as quickly as he could. So far he had managed to stop the attacks from other disciples with Imperealm Sword Formation, so he only mainly had to deal with Fang Hongxuan and Fang Bihan's lifebound beasts. He chose to leave Fang Bihan to Ying Huo after cutting her hand off.
"You should try practicing the Hexapath Samara Sword as well," Tianming said.
"You don’t have to tell me twice. I’ll master it immediately!" Ying Huo said confidently.
"Haha oh you're so naïve. Don't come crying to me later." Tianming then tossed it toward Fang Bihan.
"What the hell!" Ying Huo said, flailing in mid air. What kind of person treated their lifebound beast like this?!
Communicating telepathically, Lan Huang and Meow Meow were cooperating together. The moment the green and black phoenix came towards Tianming, they intercepted them. Lan Huang used its Azure Oceanic Purgatory to block the flames and winds from the two phoenixes as black lightning bolts came blasting out from the thunder clouds conjured by the phoenix. Meow Meow turned into a Regal Chaosfiend and used Ninefold Chaos Thunderscape, blocking all the bolts before being slammed to the ground.
"Trying to play with my lightning?" the black phoenix said with a chuckle, looking down from high above the feline beast.
The next moment, the Regal Chaosfiend suddenly got up with Ninefold Chaos Thunderscape even stronger than before, blasting black lightning bolts all over it. "That was a rather comfortable massage! Give me more!" Meow Meow said, stretching lazily, much to the shock of the Blacksky Thundercloud Phoenix. Did the cat just absorb its ability?
"If you're not going to, then it will be my turn! Go to hell, Chicken Bro!" Meow Meow snickered sadistically, sending out the eighty-one layers of Chaos Disaster the thunderscape had gathered toward the black phoenix. It vented its frustration toward Ying Huo all at once; they were both phoenixes after all. "I want to see you try disturbing me in my sleep again! Flicking my balls? Try that now, won't you?! You can't, can you?!"
Ying Huo felt a chill from behind, only to turn back and sigh in relief that it wasn't the target of the outburst. Was Meow Meow trying to make an example of that phoenix?
The lightning bolts exploded and a charred-black bird fell from the sky. Despite having the advantage of an empyrean gold body, it couldn't compete when it came to abilities—Chaos Disaster in particular.
Meanwhile, Tianming noted that his time was running out, seeing thousands of people trying to breach his Imperealm Sword Formation.
"Right now, Ying Huo and the rest have fewer stars. Even though they’re at the Empyrean Saint stage, they aren't at the fourth level yet and don't have empyrean gold bodies, which puts them at a disadvantage. I have to get them samsara manna after the faction battles. Otherwise my foes will have a huge edge over me!"
It could even be said that, compared to his power without Feiling's boost, Ying Huo and the rest were the most weaker than him they have ever been. Tianming had to solve that problem soon, for they were Primordial Chaos Beasts.
But right now he didn't have the luxury to consider such problems; he was engaged in battle against the raging Fang Hongxuan. His Thousand-Thunder Sword looked like a purple lightning bolt with thousands of small dark purple gems embedded in it, allowing electricity to spark in an arc all across it. However, it couldn't do much damage to a unique body like Tianming's.
"I see that you're so daring that you even look down on us siblings. Since you’re that Jian Xueyi's new pet, I’ll wipe you out to make a path for Azureriver!" As he approached, his sword formed nets of lightning around him, and with a single strike, thunder roared. Darkbolt Trifecta Slash! When the top grade empyrean-ranked battle art struck out, three black bolts of lightning jumped out like wild beasts toward Tianming.
"You really talk a lot. Don't you have other less cliché lines to say?" Tianming remained unmoving amidst the field of lightning. When his foe came charging in, he flipped the finger with his left arm and executed the Hexapath Samsara Sword.
