Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

Shen Haoran was sitting perfectly relaxed upon the edge of the silk-lined bed inside the grand master bedroom of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, his liquid gold eyes fixed calmly on the silhouette of Qing’er.

She sat cross-legged in the absolute center of the wide mattress, her long black hair floating lightly in the air as an incredibly dense, powerful, and reality-warping aura of pure Yin and Yang violently swirled around her bare flesh.

The chaotic, world-shaking properties of her Yin Origin Sacred Physique, which had previously been locked behind an absolute physical constraints, were now completely, seamlessly blending with the primordial essence of his Yang Essence via the Gold Incinerating Supreme Flame.

The dual cultivation had allowed him to break through to the 9th Stage of Nascent Soul Realm, and at the same time, allowed Qing’er to finally awaken and evolve her physique to its fullest potential.

The Yin Yang Origin Sacred Physique!

*CRACK!*

Just then, the infinite, burning golden sky above Haoran’s private pocket dimension violently rumbled, letting out a deep, earth-shaking vibration that caused the solid, pitch-black outer god metal ground a hundred meters below the fortress to sharply ring.

”Hm?” Haoran tilted his handsome head upward, his golden pupils calmly tracing the sudden, unnatural movement through the high spatial layers.

Massive, swirling vortexes of pitch-black, violet-tinted dark clouds were rapidly, aggressively gathering directly beneath the sea of genesis flame, completely blocking out the golden light as they began to compress the localized space with a suffocating, primitive weight.

”Heavenly Tribulation, huh.”

He did not find the sudden, apocalyptic manifestation of this heavenly tribulation even a single fraction surprising.

After all, the impartial consciousness of the world’s laws will always naturally, aggressively appear to strike down any entity attempting to break past the mortal ceiling, completely regardless of exactly where you are situated across the infinite star systems.

Even inside the boundaries of the hidden Shen Clan Domain, which was heavily fortified by countless Supreme and Immortal arrays of the ancestors, the descent of thunder was absolutely no exception to the cosmic rule, much less here inside the borders of his still fragile, newly birthed, and structurally incomplete micro-world.

The moment Qing’er’s core broke past its final limitations inside his domain, the universal laws of the outer heavens automatically pierced through the dimensional rifts to enforce their judgment.

At that precise, terminal fraction of a microsecond, the dark black clouds let out a sudden, deafening roar of violet lightning, and Qing’er’s closed eyelids violently flew open.

Her sharp, crimson-red eyes flared with a brilliant light of absolute defiance.

She didn’t voice a single word of panic; her bare body merely shifted, and she instantly, completely disappeared from the surface of the velvet bed sheets.

In a flash of pure, logic-defying spatial velocity, her physical form reappeared directly in the open, freezing air of the high golden sky, standing entirely alone and unyielding beneath the center of the massive thunder vortex to directly confront the wrath of the Heavenly Tribulation.

She does not want to implicate her young master, nor damage his Imperial Artifact.

Haoran remained perfectly seated within the luxury of the Babylon’s master bedroom, his posture loose, elegant, and entirely unbothered by the cosmic storm raging outside his windows.

He lazily raised his right hand, his slender fingers making a smooth, casual waving motion through the empty air.

*HUMMM!*

At that exact second, responding fluidly to his sovereign command, a massive, crystal-clear holographic projection screen violently materialized into existence directly in front of his face.

The translucent blue interface perfectly, dynamically tracked and displayed the real-time, high-altitude tactical feed of Qing’er’s silhouette as she stood naked and absolute against the gathering doom of the sky.

Back in the sky, with Qing’er.

The pitch-black vortex of tribulation clouds violently twisted into a tight, spinning funnel directly above her head, the violet and black lightning arcs coiling together until they condensed into a single, blinding spear of raw, entropic destruction.

*BOOM!*

The first strike descended with a catastrophic velocity, a massive bolt of absolute, sky-splitting violet lightning tearing through the golden genesis flames to slam directly into Qing’er’s exposed shoulders.

The raw kinetic impact shook the very foundation of the air, but her pale skin merely flared with a deep, liquid black aura of primordial Yin force.

She didn’t move an inch; her body naturally, effortlessly absorbed the entire electrical current, converting the destructive laws of the outer heaven into pure, unadulterated refinement fuel for her newly awakened Sacred Physique.

This was made possible due to her Forbidden Shadow Art, a Cultivation Technique that Feng Yuyan created for the Shadow Guards.

To successfully let them survive various body modification to enhance talent and strength, this art allows them to adapt and get stronger through dangerous circumstances.

Although Qing’er, due to her superior innate talent, didn’t have her body modified, she still practiced this technique and endured far greater torture because of it.

*BOOM! BOOM!*

Without granting her a single second of operational recovery, the tribulation clouds roared in a furious anger, unleashing the Second Strike and the Third Strike simultaneously.

Two colossal, twisting dragons of pure, condensed black thunder violently spiraled downward, their jaws open as they ruthlessly slammed against her chest and thighs.

