Ultragenic Warlord

Chapter 867: Inconceivable Growth

The sword in Zhang Lie's hands burned with scarlet water-attuned genetic energy. Billowing clouds of red-tinted steam surrounded him as though he were a burning pyre. The high-temperature steam was so hot that it vaporized much of the sea of blood upon coming in contact with the surface of the water.

This domain of scarlet steam was so dangerous that an ordinary lifeform would likely be vaporized without a trace—as was the case with the torn-apart fragments of Feitian's body, which turned into cured meat after being suffused with the steam.

The temperature around Zhang Lie grew so hot that his surroundings began to warp. Mirages formed all around him.

One of Zhang Lie's blades glowed with radiant light; the other shone scarlet with water-attuned genetic energy. As he combined them both, he produced an even more devastating effect.

The spiritual, metaphysical sea combined with the scarlet steam that hung around Zhang Lie, linking together the physical and metaphysical, the real and the abstract.

The spiritual sea began to burn, as though it had been ignited by the scarlet steam, forming spiritual flame. The scarlet steam, bolstered by the spiritual sea, grew even hotter. Contact with the steam seemed to sap at one's very soul.

Zhang Lie had allowed these two disparate sources of energy to combine, and their merger was so intense that the distinction between the real and illusory began to blur.

Zhang Lie struck with his two blades. The surface of the sea frothed with angry waves, like dragons emerging with the tide.

The waves roared through the sea like galloping steeds, like thundering dragons. From afar, the waves looked like a coven of flaming phoenixes spreading their wings and taking flight; from close up, they looked like flaming dragons.

These manifestations all drew from Zhang Lie's immense spiritual and genetic energy reserves, along with the sword techniques and willpower that he had honed over countless battlefields.

The spiritual sea seemed to belong to a separate dimension altogether, whereas the scarlet water-attuned genetic energy was in Zhang Lie's current dimension. The two sources of energy were linked and made manifest by Zhang Lie, and they both surged forward as Zhang Lie swung his twin blades.

The two blades combined spiritual and genetic energy, willpower and time. All that melded into a tsunami which surged toward Feitian's prone body.

The combination of these disparate energies was so potent that it could destroy any lifeform's body and soul.

No lifeform could block such an attack—but perhaps a world would be able to do so.

Either the will of the world had acted independently, or Feitian had subverted the authority of the king. Under ordinary circumstances, the will of the world wouldn't act to prevent the death of a king of the realm, but it acted now.

The energy of the world formed a gigantic barrier over the top of Feitian's head.

As the tsunami smashed into the barrier, the entire world trembled. Huge quantities of the world's energy were consumed in mere moments to maintain the barrier, but the aftermath of the explosion was too much for it to bear. Potian's body was sent flying, and even the will of the world seemed to be incapable of withstanding Zhang Lie's [Blades, Extinguish].

A tiny crack appeared in the barrier, one which was mirrored by a huge crack that ran through the skies, as though the entire world were protecting Feitian. As Zhang Lie's attack continued, the crack in the sky began to propagate, and the protective barrier seemed as though it would shatter at any moment.

The xuluo world seemed close to absolute destruction. It was shaking violently as the seabed began to crack, causing the seafloor to tilt and stratify. Seawater drained into the cracks and formed huge whirlpools over the surface of the sea.

Just as the protective barrier was about to be completely destroyed by the simultaneous assault of spiritual and genetic energy, Feitian finally broke out of its mental stupor and rapidly began to address its crisis. Its body began to stitch back together as the xuluo world, depleted of its vital energy, began to dry up and turn dark. Feitian ignored the phenomena and continued to drain energy away to restore its own body.

Whether or not it won against Zhang Lie would depend on whether the xuluo world would be destroyed first or if Feitian's body could be restored to full strength.

Indeed, a superior world that had existed since antiquity, which had drained who knew how many newly evolved superior worlds of their energy, wasn't so easy to destroy. Before the world could be destroyed, Feitian's body was restored completely. It went on the offense, spending huge portions of the world's energy in one fell swoop against Zhang Lie.

Zhang Lie's [Blades, Extinguish] had been activated for some time, and it was running out of even his huge reservoirs of stored energy. The moment Feitian regained control over the xuluo world, its burst of energy broke through Zhang Lie's attack.

By that point, more than half of the xuluo world's supply of energy had been used up. The skies, originally a rich, dark red, turned pale as Feitian's faces darkened: thousands of years' worth of energy had been depleted in an instant—the equivalent of hundreds of newly evolved superior worlds' energy.

Without that stored energy, Feitian would have died to Zhang Lie.

Fortunately, it had installed an authority in the world's core that would cause the will of the world to automatically protect itself when it was in mortal danger.

Only kings of superior worlds who had been in power for extended periods of time were able to access this authority. Otherwise, the will of the world wouldn't act to save a king in mortal danger. Kings were easily replaceable; the will of the world didn't derive its strength from its king, and therefore had no need or incentive to keep one alive even longer...