As she did this, the White Rogue lashed out with a serious expression on her snow-white face and sent her two attackers flying off into the distance so quickly that it was as if Kalvin had witnessed twin projectiles flying forth from an engine of war. Meanwhile, the other Integration-staged cultivators in the enemy group—a short-haired, clean-shaven man with intelligent, angled eyes, and a young boy with an anxious expression on his pale, slightly surprised face—abandoned their flying swords after conjuring platforms of spiritual energy that they both relied on to dash away at paces far exceeding the limits of their cultivation levels.
From his vantage point, Kalvin distinctly sensed a heavy presence of energy around their legs.
Movement skills?
Even if they were able to fight an entire stage above their cultivation levels, the speed of their sudden retreats was still quite excessive. Still, neither seemed used to their own strengths and both wound up breaking the secondary platforms that they had conjured in preparation for a second jump. Because of this, they were forced to take on the blows of the nearest Nightshadow Sect disciples, which resulted in the young boy’s right foot being torn off by the tip of the beak-shaped mass of energy that covered the arm of his attacker. He managed to create a smaller platform and kicked off of it with his good foot just in time to avoid a follow-up strike a fraction of a second later, a heavy trail of blood leaking from the stump where everything beneath his right ankle had exploded into nothingness from the force behind the initial attack.
The boy screamed in pain as his Integration-staged companion made to block his respective attacker with an all-in swing of his halmite longsword. Just before contact was made, his entire body was abruptly covered in an emerald glow that reinforced his physique in a way that only a defensive martial skill could do. Taking the hit head-on, the clean-shaven man managed to push back his attacker with a powerful swing of his sword that added to the chaotic backdrop with a reinvigorated wave of rushing winds.
The other targets dispersed with unexpected agility, betraying the fact that all of them had mastered some movement skill or other. Kalvin could clearly see that the Integration-staged members relied on a different, superior type of skill, as the energy compositions that he could perceive around their legs differed from those that surrounded the others.
Only three seconds had elapsed since he had broken the barrier with his treasured talisman and yet so much had already happened. However, despite the immediate advantage that his side had enjoyed, the young woman finished her arrayment quickly enough to momentarily protect her friends from any follow-up attacks.
How can she cast arrayments so quickly?
Each of the ten targets was abruptly engulfed in a vibrant layer of golden energy that shielded them from the merciless attacks of Belren and his sizeable entourage, though these sudden protections didn’t do anything to mitigate the forces behind each blow. Of the target group, only half of them managed to diffuse the instantaneous attacks, as the others were sent flying in various directions behind the safety of the young woman’s protective arrayments.
“Nolan!” urged the prodigy in question, though the young man was already taking action.
Making a quick hand sign, the entire clearing seemingly came to life as a pervasive, blinding light suddenly flared up in all directions. Regardless of their cultivation levels, everyone present was rendered blind for several moments as the peculiar, effecting light reached its peak vibrancy and then rapidly began to dwindle. In its place was a perfectly arranged schematic that covered the entire grounds of the clearing in a very intricate display of masterful formation placement, the uniform design appearing as if it were a glowing spider web that housed unfortunate insects spread apart at perfect intervals throughout its ensnaring reach.
What’s this?
Egg-like stones sat within form-fitting grooves that had been dug into the ground with exquisite precision, each exuding powerful auras that made it seem as if they contained living beings. Evidently a formation had been set in the area, but it had been so well hidden by an unknown, remarkable concealment arrayment that not even Belren had caught onto its existence.
The barrier arrayment, the concealment arrayment, the movement skills, the offensive and defensive martial skills, and now this grand-level formation—how could such a small group of youngsters get their hands on so many priceless and extremely powerful techniques?
Kalvin raised his guard and then mentally urged his followers to follow suit as over four hundred powerful auras arose within the immediate vicinity. Within the blink of an eye, the entire surface of the clearing began to glow in a dark blue light, a secondary stage in the formation’s activation.
The members of both sects were quick to act, all of them targeting the ground with their strongest attack arrayments and martial skills in an effort to break the formation’s design before it fully activated. These attacks were all blocked, however, though not by any of the youths that they were targeting, but by the beings that had been summoned by the formation.
Most people present were pushed out of the clearing by the fallout of the colliding skills, the offensive projectiles exploding with great force in a rush of heated winds.
The owners of these auras visibly manifested in the moments that followed the pervasive flash, hundreds of transparent grey figures that stood idly with their arms outstretched from their collective exertions. As if on instinct and nothing else, they had taken action in unison in order to dispel the tremendous barrage of attacks, a task that they carried out flawlessly and without any apparent effort.
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Lingering spirits?
Kalvin immediately recognized that these entities weren’t simply some summoned, humanoid figures that were strictly composed of energy. No, the beings before him had once walked this world as living beings, evident powerhouses of their respective eras. It was important to note that in the modern day, it likely wasn’t possible to find so many Genesis-staged cultivators gathered in one place. More than that, the amount of individuals with similar attainments likely numbered less than a thousand throughout the entire continent, known cultivators or otherwise. And yet, over four hundred of them had been summoned by the formation in question?
