Hua Yang Zhenjun's fingers bit into Dun Che's throat like steel talons, the fox demon's choked gasps echoing through the skeletal forest of dragon remains. Zhao Rui stood frozen atop a petrified ribcage, the Ten Thousand Laws Tome burning against his chest as golden droplets of Dragon King's Blood seeped through cracks in the crystal amphora. Each falling bead struck ancient bone with a hiss of reawakening power.
"Your sentimental weakness disgusts me," Hua Yang sneered, watching Zhao Rui's face for cracks in resolve. The True Monarch's free hand crackled with Skyrend Crucible energy—prismatic death held at bay only by the hostage's value. "Surrender the relics, or watch your pet's soul unravel strand by strand."
Dun Che's amber eyes met Zhao Rui's through the haze of pain. Blood foamed at the corners of his mouth as he forced words through crushed windpipes. "Brother... run..."
The plea ignited something primal in Zhao Rui's dantian. Golden motes swarmed his vision, their song harmonizing with the faintest tremor beneath his boots—the dragon femur absorbing spilled blood.
"I said release him!" Zhao Rui's roar shook coral dust from crumbling arches.
Hua Yang's laughter dripped with triumph. "Or what? You'll—?"
The ground buckled.
Awakening Leviathan
What began as a tremor became a seismic roar. The skeletal ribcage beneath Zhao Rui's feet twisted, jagged edges knitting into opalescent scales that hummed with resurrected fury. Golden Blood pooled in the relic's fractures, its luminescence intensifying as the dead dragon's vertebrae began coiling like a serpent reborn.
Hua Yang's sneer faltered. "Impossible! The Rebirth Cycle was sealed by—"
The dragonbone tail lashed out.
Chaos Unleashed
Zhao Rui dove sideways as thirty meters of resurrected fury smashed through petrified coral. Hua Yang barely raised a barrier in time, the impact sending shockwaves that pulverized nearby pillars into crystalline shrapnel.
Dun Che seized the distraction. His claws—still slick with his own blood—raked across Hua Yang's forearm in a spray of golden ichor. The True Monarch's grip loosened just enough.
"Now!" Zhao Rui's spatial bracelet flared.
Reality folded.
Dun Che reappeared mid-air three li away, coughing seawater and curses. "Since when... can bones... bite?"
No time for answers. The resurrected dragon skeleton was thrashing in full berserk rage, its hollow eye sockets blazing with stolen Golden Blood. Zhao Rui glimpsed the truth—this wasn't true resurrection, but a blood-mad puppet dancing to the Tome's discordant song.
Hua Yang ascended on a platform of crystallized rage. "You think dead lizards frighten me?"
The Skyrend Crucible vomited a prismatic tsunami. Spectral blades sheared through the dragon's ribcage, reducing millennia-old bones to smoking shards.
Desperation's Gambit
Zhao Rui smashed the amphora against the nearest intact skeleton.
Golden Blood cascaded over bleached vertebrae.
Two more draconic forms stirred—then five—then a dozen. The throne hall became a maelstrom of resurrected fury as bone dragons turned on anything living. A Huashan disciple screamed as serrated talons pinned him to a wall. A Demon Sect acolyte dissolved mid-transformation, his demonic avatar shredded by three converging skeletal maws.
Hua Yang's barrier flickered under concentrated assault. "Madman! You've doomed us all!"
Zhao Rui didn't disagree. The Tome's pages were vibrating with manic glee, their golden script rewriting itself to match the dragons' frenzied movements. Every spilled drop of Golden Blood strengthened the horde.
Dun Che materialized at his side, fur matted with blood and algae. "Plan?"
"Same as always." Zhao Rui tossed him the fractured amphora. "Distract."
The fox demon's grin revealed a missing fang. "Magnificently."
Sacrifice and Salvation
Dun Che's charge was a masterpiece of calculated insanity. He bounded across resurrected dragon spines, lobbing stolen talismans and insults with equal fervor.
"Baldy! Your mother was a sea slug!" A frost grenade froze a pursuing bone dragon mid-lunge.
"Your crucible looks like a chamber pot!" A plasma charge detonated at Hua Yang's feet.
The True Monarch's focus fractured. Maintaining barriers against the dragon horde while countering Dun Che's guerilla tactics stretched even his Tribulation Transcendence cultivation to its limits.
Zhao Rui moved.
The God-Sealing Tome guided his path through the chaos—a dancer weaving between snapping jaws and Hua Yang's erratic counterstrikes. Golden Blood dripped from his sleeves, each accidental spill rousing new defenders.
Hua Yang sensed the trap too late.
The Price Paid
Zhao Rui's palm struck the floor, the final drops of Golden Blood seeping into the Dragon King's primordial altar.
The throne hall screamed.
Every resurrected skeleton froze mid-motion, then turned as one toward Hua Yang. The True Monarch's crucible flared in panicked defense, but a hundred draconic maws struck as a single entity.
Lightning arced. Coral vaporized. When the dust cleared, Hua Yang stood amidst shattered barriers—robes torn, hair white with strain, but very much alive.
"Clever," he spat, blood trickling from a split lip. "But insufficient."
Zhao Rui smiled. Behind Hua Yang, the largest skeleton—the Dragon King's own remains—slowly raised a claw dripping with the last golden droplets.
"You're right," Zhao Rui said. "It was never about beating you."
The claw descended.
Escape Through Chaos
The throne hall collapsed in a symphony of breaking bones and curses. Zhao Rui grabbed Dun Che's scruff as spatial teleportation whisked them through disintegrating reality.
They emerged amidst the ruins of the Hall of Celestial Treasures, the Tome's pages glowing like a distress beacon.
Dun Che stared at the amphora shard still clutched in his paw. "We lost the Blood."
"Did we?" Zhao Rui opened his palm—a single golden droplet hovered above his skin, its light refracting into the Ten Thousand Laws Tome's waiting pages.
The scripture drank the essence greedily. New glyphs bloomed across vellum—draconic commandments from an age when gods still walked mortal realms.
Somewhere in the collapsing depths, Hua Yang's enraged roar shook the ocean floor.
Dun Che grinned through broken teeth. "Same time next week?"
Zhao Rui's laughter mingled with the Dragon King's final, fading roar.