SWDnovel Chapter 117 Battle to build foundation 4
Chapter 117 Battle to build foundation 4
A surge of murderous intent and greed flashed in Zhou Huaili's eyes.
Capture this child and interrogate him about the origin of this magic.
The value of techniques that can be used in the Qi Refining stage is immeasurable.
He slapped the storage bag with his left hand, and the Spirit Mirror reappeared.
The mirrored eye reopened, and golden light swept into the barrier, illuminating Zhang Lin's location.
The golden light can illuminate the flow of true energy and reveal the weaknesses of techniques.
Whether it's a domain or a barrier, there are always nodes that maintain it.
Once you find that node, you can crush it with a single blow.
But just as the golden light was about to sweep across Zhang Lin, Zhang Lin's figure vanished.
To go out into existence and into nothingness—to traverse the void.
Within the barrier, all eight transformations can be used at will, without needing to light up the jade talismans one by one.
Zhang Lin's figure disappeared from the spot and appeared at the edge of the barrier almost instantly, thirty feet away from the original spot.
The golden light from the Spirit Mirror swept away nothing.
Before Zhang Lin could regain his footing, Zhou Huaili's silver-white flying sword attacked again.
The Azure Sword was drawn silently, transforming into a pale blue streak in the night, piercing straight towards the silver-white flying sword.
With his left hand holding the Soul-Suppressing Bell, another sound cone was compressed and formed.
Ding~
The fourth chime resounded within the barrier.
This time, the bell's sound was amplified by the barrier, increasing the sound waves' penetrating power by at least 30%.
Zhou Huaili gritted his teeth and held on, his true essence shield trembling violently with the sound of the bell.
But before he could catch his breath, Zhang Lin waved the Blood Fiend Flag in his right hand again, and the blood-red threads of Xuan Yin Soul-Seizing Invasion invaded his spiritual sea along the tail end of the bell.
Soul attacks came one after another.
The deafening clang of metal echoed within the barrier.
The silver-white flying sword was struck from the side by the Azure Gang Sword, causing it to deflect and pierce the ground at an angle.
The Azure Gang Sword was also thrown away by the recoil, tumbling several times in the air before Zhang Lin managed to stabilize it with his spiritual sense.
As the bell tolled, Zhou Huaili's consciousness became somewhat blurred. He lowered his hand, which had been drawing upon the power of heaven and earth, and passively defended himself solely with his true essence shield and flying sword.
Just then.
Zhang Lin suddenly flicked a streak of blood from his sleeve.
A dark red sword light, like a venomous snake emerging from its hole, pierced straight at Zhou Huaili's chest.
The tip of the Blood Refining Sword pierced the True Essence Shield, emitting a piercing shriek.
Even the finest magic artifacts cannot break through the true essence shield of a Foundation Establishment cultivator, not even those enhanced with the essence blood of a Foundation Establishment cultivator.
But this sword strike contained more than just the power of a magical artifact. A dark blue infernal flame ignited at the tip of the sword, and the flames spread rapidly along the surface of the true essence shield, burning a weak spot the size of a bowl into the shield.
The moment Zhou Huaili regained consciousness, he saw the Blood Refining Sword appear before him. His True Essence Shield was broken, and for the first time, a trace of fear flashed in his eyes.
The surge of true energy forced back the Blood Refining Sword. At that moment, Zhou Huaili made a decision—to retreat.
His true essence shield was broken, his spiritual sense was constantly eroded by the Blood Fiend Banner, and the barrier suppressed his perception. If the fight continued, he might really die here.
He died at the hands of someone in the Qi Refining stage.
This thought sent a chill down his spine.
He recalled his flying sword to protect himself, flew through the air, and turned to fly out of the town.
But Zhang Lin was not about to let him retreat, and he transformed into a beam of light and followed closely behind.
The Eight Transformations Mysterious Jade Ring in his dantian accelerated its operation once again, and the range of the Hidden Scenery Dance Heaven Barrier suddenly shrank from a radius of one hundred feet to thirty feet.
The suppressive force of the barrier increased exponentially as its range shrank, and the spiritual energy of heaven and earth was compressed into a stagnant state, causing Zhou Huaili's flight to slow down.
The Azure Gang Sword transformed into a beam of light and pursued Zhou Huaili, blocking his retreat from the side.
The dark red light emanating from the Blood Fiend Banner was amplified by the Blood Refining Sword, activating its special Blood Fiend Blade ability, which transformed into a crimson sword light that slammed into his shield.
The Soul-Suppressing Bell rang again, the fifth chime even more piercing.
Faced with this triple attack, Zhou Huaili had only one choice: to tough it out.
His flying sword collided with the Azure Gang Sword, and the silver light and azure light clashed fiercely in the air.
