Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 425
"Old monster!"
Li Yao stood in midair and slowly flew toward Yan Xibei, his lips curling into a hideous smile.
"Don't be scared. This is not the Core Formation Stage, but it is not the peak of the Building Foundation Stage, either.
"This is the superlative height of the Building Foundation Stage!"
"Superlative height of the Building Foundation Stage?"
Yan Xibei was dumbfounded. He immediately burst into fury. "What kind of bullsh*t level is that? There isn't such a thing!"
BOOM!
Li Yao suddenly accelerated to the maximum speed and crashed into Yan Xibei, while he shouted, "Chief Xiong was right. Roads are made by people. Every level is created by people, too. This is the level that I have created, the superlative height of the Building Foundation Stage!"
"Whatever level you are in, you can go to hell!" Yan Xibei bellowed. The bloody aura around his body was all turned into the most powerful blast and brutally blew Li Yao hundreds of meters away into a rock.
The bystanders were all stunned, not sure how they should react.
When they saw that Li Yao was so confident in such a glamorous appearance, they had thought that he would be able to fight Yan Xibei for a long time and did not expect that he would be blown back so easily!
However, weird clicking sounds echoed in the rock that Li Yao had crashed into. His dominating aura was not in the least diminished, either. Soon, even the hill could not bear it any longer, and overlapping cracks appeared on its surface.
Huala!
The rock exploded in raging dust, and a magnificent shadow suddenly leapt up from the broken stones!
The glittering black armor was painted with gold rings. Two crossed sabers were attached to its back, and a giant spear pointed at the sky from its helmet as if it were trying to cut a hole in the sky!
Everybody gasped. In their trance, many people thought that they were looking at yet another calamity-level apocalyptic beast. But when they looked carefully, they found that it was a set of plugins refined out of the bones and shells of the calamity-level apocalyptic beasts as well as materials from other demon beasts!
"Do forgive me, everybody. I have just grasped a new way to utilize my strength, and I'm still familiarizing myself with it."
Li Yao warmed up his four limbs. The spluttering electric arcs attached the strengthening plugins to the Sky Scorpion Armor perfectly. It was agiler, swifter, and stronger than he had anticipated!
Apocalyptic Extension versus apocalyptic body!
Calamity versus calamity!
Swoosh!
In the blink of an eye, Li Yao, wearing the Apocalyptic Extension, was already gone. The rock that he had been in exploded, revealing a giant hole almost five meters deep where hot steam was popping up nonstop as if it had been hit by a falling star!
Yan Xibei, on the other hand, screamed miserably!
Chapter 632: Underground Changes! |
After putting on the Apocalyptic Extension, Li Yao was more than five meters tall, too, and on par with Yan Xibei.
They collided like two calamity-level apocalyptic beasts.
The sabers on Li Yao's back pierced deep into Yan Xibei's body, while Yan Xibei's scorpion tail dug into the stomach of the Apocalyptic Extension, and his mantis forelegs left two deep traces on the plugins!
However, the Apocalyptic Extension was merely Li Yao's strengthening components and had no senses at all. Li Yao wouldn't be harmed even if it was shattered.
Yan Xibei's apocalyptic body, on the other hand, was made of flesh and blood and was connected to his own body.
The result of the hundreds of high-speed collisions in that moment was that Li Yao tore off plenty of meat and shells from Yan Xibei's body while Yan Xibei failed to hurt Li Yao, although he had almost wrecked the Apocalyptic Extension.
Even the apocalypse cloud condensed by Yan Xibei's bloody mist in the sky was scattering apart under the blast of Li Yao's surging spiritual energy!
"It's impossible!"
Yan Xibei was both grieving his loss and screaming miserably. His calmness from a moment earlier was entirely gone!
He tried his best to summon the foreign blood inside his body. The veins covering his body were getting thicker and thicker. Many overlapping spots bugled high as if they were ugly hearts while the foreign blood inside them accrued.
Bo! Bo bo bo bo!
