Book 17, Indigo Prefecture – Chapter 26, Spiritual Chaos
The ‘bandage’ over the flaw in the membrane managed to resist for only a moment before being punctured straight through by that black needle. The black needle entered the most important part of Linley’s mind...the area above his sea of consciousness.
“Rumble...”
The entire sea of consciousness began to swirl, and countless rays of spiritual energy danced about, merged together with that ‘azure light’ and swept towards that black needle, which had no place to hide.
“Crackle...” That spiritual energy which glowed with azure light surrounded the black needle and stalemated it, with the two slowly grinding each other down.
Mosley and the other fourteen Six Star Fiends raised their heads, staring at Linley.
“Lord Mosley, what should we do?” They looked at Mosley.
“Keep attacking. His soul defense isn’t exceptionally strong. Otherwise, he wouldn’t need to spend so much time to resist my attack.” Mosley immediately ordered. “Remember. Use soul attacks against him.”
“Yes!”
The experts immediately rushed into the sky.
Linley’s ashen face returned to its normal appearance. At this moment, Melina, Shanda, and the other ten Six Star Fiends of the Azure Dragon clan had gathered here as well.
“Captain, are you alright?” Melina hurriedly asked.
“I’m fine.” Linley shook his head, but in his heart, he still felt a surge of fear. “Luckily, I’ve undergone the Ancestral Baptism, and the primal energy of the Azure Dragon clan intensified and merged with my soul. In the end, I was able to endure it.” The primal energy of the Azure Dragon clan, that azure light, was very unusual. It was capable of fusing with spiritual energy in order to execute their innate divine ability.
At the same time, it could also be used to protect the soul.
“They are attacking.” A member of the squad suddenly said frantically.
Linley lowered his head to stare at the fifteen people flying towards them at high speed. He immediately ordered through divine sense, “That bald, gray-robed man is a Seven Star Fiend who specializes in soul attacks. In a little bit, Shanda, you and the other five who are specialized in material attacks should go deal with him. As for the other four, accompany me in killing the other Six Star Fiends.”
“Captain, just Shanda and the other five? Are they enough?” Melina said with concern.
“Don’t worry. I still have a card up my sleeve I have yet to play.” Linley looked down at the fifteen people charging from below.
The reason he hadn’t used his ultimate technique was because his forces hadn’t arrived yet. Another reason was that he was afraid that the enemy would panic and immediately flee. This was why he hadn’t used that technique...Spiritual Chaos! Spiritual Chaos was a technique which could only be used with the assistance of the ‘black stone’.
At Miluo Island, Linley had relied on this technique to force a large number of Highgods to enter a dazed state.
Even Seven Star Fiends would be slightly affected. But when experts did battle, just a slight effect would be enough!
“Eleven of them?” Mosley narrowed his eyes.
“Ignore the others. Kill that leader!” Mosley shouted through divine sense. “When we kill that Seven Star Fiend, we can be considered as having avenged your captain.”
“Kill!”
At this time, nobody was going to retreat. Nobody who dared to join their clan’s war-squads would cower. Mosley led his fourteen Six Star Fiends in an upwards charge, directly into Linley’s ‘Blackstone Space’. These fifteen people were clustered together, for fear of being targeted and killed individually.
The fifteen flew together, as though they were one unified body, directly towards Linley.
The ten Six Star Fiends of the Azure Dragon clan were next to Linley as well, and Linley gave the order coolly. “Let’s go!” According to their plan, Linley’s group of eleven would also charge downwards. After all, the distance between them was less than a few hundred meters.
They would fight in close combat in just a moment!
“Kill!” Linley’s side seemed to care not one whit for their own lives.
“Kill!” Mosley’s side, as well, seemed to be utterly fearless towards death.
Linley’s eyes suddenly flashed and turned cold.
In his sea of consciousness, his spiritual energy, centered around the ‘black stone’, began to turn, and strange rays of spiritual energy instantly spread out, surrounding the entire Gravitational Space. This ‘Spiritual Chaos’ effect was immediately applied against those fifteen people.
“Whoooosh.”
Mosley’s group of fifteen simultaneously heard a very strange, unique wind sound reverberate in their minds. This sort of wind sound caused their minds to uncontrollably feel dazed for a moment. But that moment of being dazed was also the most critical moment in this battle...
“Slash!” “Slash!” “Slash!”
