Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 468
"The slogan of qi-trainers is 'born in Iron Plateau, die in Iron Plateau'. For Cultivators, we can also live in space and die in space!"
Ye Hongfei passed out.
Li Yao held him in a daze for a long time. He handed him over to the Cultivators who were good at healing when the reinforcements arrived.
Li Yao stood up straight inch by inch and walked toward the window.
After every step, the floor below his feet would break.
Countless pebbles were rising around him slowly as he moved forward and dropped to the ground after he passed by.
Li Yao had not been so furious for a long time. He was so angry that he found it hard to tame his spiritual energy. Endless vigor seemed to have been stored inside his body like a tsunami that was about to break out!
Beep! Beep!
The crystal processor uttered hasty alarms.
"'Hellsword' Zhuang Ziyou, the hostile Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, has shown up again and killed a Cultivator at the high level of the Building Foundation Stage instantly!"
"Hellsword!"
Li Yao spoke the name in a coarse voice.
Huala!
In the surrounding five square meters, the floor exploded into broken stones the size of fists.
The broken stones were then turned into powder that looked like sand a second later. They condensed a brewing storm around Li Yao!
Inside the storm, an immense aura was flowing out of Li Yao's body, wreathing the beginner-level Gold Wolf Battlesuit in a soul-stirring air. Thousands of gold streaks were beaming out of the gaps of the crystal suit!
In that moment, an invisible string inside Li Yao's head seemed to snap.
He made an extremely insane decision.
Today, whatever price he had to pay, he would slay a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator!
Chapter 698: Worth a Try! |
Swoosh!
Without any hesitation, Li Yao dashed toward the center of the city like a hungry wolf.
"Fellow Cultivator Sand, what are you doing?"
Cai Qi, the sword Cultivator in the Nascent Soul Stage, sensed Li Yao's furious spiritual waves and was greatly shocked.
"They have heavily wounded Master Ye," Li Yao shouted. "I'm going to avenge him!"
After saying that, he cut off the communication directly.
If Cai Qi had been able to see Li Yao's face, he would have discovered that Li Yao's countenance was somewhat twisted and totally different from his voice.
His voice was coarse, crazy, and rash.
But his countenance was extremely tranquil. His eyes were as deep and dark as a cold spring. His lips that were as thin as sharp blades.
In a small alley some ten blocks away, Li Yao returned both the Gold Wolf Battlesuit and the mustard-seed suit into his Cosmos Ring.
Glancing around for a while, his eyes stopped at a clothes store on the left side of the street.
A while later, Li Yao was rushing through the streets 'in panic' dressed like a common citizen with blood smeared on his face.
At this moment, the catastrophe of devils finally escalated into the second phase.
In the first phase, the Cultivators were faced with only devils and devilized people.
But as the squads entered deep into every district of the tenth space ring and rescued more and more citizens, they were more and more scattered, and their traces were gradually grasped by the Immortal Cultivators who were lurking in the darkness.
The attack on Ye Hongfei was only the beginning.
Starting from that moment, the Immortal Cultivators who had been hiding themselves showed up one after another.
Some of them blended in with scared ordinary people, some pretended to be dead bodies around the devils' altars, and some acted like devilized people and assassinated the Cultivators when their spiritual energy was running dry and they were in a hurry to rescue ordinary citizens!
The Cultivators had the advantage in numbers, but they were walking in the light while the enemy was in the dark. They also had to rescue the ordinary people. Moreover, among the Immortal Cultivators, there were the real 'Eight Blades of Black Spider', top assassins of the Temple of Immortals, and 'Hellsword', a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator!
On the Cultivators' side, more than ten Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators had arrived, but the tenth space ring was in an utter mess right now. The assassins often fled far away immediately when their assassination failed. It was extremely tricky to keep them on the radar.
Grunts and moans were echoing nonstop inside the communication channel.
News that a Cultivator had perished came one after another.
The blue sky, which was in fact a dome, had a series of explosions. After spluttering sparks, it turned into a square black screen.
Countless black screens were connected together, as if night had fallen.
…
Half a day later, Li Yao arrived in the refrigeration warehouse of a big hotel not far away from the center of the city.
The refrigeration warehouse was half below the ground and had very solid walls.
Li Yao had also deployed a lot of alarm and defense rune arrays, making the place a temporary fortress for him.
After all the rune arrays were triggered, an overwhelming defense network was established. Then, Li Yao retrieved a piece of bizarre-shaped magical equipment from his Cosmos Ring.
It looked like a colorful metal helmet that was embedded with crystals. Li Yao put it on his head. As the rune arrays functioned, the crystals started glittering. Streams of brightness in various colors flowed out and leaked into Li Yao's forehead, temples, and skull.
The magical equipment was named 'Super Perception Hat'. Li Yao had made it specially for complicated computations in the super perceptive state. It could both cool down and nurture his head so that his head would not overheat, and the broken cerebral vessels would be repaired promptly. Moreover, the secret medications inside the helmet could also provide nutrition for his brain cells in order to stay in the super perceptive state longer.
