Inside the White Rock Long Hall, the administrators looked at the colossal behemoth on the screen, feelings of unease welling in their hearts.
Chen Chuan had displayed overwhelming dominance in his earlier assault on Covington, but he was now facing a Throne martial artist who had essentially unleashed his full power. Could he truly hold the line?
They had very little confidence in the outcome.
And that was not their only concern; they turned their eyes toward another screen.
Mr. Weiss of Liberty Academy was currently holding back that other entity—and his opponent was likewise a massive being tens of meters tall.
Floating suspended in midair, the entity radiated a gorgeous crystalline mist. Down its center ran a luminous vertical ridge flanked by two dark apertures, resembling an enormous face, while a long trunk-like snout hung all the way to the ground.
At that moment, a human silhouette was circling it at high speed. Everywhere the figure darted past, dazzling flashes of light burst forth—fading here only to flare up again over there.
An administrator asked nervously, "Can Mr. Weiss hold him off?"
Ryan said, "Mr. Weiss is a martial artist of the Visage of the Divine. As long as he has enough surrogate bodies, he can keep fighting indefinitely."
Alu spoke up then: "Esteemed administrators, due to field erosion, Mr. Weiss has already swapped bodies three times. I have consulted with Mr. Weiss; to maintain his current intensity, he is projected to require at least two more surrogate bodies over the next three minutes, yet he has only three spares remaining."
Shock rippled through the administrators. That meant the line there could only hold for three or four more minutes at most.
Even if Chen Chuan managed to contain Covington, the situation remained perilous. In truth, that entity posed the greatest threat of all—because it was exceptionally unique, which was the very reason it had been imprisoned in the first place.
Once it broke out of the area and escaped the perimeter of the ritual and Center City itself, it could tear open a fissure out of thin air. At that point, slipping back to the other side would be the best-case scenario; what was far more likely was that it would draw even more entities from the other side into this realm.
That was by no means good news.
Moreover, they could not overlook the deeply unsettling attitude of the former emperor. Up to now, he had not displayed the slightest clear intention, merely strolling leisurely amidst the ritual mist as though none of this concerned him.
Yet with a powerhouse of the old era, no one could easily fathom his true motives. Who could guarantee that he would not suddenly intervene at a crucial juncture, introducing yet another unpredictable variable?
Someone could not help asking, "Alu, is Mr. Krosal still on his way?"
Alu replied, "Mr. Krosal is already rushing here at top speed. Current projections estimate he will arrive in fifteen to eighteen minutes."
Hearing that, everyone knew that even if he made it, it would likely be too late. The Three-Star Conjunction would conclude around that same time, at which point the upper-level psychic force would descend to suppress everything. There would be no need for anyone else to intervene then; what mattered most was what transpired in the next few minutes.
Someone said, "Then everything hinges on Section Chief Chen. If he can eliminate that archon as quickly as possible and go reinforce Mr. Weiss, there might still be a chance."
Yet few were optimistic. Covington had plainly brought forth all of his strength. Looking at that massive form on the screen and his nearly despair-inducing regenerative capacity, even if Section Chief Chen could truly gain the upper hand, they could not fathom how he could finish the creature off in such a short window of time.
Ryan stared intently at the screen. Though a monster like Covington seemed almost impossible to dispatch quickly no matter how one looked at it, he had a strong premonition that the battle on this front might not take long at all.
Having absorbed those wisps of vital energy, the pale spiritual flames around Covington grew increasingly vigorous. But the moment the Xuejun Saber in Chen Chuan's hand lit up, the creature sensed something instantly, and the eyes across all its faces snapped toward him in unison.
The brilliant fire of spirituality gathering upon the blade made Chen Chuan's intentions glaringly obvious.
Covington immediately shifted his gargantuan body, the whip-like tendrils surrounding him thrashing outward to strike at Chen Chuan. Chen Chuan withdrew one hand while still sustaining the condensation of his spiritual fire. With a mere shift of thought, the Grand Firmament Forms field wrapped around him and shifted his position, easily dodging each of the incoming strikes.
A massive frame certainly bolstered defensive capability, but it inevitably slowed movement and attack speed.
Seeing that he could not land a blow, all Covington could do was increase the draw of his aberrant power. This caused Chen Chuan's second self to turn almost entirely insubstantial, fading to something as faint as light mist.
Chen Chuan remained completely unmoved. An intensely brilliant white-gold blade aura had already manifested on the Xuejun Saber, and lifted by his field, he ascended into the sky above, looking down upon the leviathan beneath him.
At that moment, Covington seemed to sense impending danger. The tendrils on either side rose and converged toward the center until their tips overlapped at a single point, where an identical surge of flashing light flared to life.
