As Yoriichi drifted downward, the freezing water rushing past his face, his ancient soul refused to surrender.
'I need to use another thing... another type of attack,' his internal monologue echoed in the absolute silence of his fading consciousness. 'The main forms are being rejected by the abyss. I need something effective in this terrain. Something different. I need more force. A new variance with my new attribute.'
In this absolute, near-death survival situation, completely isolated from the world above, Yoriichi's mind entered a rare, profound state of martial enlightenment. He ceased fighting the environment and began to understand it.
Simultaneously, an extreme biological reaction occurred within his body.
His Dantian was completely, utterly empty of Dou Qi. Yet, the physical vessel of a Nine-Star Dou Zhe desperately demanded energy to survive the crushing ocean pressure. The external pressure of the deep sinkhole violently squeezed against his internal pathways, acting as a massive, geological anvil.
Unknowingly, this immense, life-or-death external pressure triggered an involuntary, violent condensation within his core.
The empty, milky-white vortex in his Dantian began to spin rapidly, creating a terrifying internal vacuum. It violently sucked in the ambient, pure water energy of the abyss. The opposing forces of his internal Yang and the external Yin clashed, compressed, and reached critical mass under the weight of the deep water.
Drip.
A single, heavy drop of liquid Dou Qi formed in the center of his Dantian.
It wasn't pure fire, nor was it pure water. It was a terrifying, perfectly balanced milky-white liquid, swirling with microscopic sparks of gold and azure. It was heavier, denser, and infinitely more explosive than anything he had possessed before.
Yoriichi had broken through to the Dou Shi realm.
The Black-Water Tyrant Salamander hovered just feet away. Believing its prey to be a corpse, it extended its slimy tail to hook Yoriichi's leg and pull him into its gaping maw.
Just as the back of Yoriichi's head was about to brush against the horizontal bedrock of the underwater floor, his crimson eyes violently snapped open.
A new, terrifying surge of explosive, liquid energy coursed through his frozen veins, instantly banishing the paralysis.
Sun Breathing... he whispered into the water, the syllables carrying profound, crushing weight.
His body, previously limp, snapped into a coil of braided steel. He pushed his boots violently against the rocky ocean floor, spinning his body and launching himself upward toward the descending beast like a released missile.
He gripped the hilt of his katana with both hands, funneling the entirety of his new, liquid Dou Qi into the blade.
...First Variant...
A miraculous phenomenon occurred. The blade did not just ignite with fire. Drawing upon the Azure spark and the ambient deep-water pressure, Yoriichi coated the outer layer of the katana in a terrifyingly high-pressure, frictionless sheath of water. Inside that watery sheath, the core of the blade glowed with the absolute, concentrated heat of a miniature sun, trapped and contained.
He held the blade horizontally across his chest as he rocketed upward at blinding speed.
...The Eclipsing Torrent.
The blade moved with a profound, viable resonance, vibrating in perfect harmony with the surrounding aquatic environment. He was no longer fighting the water; he was borrowing the sheer crushing power of nature itself, turning the water resistance entirely into cutting force.
The Salamander, suddenly finding its "dead" prey rocketing upward with a terrifying new aura, shrieked in sudden panic. Finding this ant's antics infuriating, the beast's primitive pride took over. It lowered its massive, armored head, moving head-on to clash with its full, Rank 3 physical power, intending to crush the human completely.
They collided in the dark.
But the physical dynamic had completely shifted. The kinetic force Yoriichi carried, fueled by his liquid Dou Shi core and the frictionless, hydro-cutting edge of his variant technique, was astronomical.
Instead of Yoriichi being crushed, the upward thrust of his horizontal blade caught the beast perfectly under its massive jaw. The sheer, unstoppable momentum of Yoriichi's ascent physically halted the beast's downward dive.
Yoriichi pushed.
With a roar of bubbles that was swallowed by the deep, Yoriichi drove the massive, multi-ton beast upward. He pushed it back through the dark water, ascending at a terrifying speed toward the surface.
Above ground, Captain Lin raised her hand, her fingers tightening around the crimson signal vial, ready to shatter it.
RUMBLE!
The entire sinkhole violently erupted.
"Look out!" Xiao Yu shouted, grabbing Feng and jumping backward as the ground shook.
A massive, blinding column of swamp water, mud, and superheated steam blasted thirty feet into the humid air.
From the center of the eruption, the colossal Black-Water Tyrant Salamander was forcefully launched into the sky, suspended in mid-air by the sheer upward force of the human beneath it.
Yoriichi broke the surface mere seconds later, his clothes soaked, his crimson eyes glowing with absolute, lethal intent. As they hung weightless in the air above the sinkhole, Yoriichi unleashed the fully realized power of his new technique.
He slashed his blade fully through the beast's underbelly.
The high-pressure water sheath of the Eclipsing Torrent acted as an industrial hydro-cutter, instantly shredding through the beast's frictionless slime and hardened scales. With the physical defenses stripped away, the blade's core—the absolute solar heat—penetrated deep into the beast's flesh.
SKREEEEE!
A blinding, agonizing screech of steam and pain tore from the beast's throat. The extreme heat flash-boiled its internal organs upon contact.
A colossal explosion of steam and blood ruptured from the beast's midsection. More than half of its massive torso was cleanly sliced open and penetrated. Huge chunks of scorched flesh and boiling blood gushed out into the air, raining down upon the swamp like a macabre monsoon.
The apex predator of the wetlands screamed in absolute agony one final time. Its massive body contorted violently in the air before the life completely faded from its glowing yellow eyes.
SPLASH!
The massive, bisected corpse of the Black-Water Tyrant Salamander crashed heavily back into the sinkhole, sending a massive wave of murky water washing over the mangrove roots. It bobbed to the surface, dead and floating in a pool of its own boiling blood.
A moment later, Yoriichi descended from the air.
He landed heavily on the thickest mangrove root. His boots slammed into the wet wood with a violent thud. His legs, completely drained of stamina and trembling from oxygen deprivation, buckled instantly.
Using the remaining momentum of his descent, Yoriichi forcefully drove the tip of his katana deep into the wooden root to act as an anchor. He dropped heavily to his knees, his hands gripping the hilt's guard with white-knuckled intensity to keep himself from collapsing completely.
He lowered his head, his dark hair plastered to his forehead. His chest heaved violently as he forcefully coughed up a massive mouthful of murky swamp water, gasping for the humid wetland air as if it were the greatest treasure in the world.