"Is there anything we can do to stop it?" Yuan asked them.
"There is none! I'll try to stop it. The rest of you run away!" Grandpa Lan said, prepared to lay down his own life for them.
However, Yuan said to him, "No! I will take care of it!"
"What?! You'll die!" Lan Yingying said to him.
"That's fine. I won't die forever even if I die. However, that might not be the case for you guys." And without waiting for them to respond, Yuan made his move, flying towards the Demon Lord.
"Wait! Young man!" Grandpa Lan tried to stop him, but alas, Yuan completely ignored him and continued moving forward.
"Hahaha! So you want to die, huh?! This is perfect!" The Demon Lord laughed as its aura grew more volatile and intense.
The Demon Lord was not only getting more powerful, but its body was also glowing redder and redder.
As Yuan got closer to the Demon Lord, he wondered if there was anything he could do, but alas, he could not think of any methods that would save him in this desperate situation.
"Hmph! So what if I die? I'll just respawn! So what if I lose my cultivation base? I'll just cultivate some more! If I become a cripple, it won't be my first time! And it's not like I won't be able to walk or move! I'll still be able to explore this world— whether I'm a cultivator or not!"
Yuan changed direction midway, leading the Demon Lord further away from the Lan Family.
Of course, the Demon Lord was more than happy to chase after Yuan even if it wouldn't be able to kill the Lan Family. In its eyes, he would do the other demons a bigger favor if it killed Yuan, who was a much bigger threat than the Lan Family could ever be.
"Do you really think you can outrun me?!" The Demon Lord laughed as it got closer and closer to Yuan.
Even though Yuan's strength could rival even a Spirit Lord as a Spirit Grandmaster, his flying speed was an entirely different story.
Slowly but surely, the Demon Lord caught up to Yuan, and it was just a matter of time before it blew its entire cultivation up.
Yuan stopped running away once they were far enough from the Lan Family, and there was no point when he knew that he wouldn't outrun the Demon Lord.
"In just a few seconds, I will blow up, and everything within ten thousand meters will disappear with me!" The Demon Lord laughed out loud as it hovered a few meters away from Yuan.
"Go ahead. You'll be the only one dying, anyway." Yuan shrugged in a nonchalant manner, dumbfounding the Demon Lord.
"You're not afraid of dying?" The Demon Lord frowned.
"I won't die."
"Bullshit! You're not immortal! Not even a Spirit King would survive a Core Detonation at this level!" The Demon Lord didn't believe Yuan.
Yuan didn't bother responding to it and calmly stared at the Demon Lord that was almost petrified at this moment.
"Oooh! I can feel it! Power overwhelming my body! Hahaha! It's about time! Die for me, human!" The Demon Lord laughed out loud until it exploded.
It was at this moment Yuan thought about logging off to escape the explosion, but alas...
[You cannot log off during combat]
A second later, the Demon Lord's body suddenly began twisting and turning in a spiraling motion, almost like a black hole had appeared inside its body and was consuming the Demon Lord inside-out.
The Demon Lord's body twisted until it was the size and shape of a small pebble, almost like a glass marble of sorts.
This pebble then glowed brightly before exploding with a massive amount of spiritual energy.
Yuan immediately used the Empyrean Overlord to protect himself by placing it in front of his face. However, the explosion was too large and powerful, and Yuan could feel everything below his chest disappear almost instantly.
"Ah!"
Yuan was overwhelmed with pain, losing consciousness almost immediately.
Meanwhile, the Lan Family could see a bright light in the distance, followed by a strong earthquake a second later.
"Yuan!" Lan Yingying felt her heart being squeezed when she saw this light, and tears quickly flowed from her eyes.
"Alas… This young man actually sacrificed his life for us…" Grandpa Lan sighed, feeling an indescribable feeling in his heart.
Many of the participants in the Mystic Realm were also able to see this bright light in the sky, as it was like a second sun that had suddenly appeared in the world.
The sun created by the Demon Lord remained for a good minute before it finally began to subside.
The Lan Family went to the scene of the explosion in hopes to find Yuan's remains, but alas, they were unable to find him, almost like he'd disappeared from this world.
"As expected, his body has completely disintegrated from the Demon Lord's Core Detonation…" Grandpa Lan sighed.
After all, even he wouldn't survive such a devastating attack, much less a Spirit Grandmaster with a human body.
"Yingying, make sure you take care of that baby… That young man sacrificed his own life so that you two— all of us could live…" Grandma Lan said to her in a griefing tone.
"I understand…" Lan Yingying nodded, still with tears in her eyes.
Meanwhile, about a hundred miles away from where the explosion had occurred, a body that was anything but complete laid on the ground, looking like a corpse that had recently been chewed on by wild animals.
"Heavens… That almost scared me to death…" The voice of a young lady resounded after this disfigured body suddenly dropped from the sky and landed behind her.
"Just what on earth happened to this person? His body looks like it'd just ate an explosion. Was he a victim of that random explosion just now?" The young lady inspected the corpse out of curiosity, not feeling grossed out by the awful sight that would normally make any young lady's stomach churn with disgust.
"Hmm? And why does it feel like I have seen him somewhere before?"
Ding!
[Perfect Regeneration has activated!]