Just like slicing watermelons, more than half of the Six Star Fiends of the Barbary clan who were affected by the ‘Spiritual Chaos’ were killed. Linley was like a tiger or like a pack of wolves, instantly killing three of the Six Star Fiends.
Shanda and the other five who were specialized in material attacks launched their assaults directly against Mosley.
Mosley just felt his head go slightly dizzy, but his mind was still clear. As a supreme expert who specialized in the soul, this sort of soul effect didn’t impact him too much. But when he saw how many people on his side had been killed, he was instantly enraged.
Mosley let out an explosive howl.
A translucent, fan-shaped ripple burst out from Mosley, spreading out towards those six attackers coming from in front of him. Shanda and the other Six Star Fiends only had enough time to unleash a single fierce material attack before they themselves were hit.
The translucent ripple passed through the bodies of Shanda and the other five. Their bodies trembled, and then three of them collapsed from the skies.
The three had died!
“Shanda!” Melina called out frantically.
“Big Brother!” Another squad member, a female one, howled bitterly as well.
Shanda was one of the three who had died.
“Not good.” Watching this from behind, Linley was deeply shocked. “This person was actually unaffected by my Spiritual Chaos technique.” In Miluo Island, he had battled against Seven Star Fiends before, and that time, his opponent had been affected.
However...
Mosley clearly was highly specialized in the soul, and thus his endurance in taking these attacks was greater as well.
“Swish!” “Swish!” “Swish!”
The material attacks which Shanda’s group of six had launched had transformed into the shapes of sabers, needles, awls, threads...and all of them shot out towards Mosley. Although Mosley’s soul was strong, his material defense was average.
The gravity was too strong. Mosley didn’t have enough time to dodge.
“Aaaaaargh!” Mosley let out an angry roar, a deep, rumbling roar.
Immediately, the illusory image of an enormous long, black, coiling serpent appeared behind Mosley. This black serpent naturally emanated a heart-shaking aura. Its entire body was as black as tar. It only had a single eye, and this eye was vertical, as red as blood.
“Slash!” “Slash!”
The material attacks slashed down on Mosley’s body. His armor shattered, and his body was cut into. Mosley, knowing that he didn’t have enough time to dodge, had focused on allowing the energy attacks to strike non-lethal parts of his body, guaranteeing that his head was undamaged.
This was the problem with material attacks; they weren’t like ‘soul attacks’, which could be aimed at a specific weakness, making it so that there was no real way to protect an ‘important part’ of the body. Material attacks were generally only effective in close combat.
“Die.” Mosley stared at Linley.
That enormous coiling black serpent behind him also stared at Linley with its solitary, blood-red eye. “Not good.” Linley hurriedly controlled his ‘Blackstone Space’, making the direction of the gravity orient downwards, wanting to impact his opponent.
“Rumble...” A translucent ray of light shot out from the center of Mosley’s forehead, piercing directly towards Linley.
Innate divine ability: ‘Soul Extinguisher’!
“Captain!” The other Six Star Fiends were greatly shocked.
“No time.” The attack of this innate ability was simply too fast. He wasn’t even able to dodge. Linley couldn’t help but just grit his teeth, planning to take it head on.
“Swish!” An arm suddenly appeared in front of Linley, blocking for him just as that translucent ray of light was about to hit him. That translucent ray of light shot directly into the arm. Linley turned to look. Shocked, he said, “Scar [Si’ka’er]!”
Scar, one of the ten Six Star Fiends under Linley’s command. Scar normally was a man of few words, but he had never hesitated with regards to Linley’s orders. Who would have imagined at this moment, Scar would suddenly sacrifice himself to save Linley?
Scar fell directly the skies. “Kill!” At the same time, the other squad members transformed into rays of light, attacking directly towards Mosley’s head.
“Roaaaaaaar!” Mosley once more emitted that furious roar.
But before he was able to launch that soul attack yet again, the sound of the air exploding could be heard, and his head transformed into a pile of mud-like flesh as a divine spark flew out.
Mosley, dead!
The world suddenly turned quiet. In mid-air, Linley and the others remained quiet for quite some time. In this battle, they had killed two enemy Seven Star Fiends and twelve Six Star Fiends, with three Six Star Fiends escaping.
“Three still managed to flee.” Melina said unhappily.
