by <unknown>
For the convenience of maintaining the Colossi, almost a thousand mobile rails had been installed on the dome of the temple of the Colossi so that the large-scale tools and facilities could be moved more easily. A lot of bizarre-looking maintenance magical equipment was also dangling down from the rails, like the vines falling down from the branches in a murky forest.
The rails on the dome that were almost hidden in darkness did not have anything that called for attention at first glance. Only if one observed in the most careful way would they notice feeble airwaves spreading out slowly, like the ripples in a pond caused by a gentle breeze.
"It's dust," Li Yao mumbled, his eyelids bouncing. "A tiny bit of dust was blown softly and spreading in the air from quite a few rails. It's almost like… something invisible is crouching on the rails and crawling forward slowly!
"As for their target—"
Li Yao marked the few rails that were spraying dust and looked at the intersection of their extensions. His eyes went straight downward, but his heart instantly froze!
Below the intersection of the rails was the Colossus that looked like a black skeleton with red nerves!
"What's that? What's that exactly?"
Li Yao suddenly grew anxious. He was certain that some weird, invisible beings were approaching the black-skeleton-like Colossus, which seemed to have finished its maintenance and been fully charged with spiritual energy with the dozens of thick tubes connected. They were moving stealthily above while the Cultivators on the Great Qian Dynasty's side and on Ghost Qin's side were fiercely arguing with each other!
Li Yao and Long Yangjun looked at each other and noticed the anxiety in each other's eyes.
"Is there any way that we can see who they are?" Li Yao gnashed his teeth.
"It's very difficult. If we activate the automatic defense rune array inside the warehouse of the Colossi, it is very possible that somebody will notice our existence!"
Long Yangjun thought quickly and bit her lips softly. She put on a vague smile and said, "However, there's a way that is worth a try. This Nuwa warship hasn't been maintained for a long time. A lot of magical equipment has aged and deteriorated. They can be functional for a while and nonfunctional a moment later. For example, some of the fire extinguishing magical equipment and the recovery magical equipment…"
Despite her plain face, she had a pair of stunningly beautiful hands. When her fingers were bouncing, it was like a gorgeous dance on the threads of light.
As the small finger on her left hand curled, a light ball no larger than the size of millet rushed out of the tip of her finger and entered the pillar-shaped crystal processor like bioelectricity!
On the surveillance picture, from one of the rails where feeble ripples were spreading out, a cluster of thick, blue gas spurted out!
The gas was designed to extinguish fire and should have surged out incessantly.
However, as a piece of 'unmaintained', 'aged' magical equipment, under the stimulation of the spiritual waves of the outside world, the device was only able to produce one cluster of inert gas, which seemed acceptable enough.
When the Cultivators on the two sides were staying at the highest alert, such a noise that sounded almost like a fart was as shocking as thunder!
Qi Zhongdao, Han Baling, Yan Liren, Qi Changsheng, Ba Xiaoyu, Master Bitter Cicada, Wan Mingzhu… All the super Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators darted their keen eyes toward the rail instantly!
The being behind the invisible ripples crouching on the rail never expected even in his wildest dreams that a cluster of bluish gas would suddenly spurt out right above him. Although he reacted promptly enough and retreated immediately, part of his body was still outlined by the blue gas. In the fuzziness, it appeared to be armor!
"Somebody is in midair!"
Although the target was exposed for only 0.1 seconds, Qi Zhongdao, Han Baling, and the other super Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators were too extraordinary to let go of him again now that his traces had been seen.
Shua!
The brilliance of the sword burst out of nowhere like lightning and darted toward the invisible man from dozens of tricky angles in the sharpest auras!
Yan Liren had attacked again!
"Who's acting mysteriously up there? Get out!"
Yan Liren sniffed. As his spiritual energy surged out, the sword auras entangled the rail almost a hundred meters above the ground like visible dragons.
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
A series of dazzling sparks erupted on top of the rail. Outside of everyone's expectations, the invisible man was not hurt but retreated fast into the darkness in a feeble ripple.
