Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 1469
But for some reason, Li Yao still felt that she was more trustworthy than the four Kurfürst families and Li Linghai.
Although the deep ocean where the pulse signals came from entailed a great threat, the risks would be worth it.
"Li Jialing, it suddenly occurred to me that there's something I need to do. Just play with yourself here for a while."
Li Yao boosted the Gold Vulture to swim deeper into the ocean. "I'll be back soon!"
"Huh?"
Li Jialing was dumbfounded. "Brother Yao, what-what are you going to do? And what am I supposed to do here?"
"I'm going to enjoy the coolness in the deep ocean."
Li Yao said, "As for you, just observe the battle and find a place where the enemies are fewer and weaker to fight. Then, just pretend that your crystal suit is too seriously damaged to fight anymore and go back to the surface of the ocean. Remember, don't run to the center of the battlefield where it is most heated. Dongfang Wang's subordinates are all desperate mad dogs. They can be dreadful!"
Li Yao's voice was still echoing when the wings of the Gold Vulture already retreated into the shape of fish fins, allowing the Colossus to dash into the ocean.
Two thousand meters, three thousand meters, five thousand meters…
It was already the deep ocean where there was absolutely no sunlight. The water pressed the Gold Vulture from all directions like half-consolidated iron, squeezing the shell of the Colossus that emitted squeaky noises and giving a strong sense of suffocation.
The sense of suffocation of this place was even stronger than the "earthly dragons" below the ground of the Land of Sins.
After all, the rocks there were solid and would not really fall although they looked intimidating.
However, in this place, after every meter he descended, the pressure of the water would grow by a little bit. Although the Gold Vulture had adopted the shells and the anti-pressure kits made of superalloys, it seemed to be kneaded into the size of a fist any minute.
Is this… Long Yangjun's real strength?
Li Yao was greatly alarmed. He did not expect Long Yangjun to be capable enough of sending her telepathic thoughts to his Colossus accurately through such thick water.
He was even more curious about what the guy was up to.
Maximizing his senses, he looked down and could vaguely sense the bottom of the ocean.
However, at the center of the rugged bottom of the ocean lied a narrow, long trench, which boasted a feeble attraction force and absorbed seawater nonstop, as if it were a bottomless hole leading to the core of the planet.
Bo… Bo… Bo… Bo… Bo…
The pulse signals came from the trench and were as enticing as the songs of a siren.
Frowning, Li Yao dived into the trench in the Gold Vulture.
The faults on the two sides of the trench were like vertical precipices. Maximizing the searchlight on the Gold Vulture, Li Yao could vaguely see countless bones of primeval beasts, as well as enormous artificial buildings and utensils, embedded in the faults.
Several of the huge objects looked like twisted, broken starships. There were also the bones of giants, which reflected creepy brilliance under the searchlight. Li Yao was rather shocked at first but then realized that they were all the debris of the Colossi from hundreds of thousands of years ago.
It appeared to be a primeval battlefield that hadn't been discovered yet.
Since the Empyreal Terminus Sector was an "intersection" of the three thousand worlds, it was not strange that the place used to be a main battlefield in the primeval war hundreds of thousands of years ago.
It appeared that Long Yangjun had recovered a lot of "primeval memories" to find this unvisited primeval battlefield. But what treasures had she found from this battlefield?
Li Yao glanced at the control menu. It was already nine thousand and nine hundred meters below sea level.
The ocean below his feet suddenly glowed. At first, it was just a tiny spot of light. But it soon turned into the most glamorous crystal and dashed at the Gold Vulture as quickly as a bolt of lightning, completely ignoring the blockage and pressure of the seawater!
Shua!
In the exact moment, the glamorous crystal passed by the Gold Vulture, leaving a devastating damage on the breastplate of the Colossus with brute force. Although it was probably a minor damage on the ground, it might've led to catastrophic consequences at the deep ocean almost ten thousand meters below sea level!
"Long Yangjun!"
