Chapter 98: Demon vs barry and Qing yan

“Who goes there?!”

The booming voice of the Demon Vanguard Scout ripped through the quiet mountain pass. His burning, sulfur-yellow eyes whipped toward the thicket where we were crouching. He raised his massive executioner’s axe, pointing it directly at our hiding spot as a foul, toxic red smoke bled from his armor. “Show yourselves, human rats!”

“If you insist,” I muttered, preparing to step forward. But before I could even move, the brush beside me rustled violently. Qing Yan didn’t just step out—she erupted. Driven by an unbridled, furious hatred for the monsters who had slaughtered her sect and turned her people into slaves, she forced her core to activate.

A massive circle of fire sparked around her feet, and the translucent silk of her new vermilion gown whipped wildly in the wind as her Genesis Peak aura flared.

The Vanguard Leader’s jaw dropped slightly at her staggering beauty, but as his eyes registered her clear features and the long earrings catching the sun, his expression twisted into a foul, mocking sneer.

“Well, well, look what crawled out of the cages!” the demon boomed, his laughter echoing off the stone cliffs like cracking bone. “I wondered where that high-tier slave bitch disappeared to! You managed to break your seals, girl? Look at you, dressed up in luxury silks like a bride. It doesn’t matter. You’re coming straight back to the chains!”

“The only thing I am doing right now,” Qing Yan hissed, her teeth grinding together as her entire frame trembled with rage, “is sending you to hell!”

She thrust her palms forward, unleashing a massive, roaring firestorm to incinerate the front line. The flames exploded outward, tearing through the ground with terrifying heat.

BOOM!

But the Vanguard Leader didn’t crash back like his lower-tier scouts. He was a seasoned high-tier commander sent specifically by the Demon Lords to investigate the forest, possessing a brutal, crushing physical strength and enchanted platemail. He swung his massive executioner’s axe in a

circular motion, unleashing a wave of oppressive, dark red demonic fog that slammed directly into her firestorm, forcing the flames to crackle and stall in mid-air.

“Hahaha! Is that all you got?!” the Vanguard Leader mocked, lifting his weapon high into the air as he broke through the smoke, lunging forward with a ferocious grin right at her. “Die, slave!”

Qing Yan’s eyes narrowed as she stood her ground, her body glowing with fire as she prepared to clash with the blade, but the sheer physical weight of his oncoming strike was immense.

Seeing the sheer power behind the demon boss’s attack, the playful smile vanished from my face. My eyes narrowed, and the absolute, boundary-breaking pressure of my newly stabilized Meridian Stage, He was powerful, but against my newly achieved strength, the battlefield belonged to me.

‘You’ve got a lot of nerve talking to my woman like that,’ I thought.

Utilizing my insane new speed, I vanished from my position. To the demon boss and his scouts, it didn’t even look like a blur—I simply ceased to exist in that space.

CRACK!

I reappeared directly in front of Qing Yan, stepping right into the path of the descending weapon. Without even drawing a blade, I raised my left hand, coating my fist in a solid, blinding shield of pure, compressed golden aura. The massive executioner’s axe slammed directly against my bare fist.

The collision sounded like a clap of thunder, sending a violent shockwave tearing across the path, but the axe stopped dead in its tracks. It couldn’t move a single millimeter deeper.

“What?! Impossible!” the Vanguard Leader gasped, his eyes widening in total, primal terror as he tried to pull his weapon back. The realization hit him like a physical blow—he was completely outmatched by the sheer density of the golden energy radiating from my body.

I looked up at the monster, a dangerous, arrogant smile breaking across my face.

“Hey, big guy,” I murmured,

“You talk a lot of game for a guy who’s swinging a glorified butter knife. Did you really think you could touch her while I’m standing here?”

With a casual twist of my wrist, I gripped the edge of the blade and squeezed.

SHATTER!

The executioner’s axe violently exploded into a thousand molten shards, the metal flying across the dirt as the Vanguard Leader stumbled backward, his hands bleeding and his chest completely exposed.

I didn’t stop there. Turning my head back slightly toward Qing Yan, who was watching with her mouth open in pure shock, I gave her a reassuring wink. “Hey, take a second to breathe. I told you I’d take responsibility, didn’t I? Let your man handle the lifting with this big guy.”

“B-Barry…” she whispered, her cheeks instantly re-igniting into a brilliant, crimson despite the ongoing battle. She clutched her vermilion robes tighter around herself, her long earrings swaying as she stared at my back in absolute awe.

“Insolent human pests! Kill them both!” the Vanguard Leader screamed frantically to his men, backing away in a panic.

Dozens of armored perimeter scouts drew their weapons and charged toward us from all sides, trying to surround us.

But Qing Yan didn’t step back or hide behind me. Hearing the enemy charge, her fierce, battle-hardened pride as a high-tier cultivator roared to life. Her eyes flared with a blazing light, and she shifted her stance, the deep slit of her dress parting beautifully as she swung her leg around, channeling her fire directly into the advancing crowd.

“Don’t think you can handle all the fun, Barry!” she shouted, a confident, slightly irritated smirk breaking through her blushing face. “I am perfectly capable of burning these trash to ashes!”

She launched herself directly into the incoming horde of scouts, her hands weaving intricate mudras as pillars of fire erupted from the earth beneath the demons feet. While I focused on dominating the terrified Vanguard Leader, she moved like a red streak of lightning through the perimeter, her fire vaporizing the armor of any scout who dared to get close to her.

“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” I laughed loudly, my aura erupting outward in a majestic wave that cracked the stone cliffs around us.

“Let’s clean up this camp together!”

With our powers perfectly synchronized, we turned the entire demon encampment into a swirling storm of golden lightning and roaring fire, completely tearing through their forces side-by-side.