Alu's timely prompt sounded: "Ritual defenses raised to Level One. Prepare for field impact—"
Chen Chuan's preparation had seemed deliberate, but the entire process had taken only a breath or two. Yet for a martial artist, the spiritual force that could be marshaled in that brief span was utterly terrifying.
Holding the saber with both hands, he raised it high above his head. The moment his power crested at its absolute peak, he swept the blade downward!
Across the heavens, a flash of blade light streaked past.
The flare of light atop Covington erupted simultaneously. Yet the instant the two collided, the overhead brilliance flashed, completely obliterating the newly unleashed spiritual light in an instant before slicing cleanly and unhindered into his body.
His movements froze, and the surrounding din seemed to fall deathly still.
A moment later, a neat, smooth vertical cleft slowly parted across his rigid carapace. The rift expanded outward, nearly solidified light oozing slowly from within, until it silently detonated. The resulting storm of pulverizing flesh and blood was immediately swallowed up by the subsequent gush of radiant light.
The screens in the White Rock Long Hall were instantly bleached entirely white, obscuring all sight. A moment later, they thought they heard something, followed by a wave-like heave beneath their feet and a resonant droning in their ears.
This time, the radiance born of the spiritual impact did not flash and fade; it continuously generated, as if the light could swallow everything whole. Only after several breaths did it gradually disperse and recede.
Light shimmered around Chen Chuan as he hovered alone in the air above. He looked at the mangled flesh and blood drifting amid the ash, knowing that even reaching this stage did not mean the battle was over.
As a Throne martial artist, so long as a single scrap of the creature's mangled remains survived, it retained the chance to reconverge and regenerate anew.
He extended a finger, shut his eyes slightly, and tapped the center of his brow.
*Boom!*
The Grand Firmament Forms and Grand Radiant Light Forms snapped open simultaneously! This time, moving in tandem with his field, the entire perimeter inside and outside the Blockade Hall was swept within their reach. In the dark night, a colossal solar disk seemed to abruptly appear!
Wherever the light touched, the dancing flecks of flesh and mutated tissue melted and dissolved.
Bits of shattered matter that had fallen to the ground and were attempting to burrow into the dirt and sand found themselves suppressed and severed by the dual melting force of the Grand Firmament and Grand Radiant Light. Unable to draw further power from the other side, they twitched and thrashed, constantly attempting to regrow and pull together into a complete body.
Yet beneath the blazing radiance, wisps of thick smoke curled from their surfaces, and they gradually shrank until they moved no more.
Rossard was sprawled on the ground. The sudden severance of the aberrant pull draining his vital energy jolted him awake. Panting heavily, he shook his head, looked up, and witnessed the staggering sight.
Sensing something, he shifted his feet and spotted a lump of flesh writhing in the light. After a moment of silence, he brought his foot down with a hard stomp, ground his heel into it, and stepped back to find it reduced to completely charred dross.
He looked outward. The ground everywhere was carpeted in a dense layer of this blackened residue resembling melted pitch, while faint heat steamed through the air under the lingering radiance.
His emotions were exceedingly complex. He knew that even his former superior could not possibly reconverge under such conditions.
He tilted his head back to gaze upward. The saber-wielding figure stood aloft, encircled by white-gold radiance, his coat and long scarf billowing outward in the wind.
At that moment, a sudden realization struck him: had Chen Chuan not used his spirit visage from start to finish?
The thought drew a sigh from him. He felt there was no longer any need to fight that duel against this man.
He had already lost.
Chen Chuan slowly drew back the power of the two great forms. He felt out his surroundings; within the reach of his field, not a trace of anything carrying Covington's field imprint remained. He lowered his hand and opened his eyes.
He looked at the night sky, which had grown vastly clearer. Had Covington not merged with that entity, matters might have been different; but since the two had fused into one, the secret arts of the Purist Faction proved equally effective against him.
After a brief pause, he swept his gaze toward the ground below. Many of the imprisoned specimens remained trapped within the ritual. Though the barriers had suffered damage during the shockwaves, they were quickly being restored. While somewhat chaotic, order was largely holding.
This was thanks not only to the efforts of the ritual specialists, but also to Alu's regulation, which could channel the resources of Vea State directly into usable power.
Yet one area still appeared perilous. He cast his gaze in that direction. That entity seemed to have realized what had transpired here and was violently ramming its way outward; the figure originally tasked with intercepting it was already struggling to hold the line.
Seeing this, Chen Chuan vanished in a flash, reappearing directly before the entity.
Hovering in midair with saber in hand, he looked down at the misty, semi-spiritual form and said calmly, "Why the rush to leave, Your Excellency? It seems our conversation from last time wasn't finished, was it?"
Chapter 1153