Li Yao was both shocked and exasperated. His telepathic thoughts soared to the glamorous crystal like overwhelming undercurrents. "You have tricked me to this place because you want to die together with me?"
"Hehehehe. I said last time that I would like to try your 'gold bird'. How can I not honor my words?"
Long Yangjun's giggling voice was shot into the "Gold Vulture" through the iron-like water in the waves of telepathic thoughts. "We've been fighting since the first second we met. Later, deep inside the Nuwa warship, we only reached cooperation after we revealed all our trump cards only to discover that neither of us could defeat the other person, didn't we?
"Now, we have come to a greater stage and gotten brand-new techniques. How can we talk about cooperation if we do not fight and get to know each other better? I do not want to hamstring you or to be hamstrung by you!
"That is why I have prepared the battlefield that absolutely nobody will disrupt. I am not playing any trick this time. It is just a competition of pure strength. Watch closely, I'm coming!"
Hardly had she concluded her sentence when Long Yangjun charged at him again.
While she was talking, Li Yao had already seen clearly that the Colossus she was using was not the high-speed scout model "Yin Yang" that he discovered from the Nuwa warship in the Ancient Sages Sector, but a new, more elegant, and more classical model!
The Colossus was about twenty-five meters high, slightly shorter than the Gold Vulture. It did not adopt any regular superalloy material at all but seemed to be entirely made of transparent crystals that were changing their colors all the time.
Once somebody was attracted by the dazzling light, their soul would be entirely under the mercy of Long Yangjun.
Li Yao shuddered hard, only to discover that Long Yangjun had already reached right in front of him with the weird Colossus. It was really fast!
He turned his wings into two shields and protected the body in time. But still, he was knocked dozens of meters into the rocks on one side of the cliffs because of the clash. The rocks fell apart, the seawater was rolling, and the mud blocked everything around. His senses were reduced to almost zero!
Li Yao roared crazily, and his wings immediately split apart into hundreds of streaks of light. The metal feathers that looked like willow leaves were darted out and protected his body within a web. He jumped out of the fault and immediately locked onto the diamond-like Colossus. The breastplate of the Gold Vulture opened, and the gold cannon inside hit the target precisely!
BOOM!
The previously colorful Colossus was blown into gold under the attack!
But after a moment, the gold color dimmed, and the Colossus was utterly undamaged!
Not only was it undamaged, the Colossus even had weird changes after absorbing the energy of the attack. The shell of the Colossus flowed like water and assembled into a new "fin" and a "tail", exactly like a siren in the deep ocean.
"This is a Colossus that I found after I came to the center of the cosmos. Its name is 'Heavenly Crystal'."
Long Yangjun chuckled. "How about it? It is as good as your 'Gold Vulture', isn't it?"
In the next second, the Colossus turned into a streak of brilliance and charged at Li Yao again!
One blue and the other gold, the two streaks of brilliance were engaged in the fierce battle ten thousand meters below the ocean and collided a hundred times in only three seconds!
It had been a long time since Li Yao last gritted his teeth so hard.
He finally understood why Li Linghai had such a high remark on Long Yangjun and believed that she was a great "threat".
Long Yangjun, with her primeval memories awakened and her dual bloodlines of Nuwa and Pangu activated, was certainly no longer the "Lead Eunuch Wang Xi" that was second to "Sword Manic" Yan Liren in the Ancient Sages Sector.
Her every movement carried the most ancient and dominating air, as if a real god were standing before Li Yao.
Her goddamn Colossus was also erratic and boasted the weird technique to absorb the enemy's attacks. It was truly horrifying!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
After the 1,001st collision, Li Yao was blown into the fault and punched by a storm of fists again. Cracks appeared all over the Gold Vulture, and the squeaky noises caused by the heavy pressure of the seawater were particularly earsplitting.
"It appears that your 'gold bird' is not good enough."
Long Yangjun appeared right next to Li Yao like a ghost. She was even bold enough to crane the head of her Colossus to the head of the Gold Colossus and said in a low voice, "If this is your best, how are you qualified to cooperate with me and explore the greatest secret of the universe?"