Spine tingling with surprise, Kalvin wondered how they had accumulated so many spirits. Had they personally killed these great figures in order to harvest their souls? Such a thing shouldn’t have been possible, both due to the limited number of powerhouses with such cultivation levels and also due to the sheer challenge of realizing such an endeavour.
Kalvin couldn’t afford to waste any more time locked in place by his contemplations, for the moment after the spirits threw up a simultaneous defence they immediately shifted their focus to offensive martial skills.
Sensing mortal danger for the first time in a long while, Kalvin grasped his treasured necklace as over four hundred unique techniques manifested within the space between the floating spirits—all of which hovered just a few paces above the egg-like rocks that had evidently housed their souls—which gave life to an awe-inspiring sight. Seeing that several attacks would hit him before he could channel enough energy into the necklace, he had no choice but to deal with the immediate threats that were currently rocketing toward him.
Falcons, serpents, snapping turtles, wolves, lions and other deadly creatures; all sorts of gigantic animals suddenly spawned in the immediate area, all of them soaring upwards towards specific targets as they rapidly grew in size with their upward ascent.
Most of the Nightshadow Sect members managed to fend off the oncoming attacks, though at least a dozen were killed by spirits that boasted higher levels of cultivation. The primary offensive martial skill of their sect enabled them to injure people one or two levels superior to them in cultivation, so the fact that so many of them had died miserable, body-disintegrating deaths as they were swallowed up by beaks and jaws of the manifested creatures showed that none of the lingering spirits had been simple individuals during their lifetimes. With such overpowering techniques at their disposal, how could they have been?
Tems and his people were hit fairly hard, driving off all but three martial skills. While the number of uninhibited attacks was low, they had been launched by spirits at the third level of Genesis. Considering that most of the Falling Rain Sect’s fighters were at the Integration stage, these attacks wreaked absolute havoc on the unfortunate disciples. Hundreds died within seconds, their bodies engulfed with bright lights—blue, red and green energies that made up the bull, tarantula and ape that crashed into them with devastating strength—before being eaten away like paper by flames. Hundreds more were smashed by rampaging limbs that struck them with such strength that their bodies simply exploded into bloody mists in the exact locations where the contact took place.
Tems, Dracia and several other great elders hastened to repel these attacks after dealing with the ones that had targeted them personally.
Julian reacted with his own discretion, the mercenaries launching a collective attack arrayment that involved the combined energies of over three thousand cultivators in the mid-to-late levels of Integration. Alone, the effects would have been negligible, but with the added energies of so many people?
Over fifty of the expanding martial skills were dispelled almost immediately, once they had been peppered with tens of thousands of large arrows of golden light. Of the six remaining ones that had targeted the CMA’s forces, three were dispelled by Benlay, Kester and Julian, who were quick to respond with offensive skills of their own.
Kalvin dealt with the remaining two, summoning two golden needles from his spatial bag and charging them with his inner essence before throwing them directly into the faces of the oncoming animal manifestations. The moment the opposing sources of energy met, the enemy attacks simply disappeared as if they were the object of hallucination, the needles similarly ceasing to exist.
Twenty million spirit stones…
Forced backward about fifty paces by the raging environment, Kalvin forcibly stabilized himself about a hundred paces above the ground, which was littered with imposing lingering spirits. Based upon their appearances and behavior, their minds had been abolished and they were currently no more than convenient puppets similar to those that he could create.
What the hell did Tems get me involved in?
So much energy had been released into the surroundings that hundreds of tendrils of lightning snaked this way and that between the ground and the sky, where just as many slim, whiplashing tornadoes swayed violently amidst an apocalyptic explosion of chaotic, contesting winds.
Expression warping into one of anger as the air hissed and howled in his ears, Kalvin activated his Thousand Killing Formation with a combined exertion of his inner energies and his will. Not one to be overly confident in a life-and-death battle, he forcibly summoned every single one of his Genesis-staged energy manifestations, about twice the amount of the spirits that had been summoned by his target.
Time seemed to stand still for a moment as he connected eyes with Nolan, even as the blood from the bludgeoned members of the coalition force continued to patter to the ground below as if several small clouds had briefly appeared to shed their gruesome precipitation. All members of the opposing force had appeared at his side, all of them floating high up in the air as they looked down on those that surrounded them with mixed expressions of anger, wariness and anguish. Only half their number remained unscathed, the others leaking blood from some orifice or other due to unseen internal injuries, the youngest one blinking away tears as the flesh around his severed foot began to slowly restore itself.
Too focused to give any thought to how an Integration-staged cultivator could regenerate a lost body part in the same way that those at the Genesis stage were able to, Kalvin floated upward so that he was level with his enemies. As soon as he began to move, his ten strongest summoned spirits rushed to his sides to stand at attention with crossed arms and unseeing eyes. Meanwhile, the others mixed in with the overall force of the temporary coalition, hundreds of glowing, humanoid figures that floated silently in place like a mass of vibrant, golden lanterns.
The blood drained from the faces of his opponents, for they clearly hadn’t foreseen such a turn of events. The ten of them along with over four hundred lingering spirits, or the several thousand members of the coalition force along with over eight hundred of his summoned energy manifestations. Which side would win? Kalvin was eager to find out, and to finally put an end to this growing headache.