“Humph, nothing is impossible, not when it comes to that Wang Lin,” the Vice-Marshal Xuan muttered inwardly, sighing. Had he not been so haughty, so blind as to underestimate Wang Lin as the others had, he wouldn’t be nursing injuries still.

Apart from the Celestial Marshal, the seven remaining Demon Marshals rose, their gazes sharp as lightning, tinged with disbelief. They fixed upon Wang Lin like drawn swords, a sense of the unfathomable surging within them.

Below, their own Vice-Marshals stared, mouths agape, hearts battered by a tempest.

For all present knew that while some could strike the drum five times, to do so in quick succession, merging each strike’s reverberations, created a backlash of earth-shattering proportions!

Such a violent recoil was beyond the endurance of any Demon General. Even the prodigious Mo Fei could only withstand three such blows. A fourth would surely break him!

Yet, Wang Lin had struck it five times in rapid succession. Had he been wounded or stumbled back, it would have been barely acceptable.

Instead, he stood motionless, as if floating beside the Demon Drum, his countenance serene. The five strikes seemed as though they’d landed upon an ordinary drum, devoid of any backlash.

“This… how is this possible? Am I seeing things? He struck it five times so casually…”

“There must be trickery! The sorcerer has resorted to some foul art!”

“Yu Sen struggled mightily for four, yet he achieves five with such ease! Still, Mo Fei achieved eight, Wang Lin will never surpass that!” Murmurs of astonishment rippled through the crowd.

Wang Lin’s face was not unfamiliar. During the preliminary rounds, he was the first to dare wound a Demon General so grievously, earning him the lasting attention of the demon folk.

However, the scribes, courtiers, noble sons and daughters, the power brokers of the Sky Demon City, did not believe Wang Lin to be truly formidable. They attributed his victory to the weakness of his opponent, Ao Di.

Should Wang Lin face the likes of Mo Fei or Shi Xiao, defeat was inevitable! This was the unwavering conviction of most.

But now, this Wang Lin, whom they held in such low esteem, was casually, almost playfully, striking the Demon Drum five times before their very eyes!

The sight left them utterly stunned.

Some even dared suspect the Demon Drum had malfunctioned. But glancing around, they saw many in their entourage struck dumb, some even rendered unconscious by the merging sound waves. They felt their own demon energies tremble, threatening to break free. The thought of malfunction vanished.

Moreover, radiating outward from the Demon Drum, the tiled ground lay fractured, a testament to the incredible force of the impact.

To cause such devastation within this warded arena defied comprehension.

The Demon Generals, almost to a soul, gasped for breath. Yu Sen’s face bore a bitter expression. He shook his head, abandoning all thought of rivalry with Wang Lin.

The lone female Demon General, Xie Lian, was clad in revealing armor. While a full suit, it accented her curves.

Crimson gauntlets adorned her arms, leaving much of her alabaster flesh bare. The chestplate offered a hint of her slender waist, where a black tattoo snaked down her neck, crossed her chest, and vanished beneath her waist.

Below, armored leaves cascaded in an arc, covering her hips, while greaves hugged her calves. Her bearing was at once martial and alluring.

A helmet concealed her face, save for a pair of luminous eyes that shone with intense interest as she regarded Wang Lin.

Shi Xiao, another Demon General, eyed Wang Lin with open astonishment. Beside him, Chen Tao murmured, “I told you, this one is strong!”

Shi Xiao merely grunted, offering no reply, but his face darkened.

Of the Demon Generals, only Mo Fei remained unperturbed, averting his gaze toward the distant horizon, lost in thought. A disciple of the Great Luo Sword Sect who stood beside him cast a killing glare towards Wang Lin, making no attempt to hide it.

Amidst the uproar, the gold-armored man’s face was a mask of fury. He stared at the Demon Drum, his fists clenched.

Wang Lin withdrew his hand, turning to face the gold-armored man. As he turned, the clamor subsided, and all eyes fell upon him.

“You… have lost,” Wang Lin stated plainly, pointing at the gold-armored man.

At the moment of striking the drum, the rebounding force was met by the Mark of Life surrounding Wang Lin’s body. The force was tremendous, requiring nearly two thousand layers of the Mark to dissipate the energy.

The Mark of Life was self-regenerating, as long as it was not all destroyed at once, it would reappear. That was its true strength.

“No wonder the grey-robed Heavenly Fate Master said he had ten billion Marks of Life to defend himself. Even should the very star of Heavenly Fate shatter, he would be unharmed. Such defense is rare indeed!”

Hearing Wang Lin’s words, the gold-armored man’s face grew darker still. “The Master said you wouldn’t exceed five. Are you daft? Can you not grasp my meaning? You struck it five times, the same number I declared. You have not won!”