At the moment, the killing intent behind Long Yangjun's lighthearted words seemed to have really been raised to the maximum.
In the meantime, the sharpest voice also burst out in Li Yao's head. "Go to hell. He is mine!"
Chapter 2303: When One Is Dying |
It all happened too fast. The Gold Vulture, which seemed to have been hit brutally all the time, suddenly opened its mouth, spitting out a cluster of bloody mist that pierced at the face of the "Heavenly Crystal" like a blade that could tear everything apart!
The two parties were very close to each other, and the Gold Vulture's movement was very fast. Caught unprepared, the Heavenly Crystal was hit in the forehead precisely!
The materials that the Heavenly Crystal was made of were not any regular metals but the cores and skeletons of dozens of kinds of primeval beasts after they were squeezed together deep inside the crust and refined by the high temperature and pressure for millions of years. They were extremely rare even in the primeval battlefield where the debris of the Colossus could be found anywhere.
The bloody mist's physical form was merely just "Neltharion", a training model of the Star Ocean Imperium. Naturally, it was impossible to break in.
However, just because Neltharion could not penetrate into it did not mean that the mental devil could not invade it.
With the creepy laughter that was getting louder and louder, the mental devil turned into a raging phantom, trying to crawl into the Heavenly Crystal through the gaps on it.
However seemingly flawless the Colossus was, there were bound to be joints and gaps on it as long as it could move agilely.
The mental devil's body suddenly exploded into thousands of bloody threads, exploring the weakness of the Heavenly Crystal inch by inch!
Long Yangjun finally exclaimed in shock.
Even though she had foreseen that Li Yao had more trump cards, she did not expect the trump cards to be as effective.
Li Yao bellowed and cooperated with the mental devil. While Long Yangjun's mind was greatly disrupted by the mental devil, tidal exhaust flames surged out of the back of the Gold Vulture, blowing apart the fault behind him completely. Despite the heavy pressure of the ocean, he unleashed the terrible momentum above the speed of sound and crashed into the Heavenly Crystal brutally!
BOOM!
This time, it was the Heavenly Crystal that was blown to the other side of the fault by the Gold Vulture and swallowed by the furious flames. Li Yao's attacks did not stop when the entire fault collapsed as a whole and buried the Heavenly Crystal into it.
Soon, the mental devil and the Heavenly Crystal dashed out from the two sides of the fault.
The Heavenly Crystal was no longer as brilliant and colorful as it was a moment ago. It was now mottled, with narrow, long red lines vaguely slithering below the crystal shell like tapeworms.
The mental devil, on the other hand, stood on Neltharion and glared at Long Yangjun.
"Do you still want to fight?" said Li Yao coldly.
"Hu… Hu… This is more like it. This is what 'Vulture Li Yao' should do!"
Long Yangjun panted hard but chuckled in a low voice. "So, this is your secret weapon. I think I've seen it from somewhere? Right, this little guy was there when we dealt with Extraterrestrial Devil Mo Xuan in the Star Glory Federation. How cute. Is it your second soul?
"I did not expect that you had trained your second soul to such a terrifying level. Except for the lack of a real entity, its combat ability is as good as any regular expert in the Divinity Transformation Stage, and its weirdness is significantly greater than them. What is it exactly? Some sort of underdeveloped version of the 'Divinity Branching Stage'?
"No wonder you'd been playing weak all the time. You intended to trick me with your second soul. That was indeed in line with your style. Thankfully, I knew that you were sordid and shameless since the very beginning, or I might've really been hit. Hehehehe!"
"Allow me to introduce you."
Li Yao said emotionlessly, "This is indeed my second soul named mental devil. Mental devil, this is Long Yangjun. You should get to know each other."
"I won't. I hate this sexless, creepy monster!"
The mental devil sniffed at Long Yangjun. "Hey, I do not object to you at all if you want to kill this stupid idiot. But this body is mine. If you dare to break one hair on it, I will certainly fight you until I die!"