"Huh?" Yan Liren was slightly dazed. His smile was even more brilliant. He shook his short, thick right arm, and the dragons of lightning phantomized by the sword auras expanded by almost ten times in spluttering noises. The bloody mouths of the dragons that were wide open bulged into balls of lightning and exploded everywhere around the invisible ripple!
Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi!
Under the stimulation of the intense electric arcs, the invisible ripple suddenly uttered a dull scream, and his body was fully revealed. It turned out to be a Cultivator wearing a fully-enclosed, weird armor. His entire face was covered by a spider helmet. There was no telling who he was exactly.
"This is—"
In the bridge, Li Yao and Long Yangjun jumped to their feet simultaneously.
"Isn't it the armor that you were wearing just now? You have other accomplices!"
Long Yangjun blinked dozens of kilometers away in almost twenty shadows. The red crystal suit was entangling and condensing on her arms again while she glared at Li Yao angrily.
"He is not one of my people. The style of his crystal suit is obviously different from mine. You will see it if you look at it more carefully!" Li Yao smiled bitterly.
He had already seen the badge of trident-like black lightning on the chest of the stranger's crystal suit.
It was the emblem of the Imperium of True Human Beings!
His worst fear had become reality. There were indeed spies of the Imperium of True Human Beings in the Ancient Sages Sector. They appeared to be a tough tactical squad, and they had discovered the Nuwa warship, too!
Long Yangjun thought quickly and immediately realized what was going on. "They belong to… your hostile force?"
When the air in the bridge was growing tense, the atmosphere in the temple of the Colossi was tenser than ever.
While all the Cultivators were confronting the mysterious person in the crystal suit anxiously, Mother White Lotus Wan Mingzhu shrieked, "There are other rats on the ceiling!"
Pu!
She raised her broken arm and shot out a section of broken bone from her body, which exploded into overwhelming smoke in midair and covered the rails like raging ferocious beasts!
The smoke seemed to contain weird waves. Wherever the white smoke reached, the stealth techniques were instantly cracked.
With a series of cracking noises, the ten or so people wearing crystal suits on the rails were all exposed!
The Exos looked at each other in bewilderment. Realizing that they had already been uncovered, they simply leapt down and formed a well-trained battle formation around their first companion who had already been shocked unconscious!
Although Qi Zhongdao, Han Baling, and the other super Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators were knowledgeable and broad-minded, they were stunned briefly when they saw the crystal suits, built in the industrial system of the modern Cultivation civilization, for the first time, like Long Yangjun earlier.
The joints of the fully-enclosed armor, the streamlined design to reduce the windage to the minimum, the shimmers beaming out of the gaps when they were moving, and the external rune arrays that were extremely strict in structure and could be carved within one square inch… Everything made the locals of the Ancient Sages Sector uncomfortable!
"Who… are you people exactly?" Qi Zhongdao demanded, raising the Heaven Flipping S
eal into midair. The silver balls and the rails were rotating at the highest speed, all set to go!
Faced with the mysterious strangers, the Cultivators from the Great Qian Dynasty and the Ghost Qin were equally baffled. The chasm between them was somehow shortened.
"Master Righteous One, do not attack. They are my imperial guards!"
At the center of the ten or so Exos, one of the strangers wearing a phoenix helmet with crimson, fiery stripes on it suddenly smiled.
Then, he touched his temples slightly. The helmet of the crystal suit immediately dissected into hundreds of pieces and folded back to his neck, revealing Emperor Phoenix Zhu Zongyou's young and immature face.
However, the young emperor had a mysterious smile.