Dozens of 'hearts' broke apart instantly!
Boundless bloody mists flooded out and blew Li Yao away brutally.
Li Yao rolled in midair to ease the blast and was barely hurt from the explosion as he landed on the ground. The aura around him continued on the rise!
Hum! Hum hum hum hum!
The broken sabers and swords in the surrounding area were all trembling violently as if they were being controlled by a storm. They soared into the sky after a while and, spinning in midair, gathered in front of Li Yao!
The blades were broken, dented, and rusty because of the acid from Yan Xibei's apocalyptic body.
Many of them were stained with the qi-trainers' blood, which started running again, spurred by the pouring rain and Li Yao's surging spiritual energy, even though it had dried previously!
The hundred blood-stained sabers were revolving in front of Li Yao at an extremely high speed like a tornado!
After Yan Xibei detonated the blood on his body, an unparalleled, intense bloody mist was condensed. It was so red that the color was bordering on purple and black. Countless patterns in the shape of apocalyptic beasts protruded out of the surface of the bloody mist. They were roaring, raging, and making the bloody mist look like a devil that had grown countless heads of other apocalyptic beasts!
The strength of both parties had been increased to the maximum. Their spiritual gas formed an absolute domain that the wind and rain could not enter. The storm was smashing their heads like a waterfall smashing giant stones and forming a hazy fog!
Lightning was attracted by the dominating force field between them and hit the center while spluttering crazily!
Shua!
Li Yao and Yan Xibei surpassed the speed of sound simultaneously. When the collision took place, even the lightning bypassed them as if they were in fear of the intense blast.
Everyone could only see a cluster of brightness ten times more dazzling than the lightning spreading out quickly from the point of collision. The light ball was soon blown away by an immeasurable blast. Affected by the blast, the pouring rain started moving parallel to the ground instead of vertically.
A moment later, the sound of the tide-like collisions finally reached everyone's eardrums!
Blood splashed out from their ears, and they could not hear anything for a while.
They could only see that, against the flashing lightning, the two tall shadows were confronting each other like two magnificent statues!
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!
Weird noises were echoing inside the Apocalyptic Extension. As it turned out, Yan Xibei had won the round and suppressed Li Yao!
"Is this the superlative height of the Building Foundation Stage? You were merely bluffing!"
Yan Xibei burst into laughter. He suddenly exerted his strength and crushed the Apocalyptic Extension. Then—
It exploded!
Before everyone had the chance to exclaim, a streak of black brightness had dashed out of the dazzling fireball and appeared behind Yan Xibei as if it had passed through him!
Yan Xibei's smile immediately froze.
Li Yao was on one of his knees, with a sharp knife extending toward his back from the elbow of his Sky Scorpion Armor. The rainwater had wiped the last bit of blood on the blade away, making it as clear as a mirror.
Li Yao naturally had known that the Apocalyptic Extension that he had refined in a hurry was no match for Yan Xibei's apocalyptic body, which the guy had worked on cautiously for more than ten years.
However, the thing about Ares Extensions was that they were all expendable!
With his Apocalyptic Extension as bait, he launched the fatal attack!
Yan Xibei's eyes bulged, and he looked at his abdomen in disbelief. His waist used to be connected to the insect body, but right now, a black wound was slowly expanding on his waist until it penetrated all the way through his body.
As black blood and white bodily fluids seeped out, he gradually lost control of his lower half.
The apocalyptic body had been cut off from Yan Xibei by Li Yao!
Without the apocalyptic body, Yan Xibei was merely an ordinary qi-trainer. The thick veins bound to his upper body were withering at a visible speed, leaving black scars behind like vines that had been consumed by flames.
He screamed and fell to the ground. Two streams of spiritual gas spurted out of his palms, and he fled away with the counterforce!
But how could Li Yao allow him to run away? He turned into a streak of brightness again as he stretched out his right arm and picked a random weapon from the battlefield with his spiritual gas.