“It’s my fault. I didn’t expect that Mosley would be completely unaffected.” Linley said. Although they had killed the vast majority of the enemy’s Six Star Fiends, when Linley and Mosley had been fighting, those remaining Six Star Fiends had known that there was no hope of victory, and so had immediately fled.
“Scar. Thank you.” Linley turned to look at a Six Star Fiend. It was Scar, who had just saved him. Scar himself had a total of three bodies. During this battle, he had left only one divine clone back in Bloodbath Gorge, keeping another one in his body.
Just now, when Mosley had used his innate divine ability, ‘Soul Extinguisher’, Scar had immediately separated his two clones, allowing his divine clone to stretch his arm out and block that attack.
“Captain, it doesn’t matter too much that I lost a divine clone. Seven Star Fiends are the true pillars of our clan. You can’t die.” Scar said.
“When we came, there were eleven of us. Now, three of us have lost our most powerful divine clones.” Linley looked around, then sighed. The three had been killed by Mosley. “It was my miscalculation.”
If Mosley had been affected by the Spiritual Chaos, then Shanda and the others would have been able to kill him.
“Captain, this is already a major victory.”
“Right, a tremendous win!”
“Scar only lost a weak divine clone. It isn’t a huge loss to him. Our only true losses are those three Six Star Fiends. However, today, we actually killed twelve Six Star Fiends, and even Seven Star Fiends.”
“We killed Seven Star Fiends. Two of them! And Captain, you didn’t die yourself. We didn’t lose much.”
“Using my divine clone to trade for the most powerful body of a Seven Star Fiend? Worth it.”
Hearing the words of his squad members, Linley felt slightly calmer. According to the historical accomplishments of his clan in battle, it was indeed a grand victory for their side to only lose three Six Star Fiends while killing so many enemy experts, especially given that there were two Seven Star Fiends amongst them.
“In our battle against the eight great clans, our normal casualty ratio is close to one-to-one. It is quite rare for us to gain a complete victory like this.” Melina hurriedly said.
“Let’s go back.” Linley took a deep sigh.
This was the first time he had engaged in this brutal clan war, and Linley himself felt that this battle was a very brutal one. But he looked at the other squad members. “None of them seem to care that three of our squad members lost their most powerful divine clones. Clearly, they’ve experienced too much.”
Linley thought back to those red lettered names written on the stone pillar outside Squad Thirteen’s residences.
Those names represented dead squad members.
“The war between the Four Divine Beasts clan and the eight great clans is nothing more than a war of attrition. Many in our clan have died, but the same is true for theirs.” Linley sighed to himself. At the same time, he flew into the air alongside the other seven squad members.
“Captain, your ambush was truly formidable. You immediately killed one of the Seven Star Fiends.”
“Ambush? It was a one use-strategy. In the future, the enemy won’t give us such a good opportunity.” Linley understand that both Mosley as well as the Seven Star Fiend he had killed at the very start would most likely have divine clones back in their base.
By now, the enemy clan was definitely aware of his ambush.
From today onwards, the enemy squads would definitely be very vigilant against enemy Gods. They wouldn’t be caught off-guard again.
In the distant mountain forests, a group of bandits watched as Linley’s squad flew away. For a long, long moment, they remained speechless and terrified.
“Leader, what was that enormous black serpent just now? It was so terrifying.”
“That was the innate divine ability of a divine beast. I’ve seen a divine beast use an innate divine ability before. However, compared to what we just saw...that great black serpent was thousands of times more terrifying. The aura of it alone made me feel as though I couldn’t breathe.”
The battle just now had utterly terrified these God-level bandits.
“And we actually had dared to try and rob that supreme expert...” The bandits were overcome with endless regret. After having witnessed this battle, they knew that for Linley, killing them was something that could be accomplished in the blink of an eye.
Most likely, this memory would remain with them for the rest of their lives.
They would never forget that they once tried to waylay a supreme expert.
Linley led his squad of seven, quietly sneaking back towards the Skyrite Mountains. They were very careful on the way back, afraid that the eight great clans might discover them. After flying for a long time, Linley’s group finally arrived at the Skyrite Mountains.
They flew directly to the air above the Skyrite Mountains.
“Why are there so many people?” Linley stared in astonishment. There were quite a few people in the air above Bloodbath Gorge, with the leader of the group including the Patriarch, the Grand Elder, and some others. Patriarch Gislason currently had a hint of a smile on his face.