Qing’er’s crimson eyes narrowed into sharp, clinical lines as she aggressively thrust her slender arms outward, her hands gathering a blinding, brilliant shield of pure, solar Yang-qi that she had obtained after awakening her Sacred Physique.

The burning hot solar shield violently clashed against the black thunder dragons, creating a massive, blinding explosion of light that completely vaporized the surrounding golden flame that formed the sky, yet her physical body remained perfectly anchored in the sky, her long black hair billowing wildly within the sovereign storm.

*BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!*

The universal laws felt insulted by her unbending resistance.

The vortex violently turned an absolute shade of blood-red, and the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Strikes descended in a seamless, synchronized trident of pure, space-shearing destruction.

These bolts were no longer made of common plasma; they were composed of high-tier Primal Chaos Thunder—a dark, entropic energy that possessed the absolute capacity to dissolve a cultivator’s soul without even leaving a spiritual fragments upon a single graze.

Through the translucent holographic screen, Haoran watched her performance with a calm, appreciative smirk playing on his lips.

Facing the descending trident of chaos, Qing’er’s bare body began to rotate in a slow, remarkably beautiful, and ancient martial dance mid-air.

She elegantly wove her arms through the space, forcefully pulling the localized streams of Yin and Yang together to form a spinning, recursive energetic vortex around her skin.

The three massive bolts of chaos thunder slammed directly into her recursive loop, but instead of detonating her flesh, the strikes were systematically, mechanically broken down, filtered, and stripped of their destructive intent by her shifting polarities, the spent energy flowing smoothly down into her lower dantian to permanently fortify her rising cultivation realm.

The sky went completely, deathly silent for a long three seconds.

The tribulation clouds compressed until they were only a fraction of their original width, but the density of the lightning stored within the core was now so overwhelmingly immense that the black metallic ground below began to violently melt into liquid slag.

*BOOM! BOOM!*

The Seventh Strike and the Eighth Strike fired and shattered the spatial fabric of the domain as they shot downward.

They manifested as two gargantuan, solid lances of absolute, multi-colored heavenly judgment thunder that targeted not her physical flesh, but the very structural core of her soul.

”AAAAHHHH!” Qing’er let out a loud, sharp cry of pure, unbridled martial focus, her crimson eyes burning with an absolute, terrifying intensity.

She completely abandoned all defensive stances, her bare arms reaching upward toward the descending lances as she aggressively, completely unleashed the total, unrestricted output of her newly evolved Physique.

The two lances of heavenly judgment slammed straight through her palms, the sheer, unimaginable kinetic and spiritual pressure causing her white jade skin to crack with a dozen glowing silver lines of stress.

Blood began to bubble at the corners of her lips, her body violently shaking as she fought an internal war against the outer heaven’s executioners.

But her devotion to Haoran was an absolute iron wall that could not be breached by pain.

With a final, desperate surge of willpower, she forcefully clenched her fists, using her own channels to violently snap the two lances of thunder into broken, sparkling fragments of raw spiritual energy.

”...haa~! Haa~!” She breathed heavily, looking up with firm determination, ”...just one more. One more.”

Finally... the absolute, terminal climax of the Tribulation arrived.

The remaining dark clouds completely collapsed into a single, microscopic point of pure, infinite density directly above her forehead, before violently erupting into the sky-shattering Ninth Strike.

This was the Saint Annihilation Lightning—a solitary, silent beam of pure white, blinding heavenly lightning that dropped down from the void with an absolute finality, packing enough raw, concentrated destruction to cleanly erase an entire minor realm from the face of reality.

Qing’er looked up at the descending white light, a sharp, cold smirk that perfectly mirrored Haoran’s own predatory expressions forming on her beautiful, blood-stained lips.

She did not retreat, and she did not build a shield.

*HUMMMMM!*

Instead, at that exact second of her absolute ascension, an immensely grand, mountain-sized, and completely magnificent symbol of the primordial Yin and Yang violently, spectacularly materialized into existence directly behind her floating bare back.

The colossal cosmic wheel spun with a slow, majestic grace, its left half composed of absolute, starlight absorbing pitch black darkness, and its right half composed of blinding, golden solar flame.

The white beam of the Ninth Strike slammed dead into the center of the spinning cosmic symbol.

The clash between the two was completely, utterly silent.

The grand Yin and Yang wheel smoothly, flawlessly rotated by a single degree, and the entire world breaking volume of the final white lightning beam was instantly, completely, and beautifully absorbed straight into the matrix of the symbol!

And without hesitation, she completely neutralized and converted it into a permanent, radiating halo of pure, unblemished power that enveloped her body.

The dark clouds seemed to acknowledge her Ascension as they completely vanished from the golden sky, the golden genesis flames returning to illuminate the micro-cosmos.

Qing’er stood tall in the center of the air, her crimson eyes shining like twin stars as the massive symbol of the polarities slowly dissolved into her flesh, her path having successfully, flawlessly conquered the heavens under the eyes of her master.