Money quickly flew over to catch the falling Xiang Shaoyun. At the same time, the second-stage devil ant scorpion emperor charged over and roared, "For killing our leader, you will pay with your life!"

The devil ant scorpion emperor's tail started extending and shot toward Money and Xiang Shaoyun. Like a whip, the tail instantly crossed a distance of several hundred meters, its stinger piercing through the air with a might great enough to crush mountains.

Money was fast, but still not fast enough in comparison to a second-stage devil ant scorpion emperor. He had no way of escaping the stinger no matter how hard he tried. Suddenly, a figure charged over with an even faster speed. A bright radiance flashed past while a phoenix cry rang out in the air. A phoenix formed of flame crashed into the stinger.

Bang!

The flaming phoenix severed the scorpion tail, causing the devil ant scorpion to wail in pain as it quickly retreated.

"Die!" 

The attacker was Yu Caidie. Instead of using the power of wind, she was attacking with the power of flame. A raging flame spread out of her halberd, radiating a unique power as it burned everything in its way.

In the blink of an eye, a sea of flame was formed, burning all the devilish energy in a radius of one kilometer into nothingness. This attack wasn't any weaker than the attack Xiang Shaoyun had unleashed with his nine-colored fog.

The second-stage devil ant scorpion emperor had no way of escaping. It was lit on fire and was soon burned into ash. Fear overtook the other devil ant scorpions. Poisonous beasts like them feared powers of extreme yang such as the power of flame the most. This was even more so for unique flames, one which Yu Caidie was using. In fact, her flame was much scarier than even the devil flame seed.

"Why are you still standing there? Slaughter them!" Yu Caidie commanded the young geniuses, her voice dignified and imposing, waking the geniuses from their shock.

"Kill!" They attacked the devil ant scorpions. They no longer held anything back. The combat strength displayed by Xiang Shaoyun and Yu Caidie had thoroughly shocked them.

They did not want to fall too far off behind Xiang Shaoyun in the race for Yu Caidie's heart, and the surviving devil ant scorpions were used to vent their anger. At this moment, someone suddenly charged in Xiang Shaoyun's direction with his mount.

"Su Jun, what are you doing?" Tang Longfei cried out.

Su Jun ignored the cry. Seated on his leopard king mount, he dashed toward Money at his top speed. Before he had even arrived, he swung his weapon, sending an attack toward the weakened Xiang Shaoyun.

Nobody had expected Su Jun to suddenly attack Xiang Shaoyun like this. Tang Longfei had been paying close attention to Xiang Shaoyun all along, and he quickly rushed over to stop Su Jun. However, since he was in the midst of battling a devil ant scorpion emperor when he noticed the attack, it was not possible for him to reach Su Jun in time.

"Let me kill you while you're down!" Su Jun roared as he erupted with all his strength. A gold radiance rippled out of him as a sharp aura wreaked havoc all around him.

Fortunately, Money was fast enough. He might not be as fast as Emperors, but dodging an attack of a ninth-stage King like Su Jun was still possible. By the time he dodged the attack, Tang Longfei was already standing before Su Jun with his mount.

"Since you want to kill him, I'll kill you first," said Tang Longfei with a thick murderous intent.

Nobody could understand why Tang Longfei, who did not seem to have any relationship with Xiang Shaoyun, was helping him. This was especially true for Su Jun. However, it was too late to change his mind. 

He shouted at Di Tong, "Di Tong, what are you still waiting for?"

Di Tong blanked out slightly before saying coldly, "This has nothing to do with me."

He was the one who had instigated Su Jun to kill Xiang Shaoyun, but he would not admit it. After all, that would only disqualify him from remaining in Yu Caidie’s group. One ought to admit that Di Tong was truly a treacherous person. 

Su Jun's face was extremely unsightly. He had never expected that Di Tong would abandon him at a crucial moment like this. He finally realized that he had fallen for Di Tong's scheme.

"Very well. I won't forget this," said Su Jun gloomily. Since he did not dare to fight Tang Longfei, he instead fled with his Demon King mount.

Tang Longfei, not planning to spare him, quickly gave chase and attacked. Su Jun defended himself and escaped. He had managed to block a few of the incoming attacks but was still injured to the point he was coughing up blood. However, he had ultimately managed to escape.

The only reason he had managed to escape was only because Tang Longfei gave up on chasing when he got too far. Instead, he quickly returned and stood guard beside Xiang Shaoyun.

After all, Xiang Shaoyun was in a terrible shape, and Tang Longfei wasn't sure if Di Tong would try something. As for why he was guarding Xiang Shaoyun, he was the only one who knew why. Nobody else knew.

By this time, the other geniuses had killed all the devil ant scorpion emperors, but in the process, the devil ant scorpions' poison had killed two of the geniuses. Now, there were only 14 of them left in the group.

Yu Caidie arrived beside Money and asked, "How is he?"

Money landed on the ground and looked at Yu Caidie cautiously before answering, “My boss is fine. He will recover soon."

"Put him down. I'll feed him some spirit spring water," said Yu Caidie.

Money started hesitating as he wondered if he should listen. At this time, Xiang Shaoyun spoke with great difficulty, "P-put me down."

He looked extremely terrible. His entire body had been emptied of energy, and his meridians were on the verge of destruction. In fact, he was already doing very well staying awake in his condition.

After all, he had forcefully used the third stance of his Nine Overlord Skyslaying Saber Technique. He had also pushed himself to his limit two times in a row, completely drawing all the energy out of his body.

But the result was something he could be proud of as he had successfully slain a third-stage devil ant scorpion emperor. He had known that the nine-colored fog was powerful. It was capable of granting life, but it was also capable of destruction.

However, he had never expected that using the nine-colored fog he had taken some time to accumulate would actually be able to kill the devil ant scorpion emperor with one hit. That most definitely qualified as an ultimate trump card. It was much scarier than the Havoc Dance he had created himself.

Money placed Xiang Shaoyun on the ground, and Yu Caidie walked over. A bottle of healing millennium spring water appeared in her hand as she handed it over. "Drink it up. It will be useful for your recovery."

"I-I c-can't even lift my hand right now," said Xiang Shaoyun weakly. Yu Caidie frowned. After hesitating for a bit, she walked to his side, helped him up, and personally fed it to him.

The sight filled all the geniuses with envy.