Even among the spectators, some sighed, lamenting the narrow-mindedness of the gold-armored steward.

Wang Lin cast the gold-armored man a cold glare, then clenched his fist and struck the Demon Drum once more from behind.

“Dong!” The sixth drumbeat echoed after the previous five, as if resonating within the hearts of all present, causing them to jump.
A tempestuous backlash erupted from the Demon Drum, a force akin to a raging storm. Wang Lin’s hair whipped about his face as the fractured plaza, hundreds of feet around, convulsed anew, as if serpentine leviathans writhed beneath its surface. Shards of stone surged and crashed like ocean waves.

Undaunted, Wang Lin’s fist remained poised. With eyes like chips of glacial ice, he gazed upon the gold-armored warrior whose face had darkened with grim resolve. His fist descended once more.

“DOOM!” The seventh chime of the drum reverberated through the heavens and the earth. Where the previous six strikes unleashed the fury of a tempest, this seventh unleashed a cataclysmic flood!

The demon general, Mo Fei, had withstood six strikes unscathed, but this seventh forced him back, his armor splintering and cracking under the immense pressure. Such was the power of the seventh beat.

As the seventh chime echoed, the very skies shifted and darkened. The sound coalesced into a maelstrom, radiating outward from the Demon Drum in ever-widening circles.

Wang Lin stood unwavering, floating serenely in the air, his fist pressed against the drum’s surface, his gaze fixed upon the gold-clad warrior.

The heavens themselves answered the seventh chime with a thunderous roar. Above, the lightning crackled as Wang Lin’s voice, resonant and deep, echoed through the din.

“Seven strikes.”

A tremor rippled across the gold-armored warrior’s face. He glared at Wang Lin, his voice laced with venom, “I shall recommend you to the Demon Emperor himself!”

Wang Lin shook his head, his voice devoid of emotion. “I want your hand.”

“Insolent fool!” The gold-clad warrior bellowed, his eyes flashing with murderous rage. “Say that again, if you dare!”

“I want…your hand.” The words left Wang Lin’s lips as his fist descended upon the Demon Drum once more, unleashing another earth-shattering BOOM!

“DOOM!” The eighth chime exploded forth like a tidal wave engulfing the world, carrying Wang Lin’s words with it, turning them into countless echoes that swept across the land.

“I WANT YOUR HAND!” The sound consumed all. In that moment, the entire world seemed to exist only for this single, resounding decree.

Amplified by the eighth chime, the very heavens responded, churning with thunder as if the world itself were about to shatter. In the tumultuous echoes, the words were no longer merely spoken by Wang Lin, but proclaimed by the very sky! By the earth! It was the roar of the cosmos, the voice of the heavens judging the world below!

The sound *was* the voice of the heavens.

The echo of the sky, the resonance of the earth, blended with the drum’s thunder, forging a single, unshakeable decree. It was not louder than the thunder, but far more terrifying.

The unimaginable force of this declaration drained the color from the gold-armored warrior’s face. He stumbled back, his ears ringing, feeling as if the full weight of the cosmos had descended upon him. An unnatural compulsion seized him, a terrifying urge to actually sever his own arm.

The assembled onlookers were struck dumb with awe, the bravado that had filled them moments before now utterly extinguished. A profound silence descended, broken only by the storm raging above.

Among the crowd, save for a select few, none dared doubt that had Wang Lin’s words been directed at them, they too would have been compelled to mutilate themselves.

That voice…it was the voice of divine judgment! It was law itself, the most powerful decree the world had ever known.

The demon general, Mo Fei, for the first time, lowered his gaze from the heavens and fixed it upon Wang Lin.

Among the demon marshals, only the celestial marshal remained unmoved, not even deigning to glance in Wang Lin’s direction. But the other seven exchanged startled glances, their expressions betraying a mixture of awe and disbelief.

“Words made flesh!” The seven marshals muttered amongst themselves, their eyes wide with wonder.

Unnoticed, the unmoved celestial marshal, in the very instant the words echoed, allowed the barest sliver of light to escape the gap between his eyelids, revealing a flicker of ancient power.

The deputy marshal, Huang, was utterly speechless. The deputy marshal, Xuan, who sat beside him, could only sigh.

The gold-armored warrior, though pale, quickly regained his composure. He fixed his gaze on Wang Lin and said, with a forced calm, “You have merged your voice with the drum’s power, using it to invoke the wrath of the heavens. A clever trick, but only a trick. If you possessed the true power to make your words a binding reality, then you could have not only my arm, but my life itself. I would gladly offer it to you!”