Lauren didn’t hesitate. Before he could even summon his flying boat, she’d already pulled out her own—a faster, higher-grade vessel that gleamed with layered defensive arrays.

  Along the journey, she’d let Dante handle their travel arrangements without complaint. But this wasn’t the time to play nice. When you were running for your life, speed was everything.

  They leapt aboard, and the boat shot forward like a streak of light.

  Meanwhile, far away in Thunder Sect, Gerald—whose consciousness was linked to the bead—jerked upright from meditation.

  “Oh no! Dante and the others are under attack by a seventh-level demonic beast!”

  “What?” someone shouted. “A seventh-level beast?!”

  “Is Junior Sister with them?”

  Gerald’s expression darkened. “She is. Logan, check the soul lamps! I’m going to alert Master-Uncle!”

  With a flash, Gerald turned into a streak of golden light and shot toward Starfell Summit.

  Back in the desert, Dante gripped the controls of the flying boat, pushing its defensive formations to full strength. The craft tore through the air, streaking toward the horizon.

  Lauren pulled out a stack of Explosive Spirit Talismans—hundreds of them, all personally drawn in her spare time—and handed them to Nash and Westin.

  “Throw them behind us. Every single one.”

  The two didn’t need to be told twice.

  The first few detonations went off like a chain of thunderclaps. Then Nash’s eyes went wide in realization.

  “Holy shit, these are different! The spiritual energy consumption is almost nothing—these things practically detonate themselves!”

  Even mid-flight, Westin grinned. “Ms. Lauren’s talismans are cheating!”

  They weren’t strong enough to kill the old man outright—he was far beyond that—but the relentless barrage slowed him down. Each explosion scorched his once-silvery beard blacker and blacker until it looked like burnt straw.

  That pushed him over the edge.

  “You little bastards!” the old man howled, tearing through the air after them. “I’ll flay your souls and scatter your ashes!”

  Lauren didn’t flinch. She reached into her storage ring and pulled out a small, unassuming sphere—Drake’s detonator.

  She had only one.

  And she’d been saving it for something exactly like this.

  “Hold on,” she said quietly.

  Another explosion rocked the air. The white-bearded monster, still mid-curse, was caught off guard as one of the talismans detonated right in front of him. The blast slammed into his chest, sending him sprawling headfirst into the sand.

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  “Now,” Lauren whispered.

  She hurled the detonator.

  The moment it left her hand, the world went white.

  BOOM!

  The explosion wasn’t sound—it was existence itself shattering.

  Lightning split the sky into pieces. Dozens—no, hundreds—of purple bolts came crashing down, each one heavy enough to crush mountains. The air turned electric; the earth vaporized.

  The white-bearded old man didn’t even have time to scream before the bolts struck him, slamming him into the desert and burying him in a crater nearly ten miles wide. The sand melted into glass. The horizon burned violet.

  When the light finally faded, silence fell.

  Everyone on the flying boat just stared, mouths open.

  Nash was the first to speak, voice trembling. “That… that was the Immortal Venerable’s thunder, wasn’t it?”

  Lauren nodded, still half in shock.

  “Holy shit.” She murmured. She had been carrying it around in her ring for over a year.

  Dante rushed to the edge of the flying boat, watching the enormous crater shrink into the distance.

  “Is it dead?” he asked.

  Lauren shook her head, her voice unsteady. “I don’t know. But it has to be. The Immortal Venerable’s thunder isn’t something a seventh-level beast can just walk off.”

  They wanted to believe it. The thing’s hide had been thick as steel—even Dante’s blade had barely managed to scratch the fourth-tier variant they’d faced before. This one was on another level entirely.

  Still, none of them dared to turn back and check. They just kept the boat flying at full speed until the dark pit was a smudge on the horizon.

  Only then did they dare exhale. Each of them swallowed Restoring Spirit Pills, circulating their qi to recover their strength.

  The quiet didn’t last.

  Without warning, a deafening roar split the air.

  A monstrous shadow shot out of the distant crater, slicing through the air like a missile. A storm of sand billowed behind it, blotting out the horizon.

  “You little bastards!” the white-bearded voice thundered from within the dust cloud. “You’ve pissed me off for real this time!”

  Their relief shattered instantly.

  “It’s not dead!” Westin shouted. “It’s chasing us!”

  Dante sprinted back to the cockpit, hands flying over the control seals. “Don’t panic! It’s badly wounded. It can’t even maintain its human form anymore. It won’t catch us!”

  But his words didn’t help much. The others could see the truth—each time they looked back, the shadow was closer.

  As the saying went: a dying camel is still bigger than a horse. And this was no camel.

  Lauren’s expression hardened. “Do you all have Thousand-Mile Talismans?”

  Everyone nodded grimly.

  “Good. We’ll try one last assault. If that doesn’t work, we scatter. Use the talismans to escape in different directions. It can only chase one of us at most. Whoever survives, regroup at the great beast.”

  The others exchanged glances. No one wanted to abandon anyone else, but they knew she was right.

  The sandstorm drew closer. The sky darkened.

  “I see an opening!” Dante shouted. “Its armor’s cracked—I’m going in first!”

  Before anyone could stop him, his body merged with his golden sword, transforming into a blinding arc of light. He shot from the flying boat like a comet, cutting through the desert twilight.

  “Dante!” Lauren called, but he was already gone.

  The giant lizard roared, towering above the dunes, and raised one massive claw to meet him.

  The collision lit up the sky.

  Dante’s sword strike pierced clean through the monster’s forearm, leaving a gaping, smoking hole.

  For the first time, the creature howled in pain.

  That was all the opening they needed.

  “Now!” Lauren shouted.

  Nash and Westin unleashed the Explosive Spirit Talismans—hundreds of them, raining down like meteors.

  Each explosion lit up the desert like daylight, the sky painted orange and white. The stench of scorched flesh filled the air as chunks of burned armor and blood rained down.

  The lizard thrashed wildly, bellowing in fury, but it was wounded, slower, weaker. The thunderbolt had shredded its scales, leaving its body half-exposed and bleeding.

  They didn’t stop.

  Lauren launched ice talismans one after another, freezing the sand beneath its feet. Dante, regaining his form, slashed through its tendons, driving his golden sword deep into its flank.

  The battle raged until the sunset bled away and night took the sky.

  When the last talisman detonated, the desert was silent except for the sound of crackling fire. The monster’s massive body—half charred, half buried in sand—finally slumped forward.

  Its head hit the ground with a heavy thud.

  No one spoke.

  They just watched, breathing hard, every muscle tense.