Alex looked at Horace with interest.
Horace was a golden core warrior from the Purple sect, one of the major sects in the immortal realm, and he was part of a long line of warriors. Through his family, he had inherited powerful energies, similar to the power that ordinary warriors aspired to, but he had had them since birth. As he grew older, the energy grew ever stronger.
Horace was two hundred and fifty years old. When he had been one hundred years old, he had started to build his skills. When he had been two hundred years old, he had reached the golden core stage. When he had passed his tribulation, he had been surrounded by violet lightning, and now that he was two hundred and fifty years old, he was in the middle of the golden core stage. If he lived for another fifty years, then he would be able to easily break through to the nascent level. Then, even if he died, his soul would live on.
He had a lot of confidence in his bloodline, and he knew he had much greater potential than most people. No one wanted to provoke someone with such strong bloodlines, because they would eventually reach the nascent stage, making them difficult to defend against.
If the lightning tribulation didn't defeat them, then they could become the strongest warriors in the world. Most people from strong bloodlines were naturally gifted and had powerful abilities. But, then again, their lightning tribulation was much more difficult to survive.
"Oh, Great One," Horace called. "Let's see what you can do about this!"
He got onto all fours on the ground and opened his mouth. Then his mouth grew and grew until finally, he breathed in hard.
Alex felt his body being pulled forward, and if he hadn't stabilized himself in time, he would have been sucked closer to Horace.
The sand and stones around him were rushing toward Horace's mouth from the force of the suction. Even space was slightly distorted, as if it were going to collapse at any moment and be sucked into Horace's enormous mouth.
Bernie, far away in the distance, was pulled by the suction force and hovered in the air, unable to escape. As it was pulled to the ground, it used its talons to hook into the dirt, trying its best not to be pulled closer and swallowed by the terrifying mouth.
"I thought you were going to turn into some kind of powerful beast," Alex said, chuckling. "But you're nothing but a harmless snake."
With a wave of his hand, he sent a huge rock rolling over to block Horace's mouth.
Horace focused, and his mouth grew even larger. The distance between his upper and lower lips was now a few hundred feet. The huge rock rolled over and fell into his mouth, as if it had been swept into a great river or ocean by invisible waves.
As soon as the rock fell, Horace closed his mouth. He ground his teeth up and down and crushed it into thousands of smaller pieces. His huge cheeks twitched, and then he began to spit out mouthfuls of freshly made gravel. Each bit of gravel was the size of a boulder, big enough to flatten a tank, and as powerful as a cannon. Ordinary golden core warriors would never have been able to withstand such an impact.
But Alex waved his hand, and the crushed stones turned into powder and dissipated into the air.
Then he summoned his celestial staff, which appeared in front of Horace's mouth.
"Let me see which is tougher," Alex shouted. "Your teeth or my staff."
The staff had grown to the size of a huge tree trunk. Alex smashed it down fiercely and jabbed it into Horace's mouth.
Horace involuntarily bit down on the staff, and as his teeth made contact, they shattered.
Alex once again thrust his hand forward and punched Horace's throat, causing him to shrink rapidly down to his original size.
He raised his staff again and twisted it. Horace's body twisted along with it, and it seemed as if the tremendous force would rip him apart.
"Stop!" Elsa cried. She could see that Alex had defeated Horace in the most humiliating way, and so she launched her own attack.
A curtain of ice fell from the sky, and time seemed to slow.
She was using the ice and snow technique to freeze the flow of time, in the same way that Alex had used the celestial staff to freeze thousands of miles.
Elsa was obviously helping Horace escape. After all, Alex was too fast and too strong, and Horace hadn't been able to withstand him by himself.
"You want to play with time against me?" Alex asked. Then he called up his power, and cold air gushed out from the celestial staff, enveloping everything around it. It even froze Elsa's curtain of falling ice.
"How dare you try to destroy me!" Horace shouted.
After all, he was a golden core warrior. As long as his golden core wasn't destroyed, then he wouldn't die. Although Alex had badly twisted Horace's body, the damage was already repairing itself. But Alex's power had frozen him, just like everyone else, and he could only watch helplessly as Alex approached step by step.
"Don't hurt my people!" Marlon said as he returned to the scene of the battle. He punched out with his fists, and two flowing rivers rolled down from the sky. One passed through Horace, and the other passed through Elsa, melting the ice that Alex had summoned to capture them.
The celestial staff had trapped Horace and Elsa, but Alex had yet to use his own strength. Now he took a step forward and threw a punch.
Alex's punch was more powerful than anything any of them had ever seen. It created a vortex, which rippled with power.
"What kind of move is that?" Elsa asked. "It looks like something only an ancient immortal can do!"
"My god, how can he be so powerful?" Marlon asked, his jaw dropping. "Is he still human? His energy is probably greater than all the Earth's spirit energy combined. How did he manage to get all this power in a world with so little energy of its own?"
Horace and Elsa were so shocked by Alex's performance that they had already forgotten that they were in danger.
When Marlon saw such a powerful punch, he knew he had to do something to parry it. He turned his body into a giant puddle, and he started spinning, hoping to block Alex's strike.
The punch landed on the puddle of water that Marlon had transformed into, stirring up a tremendous wave.
"No!" Marlon shouted as Alex's fist rocked him, knocking free his golden core. He reached out and grabbed it, dragged it out of the water.
The golden core was a warrior's soul, so without it, the warrior would die.
Marlon hadn't expected Alex's punch to be so powerful. In his extreme anger, the golden core vibrated, and then it exploded, taking Marlon with it.