The Blood Refining Sword, enveloped in crimson light, slammed into the newly risen shield, creating a crack in the nascent shield.
The sound waves from the Soul-Suppressing Bell slipped in, causing his soul to tremble violently once again.
Zhou Huaili gritted his teeth and suppressed the shock to his soul, barely managing to gather the remaining true essence. He saw that Zhang Lin also had a flying escape technique and could not escape.
He turned around and set up a wind wall in front of him, deflecting the Blood Refining Sword away.
The wind wall is light blue and consists of dozens of high-speed rotating wind blades, like a wall of knives, enough to grind any enemy who gets close into mincemeat.
But Zhang Lin did not get close.
He made a hand seal with his right hand, and the Blood Fiend Flag rose into the air, its surface fluttering in the night wind.
All the runes on the flag lit up at the same time, and the blood-red character "摄" burst out with dazzling light, dyeing the entire barrier blood red.
The full power of the mid-grade spiritual weapon was unleashed at this moment.
An unprecedentedly thick, blood-red beam of light shot out from the flag and hurtled towards Zhou Huaili.
Wherever the beam of light passed, the wall of wind blades hissed as it was corroded by the blood-red aura, and the rubble on the ground was reflected in the blood-red light as an eerie dark red.
The mysterious Yin energy split off from the pillar of light, passed through the wind wall, and transformed into dozens of fine, blood-red threads that bound Zhou Huaili tightly like a spider web.
The cracks on the shield spread like a spider web.
Zhou Huaili gritted his teeth and poured his true essence into the shield without restraint. The cracks were forcibly repaired, only to be torn open again by the bloodthirsty aura.
His meridians were groaning, and the true energy in his dantian was almost depleted.
He could feel his true essence shield being weakened little by little, like a rice bag being gnawed on by rats.
After taking one Rejuvenation Pill, its effects were greatly reduced due to its use again in a short period of time.
Zhang Lin stood twenty feet away, his face pale, but his eyes were like two deep wells, frighteningly calm.
Zhou Huaili felt a chill run down his spine at that moment.
The Soul-Suppressing Bell, the Blood Fiend Banner, the Heaven-Burning Flame, the barrier, the magical artifacts, and the array formations were all intertwined and coordinated. He thought he had seen through Zhang Lin's trump cards several times, only to find that he had new tricks up his sleeve.
How could a junior in the Qi Refining stage have so many trump cards?
He lived for fifty-two years, did ten of those years dirty work, and killed no fewer than a hundred cultivators.
He has experienced life-or-death battles with opponents of similar skill levels, and has also fought back and killed opponents stronger than himself while severely injured.
But those battles were all clashes of strength and battles of magic.
This time was different; from beginning to end, he was being led by the other party.
But he was ultimately at the Foundation Establishment stage.
He had one last trump card. He stopped, no longer dodging or attacking, but instead quickly formed hand seals.
The blood-red light of the Blood Fiend Banner still raged on the shield, the echo of the Soul-Suppressing Bell still reverberated within the barrier, and the Azure Gang Sword and the Silver Flying Sword still clashed and collided beside him.
But Zhou Huaili ignored all of this, his hands moving faster and faster as he made hand seals.
Those hands were trembling slightly, not from fear, but because the meridians had been overworked for too long and the true energy was almost exhausted.
Beneath his long robe, his meridians, which had been convulsing from the backlash of forcibly activating the Heavenly Wind Spirit-Slaying Blade and battling the White Bone Demon God, were tinged with an abnormal bluish-white hue due to excessive drawing upon the power of heaven and earth.
But his gestures were unusually steady.
Zhou Huaili closed his eyes.
Deep within his dantian, the lotus platform of true essence that he had nurtured for ten whole years began to tremble.
When a Foundation Establishment cultivator enters the Foundation Establishment realm, a lotus platform is forged in their dantian as the foundation of their Dao.
This lotus platform is the last trump card of a Foundation Establishment cultivator. Using it means a decline in cultivation and damage to the foundation. At best, one will fall back to the threshold of Foundation Establishment; at worst, the foundation will shatter and one will fall into the Qi Refining stage.
Ten years of arduous cultivation have come to naught; his dantian has shrunk, his meridians are broken, and he has no hope of ever reaching the Foundation Establishment stage in this lifetime.
Zhou Huaili had done dirty work for ten years, teetering on the brink of life and death countless times, but he never used his last trump card.
But he used it at this moment.
He has to use it.
That junior in the Qi Refining stage was gradually wearing away his true essence shield, with the blood-red light of the Blood Fiend Banner, the sound waves of the Soul Suppressing Bell, and the scorching heat of the Heaven-Burning Flame.
It's not a one-hit kill, but rather a slow, gradual process, like boiling a frog in water.
If he doesn't force his way out, once his true energy is completely exhausted, he will truly face certain death.