"Your Majesty!" Qi Zhongdao and the rest of them were greatly surprised. Looking at Emperor Phoenix and his imperial guards' fancy attire, they were lost for words. "This—this—"
Chapter 1491: End of Negotiation! |
"Master Righteous One, Master Bitter Cicada, elders and leaders, there's no need to worry!" Emperor Phoenix Zhu Zongyou said in a crisp voice. "They are all the Fiery Phoenix bodyguards that I have trained. They have not been revealed before because they were trained exactly for the battle today! Hehe. Han Baling, Qi Changsheng, Wan Mingzhu. All the greatest headaches of the court are here. Fantastic! Masters, elders, and leaders, fight with me and eliminate the evils here, and the world will be at peace!"
"Your Majesty…" Qi Zhongdao was too old and shrewd to be convinced by Emperor Phoenix's ingenuine persuasion, and the Heaven Flipping Seal, the 'ultimate treasure of the Ancient Sages Sector', was still rotating rapidly in the air. He asked suspiciously, "If you have been planning to annihilate Han Baling, Qi Changsheng, and Wan Mingzhu, why were you lurking far away? Also, the armor of the imperial guards here are such a weird style. Not only do they greatly differ from the traditions of the armor of the Great Qian Dynasty, they have nothing similar to the primeval treasures on the ground here. Where did you find them, Your Majesty?"
"Well…" Emperor Phoenix's eyes were shuddering fast. His cheeks were reddened because of his embarrassment, and he was lost for words for a moment.
"Your emperor is lying. There is definitely something wrong with him!" Han Baling chuckled coldly. "If he was truly of a mind to besiege and annihilate us, he should've moved to our rear along the rails. However, he was getting farther and farther away from us in the darkness! Besides, if he did not have ill intentions, he would've told you everything in advance so that you could work out a trap to deal with us together!
"He was acting so stealthily, and his bullsh*t is full of loopholes. Who's going to buy that? Also, the weird-looking armor does not look like something that the Great Qian Dynasty can produce. I have never seen such an eccentric model in the collection of armors from the previous dynasties from the past hundred thousand years, either!
"This little emperor did not ascend to the throne properly in the first place. Who knows what exactly happened in the Forbidden City in the Divine Capital last spring? You all claim that the previous emperor died because he was too angry about me, but I say that he was poisoned by this little emperor! Had he not foreseen that the old emperor was about to die, how could he have made thorough arrangements in the Divine Capital and bought over the few imperial troops and the experts in the palace? How could the other princes, even including the crown prince, have been suppressed when they did not know what was going on? Also, he was just a lone ghost who was exiled to guard the ancestors' temple. Where did he find the support to help him control everything?
"Have you ever considered such things, fellow Cultivators from the central plateaus?
"The forces behind the little emperor are much more powerful than we can imagine. Today, he has finally decided to reveal them!
"Fellow Cultivator Qi, Fellow Cultivator Ba, Master Bitter Cicada, a word of advice. You must watch your backs carefully! The weapons in my hands are obvious, but the weapons in your little emperor's hands are invisible and odorless. Chances are that you will not be able to feel it until it is plunged into your stomach!
"Elders and leaders of the six major sects, it is not the time for you to gloat. Hehe. It's true that your little emperor hates our guts, but does he not hate you? Does he not want to mince you apart and burn you to ashes? The six major sects and even the entire world of Cultivators are as much trouble for the court as me and my companions are! It is especially so in light of your clandestine business during the natural disasters in the southeast. Do you think that any emperor would not be infuriated after he learned that? Your little emperor is smiling at you right now, but who knows what he is thinking in his heart? It will soon be your turn after he eliminates us, and you are still laughing and watching like idiots!"
All the Cultivators began sweating hard after hearing what he said.
It was a publicly known secret that Emperor Phoenix did not claim the crown properly. The contradiction between the court and the Cultivators was apparent even to the blind.
This time, everybody had only teamed up because of the pressure of the 'Four Rapscallions' and the temptation of the Divine Palace. They each had their own plans.
Right now, Han Baling had ripped apart their last disguise, which had made everything feel harmonious. Also, Emperor Phoenix's actions were indeed sneaky. The elders and the leaders of the six major sects were all the most astute people in the world. Now that questions of the past and present had surfaced together, how could they fight for Emperor Phoenix blindly?