When the weapon reached his hand, Li Yao noticed that it was actually a flagpole, with the flag of the Furious Bears Tribe that was riddled with blood stains and holes, big and small, flapping in the wind on the top.
Yan Xibei was rushing at an amazingly high speed. He had already run almost a thousand meters away in that moment.
But Li Yao was even faster. He appeared behind Yan Xibei after only a few leaps. The flagpole in his hand was humming and entangled by purple gold electric arcs, turning into an unstoppable spear!
Just when Li Yao was about to thrust the spear, Yan Xibei suddenly grinned. An earsplitting explosion burst out deep under the ground, and bloody mist soared to the sky like a volcano erupting. The earth collapsed, revealing a spacious and bottomless cave!
Yan Xibei accelerated again and threw himself into the cave like a weight.
Li Yao followed him without any hesitation. He tightened his body as if it were a bow, and the flagpole in his hand became the sharpest arrow. With an outburst of spiritual energy, the flagpole was thrown out with dazzling electric arcs!
BOOM! BOOM!
The two of them hit the bottom after falling down hundreds of meters, one after the other.
The place had originally been a natural limestone cave. But when Yan Xibei discovered it, he had transformed the cave into a secret base where he experimented on his apocalyptic body.
On the walls of the cave, dense weird plants that looked like vipers and vines were wriggling frantically.
Many spots where the 'veins' overlapped bulged high, resulting in translucent vesicles in which countless apocalyptic beasts were being brewed.
Behind Yan Xibei, in the center of the darkness, a giant object more than ten meters in diameter that looked like an enormous heart was fluctuating and trembling.
This object was perhaps the nest where he had bred the apocalyptic body.
His eyes wide open, Yan Xibei straightened his arms and tried to crawl to the bloody heart.
However, the flagpole of the Furious Bears Tribe had pierced through his heart from his back. Almost half of the flagpole had disappeared into the ground of the cave and made him unable to move.
The surging spiritual gas on the flagpole had blown Yan Xibei's heart into pieces a long time ago. He was merely enjoying his last breath.
Li Yao walked to Yan Xibei and stared down at him coldly.
Below Yan Xibei, blood was spreading out and bubbling with foam while it screamed feebly as if it were alive.
Yan Xibei raised his head with the last bit of his strength, so forcefully that his spine was emitting cracking noises. He smiled miserably at Li Yao.
"You all think that I was possessed by the Blood Demon and everything I did was for the Blood Stripe Virus, don't you? You think you are doing good by eliminating the evilness!
"But have you ever considered the possibility that I was never possessed by the Blood Demon and everything I said was true? What are you going to do then?
"Haha. Hahahaha. It doesn't matter. You will know the answer soon.
"Inside the 'blood pool' is the foreign blood that I carefully refined for the warriors of the six tribes. I planned to invite everybody here so that the success rate could be higher.
"But right now, at such a short distance, with a telepathic thought of mine, the blood pool can be detonated immediately, and the foreign blood will be vaporized and escape to the earth!
"Several of them are bound to be touched by the blood. You will know then whether or not I was lying. Haha. Hahahaha!"
The killing intent in Li Yao's eyes was immediately maximized!
Yan Xibei grinned hideously. "Don't be silly. You wouldn't be so naïve as to think that I didn't trigger my telepathic thought until I explained everything to you in great detail, would you? I activated the self-detonation neuron of the blood pool before I said the first word. The blood pool will explode in exactly three seconds. Let's see how you rescue all the people above us!
"Or, will you simply consider all the people who have breathed the bloody mist to be possessed by the Blood Demon and kill every one of them? Is that what you're going to do?"
Li Yao gasped and gazed at the blood pool, which was constricting and expanding at a higher and higher speed!
Three seconds, two seconds, one second!
The enormous 'heart' slowly calmed down after trembling violently for a while.
The deep red color gradually became gray, as if it were turning into a giant rock. After that, nothing else happened at all.
Li Yao blinked and looked at Yan Xibei with interest.
