The white gold qi around Isemeine seemed to form a gaseous nebula. It sparkled in the air, sometimes sparse, sometimes concentrated, but always free flowing.

Facing her, Ryu's own aura imploded as well, veins of red coursing out from his eyes and along his cheeks. His qi continued to climb, the Nether Qi around him concentrating into such a solid mass that it began to be visible even to Isemeine.

'Heaven Gate!'

Ryu roared into the skies, his steps heavy as he took a step forward.

A massive golden gate hung before him, its pressure bearing down on him like the weight of a mountain. Yet, he still took a second step, then a third.

With each one he took, the air beneath him shattered, the mountain ranged below erupting into a rain of rock and rubble.

Ryu's cultivation suddenly soared.

Lower Connecting Heaven Realm Middle Higher Peak Half-Step Immortal Ring Realm!

Ryu felt his meridians dilating and trembling, qi coursed through his body in wild waves, the crackling lightning flame that coated him increasing a level in denseness.

In the blink of an eye, Ryu had progress through more than 500 years of cultivation.

Ryu knew that if he holed himself up and did nothing but cultivate, he could even reach the Immortal Ring Realm in 200 years, let alone 500 for the mere Half-Step Immortal Ring Realm. However, despite seeing this, he wasn't disappointed in the slightest Because the Heaven Gate didn't focus on just one aspect like the Earth Gate did.

Ryu Vital Qi burst with vitality, his bodily strength spilling over and crashing through his Vessels and Pulses.

Middle Vessel Tempering. Higher Vessel Tempering Peak Vessel Tempering Half-Step Blood Tempering!

Ryu's body trembled and whined with 500 million jin of strength, more than crossing over the strength threshold for a Half-Step Path Extinction Realm expert.

As though that wasn't already enough

The sound of a resounding barrier shattering called out.

'Dominion.'

Tendrils of qi shot in every which direction. Ryu's body pulsed with so much strength that he almost couldn't control it all.

His Great Swordstaffs seemed to have a mind of their own. But, they trembled to the point they shattered, disappearing into the wind in motes of sparkling dust.

Ryu hardly flinched when this happened.

His eyes placid, he called forth his grimoire.

Black streaks of lightning surged with swirls of violet qi pulsing about it. As though they had a mind of their own, they formed into two new Great Swordstaffs, looking even more solid than their originals had been.

A heated breath left Ryu's lips, sparking flames that danced about in his surroundings. Lost in his new strength, Ryu didn't even care that Isemeine was practically frozen in the air. Beneath his Dominion, let alone control qi, even controlling her own body had become a problem.

Even now, Isemeine was still in the Rule Realm with her spear. The only people she had ever seen wield Dominions were all in the Cosmic Seed Realm at worst. What kind of joke was this?!

She knew exactly which ability Ryu had just used, but without undoing seals up to the Cosmic Realm, the maximum Ryu should be able to progress himself would be 1000 years. If he wanted to go beyond 1000 years, he would have to undo the 100th seal.

There was no way that Ryu could have already reached such a stage. She could tell that he wasn't even a hundred years old yet, so how was this happening?

How many millions of years did most need to comprehend a Dominion? How could his Pupils conclude that he would need less than a thousand?!

'Dammit!' Isemeine roared in her mind.

She knew she had no choice left. She didn't even bother to clash with Ryu even once to reach such a conclusion. Even if nothing else about Ryu changed other than his Dominion, she would be crushed. The fact that his cultivation had seen such a large improvement as well led her to believe that even Ryu hadn't expected this, or else he would have chosen to use Earth Gate instead.

The price for Heaven Gate was even heavier than that of Earth Gate. Ryu didn't experience the backlash for the latter only because he directly gained Ailsa's Primordial Yin right after and broke through numerous seals that made it negligible.

But, using Heaven Gate now was almost equivalent to signing away the right to do so again for at least the next decade unless there was a major improvement in his undone seals.

However, Ryu didn't regret it. He didn't just need to beat Isemeine, he needed to crush her. He needed to grind her dignity beneath his feet and destroy her from the inside out.

Those words she had spoken Could never be forgiven.

The moment Ryu shot forward, Isemeine's roared at the top of her lungs. Energy she hadn't wanted to use suddenly came bubbling forth.

The nebula of gaseous qi around her suddenly solidified, snapping back toward her body like a rubber band until her skin began to glow like a golden buddha.

"You asked for this!"

Isemeine's fury reached untold levels. When she thought about the consequences of what she was going to do, she just wanted to see the world burn.

However, what she would have never expected, was that even in such a state, she hardly registered when Ryu moved.

Before she could understand what was happening, the flat of a flaming blade slapped against he side of her head, sending her flying into a nearby mountain range.

' What?'

Isemeine was dazed. She couldn't wrap her head around what had just happened. It couldn't be that

BANG!

Isemeine felt her chest almost cave in as two feet landed on top of her. She didn't even feel the humiliation of her breasts being deformed in such a foul and insensitive way. All she felt was a pain that almost made her cough up her lungs.

Air jetted out from her mouth before a fountain of blood erupted from between her lips.

She hardly accepted these new pain signals before the weight on her chest vanished and a sudden pull came at her short hair.

BANG!

Isemeine's face slammed into the surface of a mountain, the grip she had on her golden spear holding on by just a thread.