The silver puppet vanished the moment it shattered the stone statue, and when it reappeared, it had returned to its original square.
Head bowed, Li Guanqi’s eyes were bloodshot. By now, he knew that the stone statues below were bound to his very life.
The agony from the destruction of a single statue had surpassed even his first medicinal bath.
Yet he had also realized how to control the puppet below.
He no longer staunched his wounds, letting his blood flow down along the spikes.
With blood as the guide and divine sense as the support.
In an instant, Li Guanqi's mind sank into the Thousand Mechanism Formation Plate below!
A flood of information regarding the formation plate surged into his mind.
A fierce sneer curled the corner of his lips. Li Guanqi retrieved a jade plaque carved with a longsword and slammed it hard against the ground!
Countless lines of light across the floor converged upon the plaque in an instant, causing it to blaze with brilliant radiance.
A longsword materialized by the puppet's left hand. Drawing the blade, the puppet gripped a sword in each hand and charged fiercely toward the opponent!
Yet the moment it crossed beyond his own squares and set foot onto the opponent's first square—
The man opposite swung his hands vigorously, as if sliding something across a board.
Li Guanqi commanded his puppet to leap back a step.
And that single step saved it from an insidious mechanism!
The square the puppet had been about to step upon split down the middle, and countless metal spikes shot up from the stone slabs on either side.
The two upturned slabs snapped shut like a closing book!
*Bang!*
If not for Li Guanqi's quick reflexes, the puppet would have already been thoroughly skewered by the spikes.
Driving power through its feet, the puppet lunged once more toward the opponent's stone statues!
Twin blades in hand, the jet-black puppet slashed viciously forward.
Yet the silver puppet stood its ground, parrying the strike with its longsword.
Li Guanqi flowed with the momentum to switch stances, thrusting a sword straight through the back of the puppet's head!!
*Bang!!*
The silver puppet dissolved into motes of spiritual light, and behind it, one of the man's stone statues blew apart with a roar!!
"Aargh! Aaagh!"
A bloodcurdling scream rang out. Clutching his head, the man dropped to his knees and slammed his forehead frantically against the ground!
"Strike while you're down, take your life while you're weak!!"
Li Guanqi's eyes were bloodshot, but he did not waste a single moment.
*Boom!!*
Yet he discovered his puppet was rooted to the spot, completely unable to move!
With disheveled hair, the man jerked his head up!
Even across hundreds of zhang, Li Guanqi could clearly see blood streaming from the man's seven facial orifices.
With a savage grimace, the man slammed down a jade plaque and roared, "Die!! I'll kill you!!"
The blue spiritual lines on the formation plate surged forward by five whole rows!
Li Guanqi had only ten rows across to begin with, meaning he had just lost a hundred squares!
*Whoosh!!*
The silver-armored puppet flashed forward, arriving on the purple tiles almost instantaneously.
Darting and weaving, it quickly closed in on the stone statues beneath Li Guanqi's platform.
Suddenly!
A peculiar raised dais rose before Li Guanqi.
Upon its stone surface lay a miniature model of the formation plate.
Beside it were several slots and a number of jade plaques.
These plaques could be slotted into specific squares.
As Li Guanqi pressed his palm against the formation plate, a deluge of information flooded his mind, and he began digesting it as fast as he could.
At this moment, the silver-armored puppet was only a single square away from Li Guanqi's stone statue!
Watching this, the disciples behind him had their hearts in their throats. They cried out, "Junior Brother!! Look out!!"
"Move!! Why isn't the black puppet moving?!"
The scar-faced man wore a vicious sneer, while the black-robed men behind him chuckled with relaxed ease.
"Hahaha, these fools don't even know the Thousand Mechanism Formation Plate is turn-based."
"Looks like we'll definitely open the fourteenth tier this time!"
Although Scarface noticed the dais rising before Li Guanqi and felt a flicker of surprise, it was clearly too late. As long as his puppet took one more step, it would smash a second stone statue!!
As the puppet strode forward, its raised blade gripped everyone's hearts!
Li Guanqi, however, abruptly slammed the mountain jade plaque in his hand into the formation plate before him!
*Boom!!*
Instantly, a colossal mountain manifested on the arena floor, completely filling the entire final row of squares!
The puppet's slash struck the mountain!
*Crash!!*
A thunderous roar rang out, but the mountain merely quivered slightly.
Li Guanqi swiftly slotted another jade plaque—one inscribed with the phantom image of a rectangle—into the formation plate.
Scarface's expression darkened as he cursed under his breath, "Damn it! He got the Mountain of Protection plaque!"
The puppet shifted its footing, flashing sideways across several squares in an attempt to flank around and attack the black-armored puppet directly.
Li Guanqi sneered. The moment the silver puppet stepped on a certain square during its flank, it was instantly teleported back three steps to where it had been before!
Scarface's face changed drastically. His eyes widened in shock as he cried out, "What happened?!"
"Why was the puppet shifted back to where it just crossed the boundary?!"
Then he looked up toward Li Guanqi, muttering, "No... what is that formation dais before him?"
How could Li Guanqi give him time to think? The moment his puppet was freed from the restriction, he drove it forward like a launched arrow!
Before his opponent could unravel the rules of the Thousand Mechanism Formation Plate, he would deliver a finishing blow!
Twin blades in hand, the jet-black puppet dragged its edges along the floor, throwing up showers of sparks!
Right then, the man's pupils trembled.
Channeling spiritual energy down into his platform, a matching formation dais finally rose before him as well.
Yet the black-armored puppet was too fast. The man haphazardly wiped away the blood blurring his vision.
In a panic, he slammed the only jade plaque left in his hand onto the formation plate!
In his blurred haze, Scarface had caught a glimpse of countless hidden weapons inscribed upon the plaque.
*Hum—*
His eyes closed, Li Guanqi's brow knitted tightly, and he commanded his puppet to leap back in retreat.
Just then, bluestone slabs in eight directions around the puppet abruptly sank!
In an instant, eight massive ballistas slowly rose from beneath the ground!
Atop each ballista sat a long wooden box holding thirty bolts, their tips gleaming with chilling cold light.
Seeing those two-finger-thick bolts, Li Guanqi did not hesitate to pull his puppet back even faster!!
At the same time, he pressed the jade plaque inscribed with hidden weapons from his own hand onto the formation plate.
Just as the eight ballistas were winched taut, twelve squares in the ground behind the black-armored puppet suddenly plunged downward.
Twelve metal pillars as thick as water barrels slowly rose, then instantly swung around to face the opposite side.
Simultaneously, the outer casings of the pillars began to split open. In mere moments, each metal pillar split into sixty-six slender metal tubes!
Chapter 97