More than ten light beams were projected by Li Yao's crystal processor. Video clips as well as dazzling data were being displayed on them.
All the crystal processors of the Cultivators were connected to the Spiritual Nexus. The real-time footage captured by the crystal cameras attached to the Cultivators was all uploaded to the Spiritual Nexus, too.
The hundred video clips being played right now were all captured in an instant by the Cultivators who were believed to have been ambushed by 'Hellsword'.
In most of the video clips, the only thing that could be seen was a blink of blackness. After that, the Cultivators were either injured or killed.
"Brain cell activity, 300%!"
Two pieces of glasses seemed to be broken at the bottom of Li Yao's eyes, which were now much sharper and clearer.
"Current target: to kill 'Hellsword' Zhuang Ziyou, a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator!
"Advantages: precise evaluation of the enemy and myself based on the shared information on the Spiritual Nexus; a super crystal suit whose performance is better than the enemy's and can be further boosted by 'Black Wing'; a maximum combat ability equaled to that of Core Formation Stage Cultivator in the middle to high level; the enemy's negligence of my ambush; the enemy's wrong judgement about my capability; the enemy's wrong specialty in mental attack, which is where my defense ability is the highest!
"Disadvantages: as a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, the enemy's basic capability is way higher than mine; even though the enemy's crystal suit is not as good as the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, it is definitely one of the best in the Flying Star Sector, and there won't be much difference in its performance; the enemy is probably supported by Core Formation Stage Cultivators such as the 'Eight Blades of Black Spider'; the enemy most likely possesses inside information on us and knows our latest progress exactly!
"The trickiest problem is that my purpose is not to run away from a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, not to wound a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, but to kill a Nascent Soul Stage!
"A Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator is stronger than anyone could imagine. I won't have a second chance if I miss the first attack!"
Although the 'Super Perceptive Hat' was fully functioning, and the rune arrays and crystals were all humming, steam was still popping up from the gaps of the helmet.
The temperature inside the refrigeration warehouse seemed to have been increased by more than ten degrees.
Li Yao's brain was overloading. His brain cell activity continued on the rise. 500%! 900%!
Holding his head in his hands, Li Yao listened to the explosions of his cerebral vessels while he pondered calmly.
"My hard capability is still no match for that of a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator. The support of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit and Black Wing may not be enough to cover the gap.
"Naturally, they should be more than enough for me to run away from a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator.
"But it will be a whole different matter to execute a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator without giving him any chance to run away.
"If I act right now, the odds of success are no higher than 1%!
"However—
"Tough as Hellsword may be, he is a human and not a god!
"A human will be tired and wounded. There will be a time when his magical equipment cracks and his spiritual energy runs dry!
"He has been causing trouble in the tenth space ring for five hours. During those five hours, he has dodged the searches of more than ten Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators while he assaulted dozens of other Cultivators!
"Even Building Foundation Stage Cultivators are not readily killable for a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator when they are in crystal suits and their spiritual energy is fully burning.
"When he killed them, he must have consumed his spiritual energy, utilized his magical equipment, and even paid a higher price!
"Moreover, he has also slain two Core Formation Stage Cultivators and heavily wounded one.
"The three Core Formation Stage Cultivators all fought back hard. One of them even detonated his own core, which must have dealt a certain amount of damage to him.
"But there's no telling how great an effect that was yet."
Colorful pictures were flashing inside Li Yao's eyes. He ordered the video clips that allegedly recorded Hellsword's assassinations in strict chronological order. Then, he raised his computational ability and analyzed all the videos.
Speed, strength, moves, temperature, humidity… He retrieved a lot of information from the videos and sent it to his brain.
"As I expected!
"The third Building Foundation Stage Cultivator that Hellsword assaulted was on par with the seventeenth Building Foundation Stage Cultivator. They were both in the middle level of the Building Foundation Stage, both focused on physical strength in their Cultivation, and both adopted similar moves to deal with the enemy because they were from the same sect.
"In the first attack, it took Hellsword 1.21 seconds to finish the battle, while it took him 3.44 seconds in the second assassination!
"Collect all the data including Hellsword's speed, strength, time of assassination, and everything else in the videos, calculate a spiritual mountain sequence with the great regression algorithm, and then turn it into a system of ordinary differential equations with the Tyrant's Armor theorem.
"It will be quite simple after that. A problem that even college students can work out very quickly. Set Hellsword's combat ability in the beginning as 100, with the independent variables and dependent variables both calculable, what is the rate of the decline of his combat ability in the five hours, and what is the number of his current combat ability according to the trend?
"Let's solve the equation set with convergent approaches. I'm getting a series of convergent sequences of numbers. When the polynomials are expanded three times, it will be the trend of the decline of Hellsword's combat ability!