A stream of rainbow-colored sword ki zipped toward Fang Hongxuan at blinding speeds. Right after that, Tianming demonstrated the might of billions. It was as if he ruled all over them. His mastery over the move was growing more and more, becoming closer to the original. Even now, he was still perfecting the sword intent of the Mortal Dao Sword. Back then, he could only achieve really minute mastery, but now he was a tenth of the way there. There was no way the strongest sword art on the continent was only this powerful.
The intricacy of the strike caused a turmoil across the Dimensional Battlefield's audience, though Tianming couldn't hear any of it. He was entirely focused on channeling the sword intent, trying to embody life in one sword and death in the other. It was just one move, yet there were countless variations.
The gold Grand-Orient Sword struck the Thousand-Lightning Sword countless times in a fraction of a second. Fang Hongxuan couldn't harm Tianming at all, but he slowly gave ground from the intense attacks, much to his shock.
"How could you—" Before he could finish, the black Grand-Orient Sword struck like a cobra, embedding itself in his clavicle. His bone was pierced straight through. He cried out in pain, sweat forming on his forehead as an expression of fear surfaced. Instantly, his left arm slumped down.
Tianming's next strike was even more ferocious. With a simple flick of the wrist, the Grand-Orient Sword's tip cut the finger off from his left hand, allowing him to take the spatial ring and completely eradicating the finger at the same time.
Once more, Fang Hongxuan cried out in abject pain as his face paled. The sword in his right hand was still thrusting, only to be blocked by Tianming's gold Grand-Orient Sword. Somehow, he felt like he was fighting two people at once. That was the main advantage of splitting the Grand-Orient Sword; it was like each one had a mind of its own.
"My Scarletflame Tome!" he cried. Tianming had immediately tossed the ring into the ocean, so it was practically impossible to recover.
"It's no more." Tianming cracked a smile as he spun the Grand-Orient Sword around before tapping Fang Hongxuan's head as he would a vegetable on the chopping block. It caused him to bleed and almost made him faint.
"How could you be so strong?! What are you going to do?!"
"Don't worry, as long as you're obedient, I’ll spare you." The smile on Tianming's face gave him a bad feeling.
Tianming bound him tightly with the Three-Thousand Starfield and claimed his sword for himself. Now, Fang Hongxuan was his to play with as he pleased.
Now that that was done, Tianming's's eyes darted around the battlefield. He saw that Meow Meow and Lan Huang were at their limits—their opponents were much stronger than them, so they could only buy time. Ying Huo, however, was doing much better against the handless Fang Bihan.
She was trying to ignore Ying Huo and work with her brother to stop Tianming, but she was too late. Ying Huo took the chance to attack her from behind in a pincer attack with Tianming from the front, using Ninenether Fiendgod Claw. She was just a helpless girl.
"I surrender!" she said, casting her sword away and lifting both arms in the air.
"Now that's more like it!" Given that he was about to be overwhelmed by the disciples of the Azureriver Faction, he would have had to kill them if they didn't surrender. Fortunately, he changed his claw to a normal slap on her head, causing her to spit up blood. She was about to curse about being hit after surrendering, but had no chance when Three-Thousand Starfield wrapped around her.
"If you move, I’ll tear them to shreds!" His voice rang throughout the battlefield. The siblings, having experienced his ruthlessness, didn't dare to even twitch. Tianming had his lifebound beasts come back and took Lan Huang back into his lifebound space for convenience, leaving Ying Huo and Meow Meow behind, each perching on one sibling's head respectively.
They smiled as they watched the other disciples still being shredded by the Imperealm Sword Formation. Most of them were sky saints, and unable to deal with the sword ki at all. Quite a few experienced ones knew to stay behind without charging in. By the time they arrived, Tianming had taken their lords captive.
"Have your subordinates stand down or you’ll lose your remaining fingers!" Tianming grabbed his left hand that only had four fingers remaining.
"Forget it!" he cried.
"Oh? You want to do this the hard way, do you?" Tianming immediately squashed his pinky finger flat.
His cry of agony was so loud that it echoed across the entire battlefield. "Li Tianming, do you ever consider the consequences of your actions? This is the Archaion Sect!" he said, his face pale.