Yan Xibei's eyes were even wider than Li Yao's, and he looked at the blood pool in disbelief. He mumbled, "How could it be… How could it be?"
Li Yao's brain suddenly shivered as he sensed a very familiar spiritual wave from the depths of the blood pool, which had become completely motionless. He thought of something and was stunned!
His heart beating fast, Li Yao sent a telepathic thought into the blood pool.
"S—Sparkle?"
There was no response from the grey blood pool at first. But very soon, an airy spiritual wave came over. "Li Yao!"
BOOM!
A drill of mystic rays pierced through the half-dead blood pool from inside, and a dragon-like warship covered in armor that looked like scales leapt out of the ground!
Chapter 633: Doom of the Foreign Blood |
The drill of mystic rays was bouncing like unpredictable flames in Yan Xibei's pupils, burning the last bit of his consciousness into oblivion.
The best warrior of Iron Plateau in the old days took a long breath, before he gradually froze, withered, and died with an indescribable expression on his face.
Li Yao didn't know what to say. He scratched his helmet for a long time before he asked, "How did you end up here?"
"We came to Iron Plateau to look for you and did not know it was so weird until we arrived. Without your specific coordinates, we could only wander aimlessly," Mo Xuan explained. "Later, we noticed that an Exo Society had landed on Iron Plateau. We had been following them secretly, but we lost them half a day ago.
"We detected that spiritual waves of this area were extremely intense, so we drew close below the ground.
"We did not anticipate that so many eccentric demon beasts were lurking here. To avoid them, we increased the speed of the drill, but we accidentally dug into a cluster of extremely strange mucus.
"The mucus seemed to be a living thing and attacked us, even trying to infiltrate Sparkle!
"But you also know that the five spectral Cultivators including me are all the crew members on board. Our bodies are made of nanotechnology-based alloys that were impenetrable for the mucus. Of course, we launched a counterattack mercilessly!
"The moment after we destroyed the central nerves of the mucus, we sensed your telepathic thoughts and drilled our way out!"
Li Yao realized that he had truly been lucky. Although the Blood Stripe Virus could corrupt living creatures and even germs, the bodies of Mo Xuan and the other spectral Cultivators were liquid metal, a kind of powerful magical equipment from the Star Ocean Imperium. It was definitely not something that the Blood Stripe Virus could conquer!
The crew members of Sparkle were the natural enemy for the Blood Stripe Virus!
"What's the situation right now?" asked Mo Xuan.
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao replied quickly, "The situation is rather complicated. You'd better keep lying low below the ground. Set the communication channel to No. 9; I'll reach out to you later!"
Since they were on the same planet, communication was a lot easier. Although Iron Plateau was not covered in the Spiritual Nexus, Li Yao could contact Sparkle through telepathic thoughts enhanced by crystal processors at the agreed frequency. It was essentially a point-to-point super mini network.
The electromagnetic environment on Iron Plateau was quite erratic, but Li Yao's capability had soared, too. The power of his soul was ten times stronger than in the past. Simple communication at a distance of several hundred kilometers wouldn't be a problem.
Looking at Yan Xibei's body one more time, Li Yao sighed with mixed thoughts.
Yan Xibei was truly the most formidable enemy he had ever met on his path of Cultivation. Although Skeleton Dragon, the ancient deadly demon from forty thousand years ago that he had encountered on Boneyard, was much more impressive than Yan Xibei in terms of absolute strength, the demon's scheme, arrangement, and response to changes were far from the previous best warrior of Iron Plateau.
Manipulating Iron Plateau natives, space residents, and Immortal Cultivators at the same time purely on his own, and trying to twist the course of development of a planet and even a constellation in the next thousands of years…
How ambitious and bold that was!
Also, the man had been so close to victory at the end.
Although it was Yan Xibei who had died in the end, Li Yao did not think that he had defeated him. Maybe, the man had been just short of some luck.
If Yan Xibei were not possessed by the Blood Demon, and the future that he described was a plausible possibility, then—