"According to the trend, Hellsword's speed is only 79.2% of his original speed during the last assault. His agility is only 71%, and only 68% of his absolute strength still remains.
"His tactical choices are getting more and more conservative, and he has been acting more and more prudently. There were many times when he could have killed more victims, but he simply let go of the Cultivators within his reach in fear that he would be stalled by them and the reinforcing Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators would arrive.
"After a comprehensive analysis of all the data, my conclusion is that, if his original combat ability was 100, his current combat ability is between 68.2 and 71.3. Considering that he might have been hiding his strength in the beginning, his real combat ability should be higher than that.
"Taking my own combat ability into calculation, and measuring the results with a double fold algorithm, the odds of me killing him instantly are lower than 2.9%!
"The odds are still too low. Now is not the time for me to take action yet!"
Right then, new information popped up in the crystal processor.
"Elder Thousand Crane, a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator of the Furious Bears Union, had a battle with Hellsword just now. They exchanged three moves and were both injured. Hellsword ran away!
"Video of the battle is being uploaded!"
Li Yao was refreshed. He immediately compiled the latest video into thousands of data and added them into calculation.
"Excellent!
"After a head-on clash with another Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, Hellsword's speed and agility during his escape have both plunged significantly!
"According to the comprehensive analysis, his current combat ability is only around 51!
"In such a case, with appropriate tactics, I will be able to lock onto him before he is fully recovered. The odds of me executing him are now higher than 28.8%!"
Li Yao leapt up from the cold ground and rubbed the frost on his face. Taking a deep breath of the cold hair, he felt that both his brain and chest were reinvigorated.
"A success rate of thirty percent is worth a try. Let me slay a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator and offer his head to the deceased!"
Chapter 699: Let the Vulture's Game Begin! |
Five seconds later, three devils gradually seeped out of the walls in a remote alley. They condensed into three sharp-edged shadows quietly and gazed at the guy walked close from the end of the alley.
The man was wearing ragged clothes that were stained with blood. He was walking in a hurry and watching the crystal processor on his wrist every now and then, like a white-collar worker who was late for work.
The weird image was utterly incompatible with the burning city.
Although the devils did not have much thinking ability, they did feel that it was somewhat strange. However, before they dwelled on the uncanniness any longer, their instincts to assault and slaughter drove them to utter blood-breezing shrieks as they lunged at the man.
Suddenly—
The three devils were frozen in midair in a hilarious posture as if a spell had been cast upon them. Even their shrieks came to a sudden halt, like roosters whose throats had suddenly been cut off.
'Surrounded' by the three devils, Li Yao tapped on the crystal processor and searched for the latest information about Hellsword.
As he expected, there was no more news about the enemy.
According to the model of Hellsword's capability that Li Yao had constructed, as time went by, the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator was slowly recovering bit by bit even though he was not taking any medication.
Right now, the success rate that Li Yao estimated had dropped to 28.1%.
But he did not dare dream that Hellsword would be silly enough to confront another Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator so that he could take the advantage.
At this moment, Hellsword's combat ability was approximately 55% of the original.
It was a very perfect number.
If it were any lower, with the wisdom and resolution of a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, Hellsword would definitely retreat from the battlefield without looking back. He would not be bewildered by petty benefits and put his life in danger.
Even though Hellsword still stayed there, Li Yao estimated that he would not act again.
Since the Temple of Immortals had prepared for the operation for a long time, there were bound to be a lot of secret bases littered about the tenth space ring. Hellsword would definitely try to avoid the hunting of the hostile Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators and sneak into the secret bases for his recovery.
Then, he would decide whether to continue his assassination or retreat as quickly as possible according to the status of his recovery and the situation of the battle in the outside world.
Therefore, this was the moment when Hellsword was the weakest. He would not get any weaker.
The biggest problem, however, was how to lock onto Hellsword.
Although he only had half of his combat ability left, a lone wolf like him who had made as distinguished accomplishments as those of pirate gangs all by himself must be really good at hiding and stealth.
With the invasion of the devils, the city was in havoc. More than ten Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators might not be able to locate Hellsword even if they joined hands.
It was even less likely for Li Yao to find him.
However…
He could not find Hellsword, but it did not mean that Hellsword could not find him.
"Let's make a gamble, Hellsword," Li Yao mumbled with a vague smile tugging at the corners of his lips, but there seemed to be two clusters of freezing ice inside his eyes.
Common bait would definitely not be tempting enough for Hellsword in his current status.
However, Li Yao believed that he was different.
Firstly, he had sabotaged the Temple of Immortals first big operation on Iron Plateau and facilitated the reconciliation and communication between the Iron Plateau natives and the space residents.
Secondly, of the four kings of the Temple of Immortals, Yan Xibei, the Mountain King, had been killed by him. If 'Hellsword' was the real 'Black King', he would surpass the deceased Mountain King and the other two kings after he killed Li Yao even though he had never thought of avenging the Mountain King.