Sensing everybody's reluctance, Emperor Phoenix grew anxious. Red blood spots were bursting out on his face as he roared furiously, "Elders and leaders, do not listen to his aspersions. Go up together and kill them. Kill them all! I will share all the Cloud Qin Gold Statues here with everybody evenly. Evenly!"
"The Cloud Qin Gold Statues are the most important weapons for a country and an army." Han Baling raised his voice, too. "One Cloud Qin Gold Statue is enough to trample on a city. How can you really mean to divide them with everybody evenly? The better your promise sounds, the more schemes you have planned!
"Masters, elders, and leaders! We did not have any grudges in the past. Many of you have even had very pleasant deals with Cloud Qin! Are we really going to fight each other while letting the little emperor who hates our guts take all the benefits? Do not be swallowed by your greed, or none of us will be able to walk out of this terrible Divine Palace!"
"Kill them! Kill them now! Whoever executes Qi Changsheng and Wan Mingzhu will be rewarded with one Cloud Qin Gold Statue. Two if you kill the barbarian chief Han Baling!" Emperor Phoenix bulged his eyes.
"The Cloud Qin Gold Statues are unowned, and whoever is qualified can claim them freely." Han Baling wasted no time castigating the enemy! "They are not yours to reward! Moreover, where did you get your armor? How did you bring the imperial guards under your control last year? If you don't explain that, I will start to wonder which of us is the actual evil!"
All the high-level Cultivators, regardless of their side, were all highly anxious, not knowing what to do in such a situation!
Right then, it was Yan Liren who had been silent the whole time that reacted first. His short sword shook violently, but his attack was aimed at neither Emperor Phoenix nor Han Baling, but a certain point in midair. The sword auras surged out into dozens of raging dragons again, covering the hundred square meters nearby once more!
Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi! Zi!
Nothing could be hidden under the illumination of the intense auras and light.
A member of the tactical squad of the Imperium, who had run away from the main force in secret and snuck above the black-skeleton-like Colossus, popped up from nowhere and landed on the shoulder of the Colossus precisely!
"There's still someone out there!"
Including Li Yao and Long Yangjun, who were observing from the bridge, everybody was suddenly alarmed!
It was not until then that they realized that Emperor Phoenix was
not easy to deal with at all despite his young and juvenile appearance.
The reason that Emperor Phoenix had chitchatted and dawdled for so long with Han Baling and Qi Zhongdao, even pretending that he had a weak case, was to buy more time for the last person so that he could jump onto the Colossus!
The guy's skills were rather impressive, too. Wan Mingzhu's overwhelming smoke had covered hundreds of square meters nearby, yet the guy had slipped away without a sound and without releasing any spiritual waves!
He must be the core of Emperor Phoenix's whole plan!
"Get down here!"
A second sword appeared in Yan Liren's left hand.
The body of the sword was only a foot and a half long, yet the soaring aura from the sword was like a waterfall sprinting from the heavens!
This time, Emperor Phoenix cut in between Yan Liren and the mysterious Exo. A longsword that seemed to be condensed of fire was unsheathed and spraying out waterfall-like auras.
A waterfall against a waterfall!
Boom!
Deafening noises were echoing in everybody's ears.
It should have been a crisp noise when two swords crashed. However, when the edges of the swords collided thousands of times in a moment, the sounds were as terrifying as a raging flood that had broken through a dam!
Yan Liren grunted. He leapt backward and rolled hundreds of times like a meatball before he finally got rid of Emperor Phoenix's sword auras that were haunting him like parasites. There was not any suspicion, hesitation, fear, or frustration on his face, only excitement!
It seemed that, for him, failure was not a problem, and the identity of the enemy was even less of a problem. Anything would be fine as long as he could fully unleash his sword arts!
Emperor Phoenix's crystal suit, on the other hand, was rippling with light, as if a thin membrane of light had covered the surface of the crystal suit.