"How interesting. It seems that your second soul has developed an independent character!"
Long Yangjun chuckled. "No, it is much more than a second soul. I've smelled something more ancient and distant from it. It seems to have come from somewhere far, far away beyond the three thousand Sectors a long, long time ago. At the very least, I cannot feel too much of the air of Pangu and Nuwa in it."
Li Yao was somewhat surprised. The "Blood Stripe Virus", the mental devil's antecedent, was indeed from an extremely distant space zone beyond the three thousand Sectors.
Li Yao did not even know if the Blood Stripe Virus' hometown and the world that the Pangu Clan, the Nuwa Clan, and mankind lived in were in the same universe.
"That explains why you look so familiar. So, we share similar identities and experiences!"
Long Yangjun continued with a smile, "I am a member of the Nuwa Clan, but I was corrupted by the forces of the Pangu Clan. You are a human being, but you have been corrupted by the mental devil. We are both carrying double destinies and bloodlines. No wonder you and I feel like old friends at the first meeting."
"We do?"
The mental devil stared at Long Yangjun in wariness. "What is your scheme? What do you want exactly?"
With a smile, Long Yangjun retreated the Heavenly Crystal on her body. She was simply wearing a regular anti-pressure crystal suit. Opening her arms, she showed that she did not have any hostility.
Li Yao sneered, "You've had enough fighting?"
"Since you boast such a weird and powerful second soul, it is impossible for me to take down the both of you at the same time. It is possible that your second soul will invade my brain and cause serious damage when I kill you. Even my body might be heisted."
Long Yangjun admitted straightforwardly, "In that case, why do I need to waste my time and energy? Like I said earlier, this is not a life-and-death battle but just a way for us to bond since we haven't seen each other for a long time."
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao said, "Fine. Now that my trump cards have all been put on the table and seen clearly, you can finally tell me what you want now, can't you?"
"I don't want anything in particular. I'm just traveling at the center of the cosmos to get a closer look at this world as well as myself."
Long Yangjun said, "However, during my journey, I have indeed discovered some interesting things. Do you remember that I told you to be wary of Queen Li Linghai last time?"
Li Yao narrowed his eyes. "Why? Have you discovered any important evidence?"
"I wouldn't say evidence, but it is nonetheless very interesting."
Long Yangjun suddenly changed the topic. "Do you want to meet Dongfang Wang? He is about to die. Also, his soul is withering together with his body, and there is even no chance for him to turn into a spectral Cultivator. As the saying goes, 'when a man is dying, his words will be wise'. What he says at the end of his life will perhaps be very reasonable and interesting!"
"What?"
Li Yao was slightly shocked. "Dongfang Wang is with you? And he is dying? Why?"
"Because his brother's secret research institute was destroyed and the supply of his 'soul nutrition liquid' was cut off!"
Long Yangjun said, "Don't look at me like that. That was the biggest secret between the two brothers. I did not know it at all until you exposed the whole issue. After Dongfang Wang's unavoidable failure, he told me everything. If he had told me sooner, everything perhaps would've been different!"
Thinking for a long time, Li Yao still found it hard to believe. "A prime minister of iron and blood is about to die just like that? He seems… too weak from the beginning to the end!"
"It is exactly because he is the prime minister of iron and blood that he is so weak and he dies so fast."
Long Yangjun made a statement that sounded utterly unreasonable. Then she asked back, "You should know how many worlds, planets, starships, Immortal Cultivators, and civilians are under the effective control of the Imperium of True Human Beings, right?"
Li Yao nodded his head. He knew the series of boring astronomical numbers, but he knew nothing more.
"If you were the prime minister of the Imperium, are you confident to manage the hundreds of Sectors, thousands of resource planets, millions of starships, and billions of people and Immortal Cultivators, not carrying out their greatest potentials but only ensuring the normal functioning of the enormous system?"
Long Yangjun asked, "Or maybe, another question. If a prime minister of the Imperium is really capable of doing that, how much computational ability will it consume? And how much soul power and vitality will he have to burn?"
