Chapter 1441 – Weakness
36 warriors appeared in front of Lin Ming once more. But this time, they were taller and larger, each of them around 10 feet high. Their golden armor was also a darker, mellower hue, and the strength percolating in their bodies had increased by several times.
Their cultivation was similar to Lin Ming’s, each of them equal to a middle Divine Transformation human martial artist. Not just that, but they had a solid foundation and their blood vitality was booming. If any one of them were chosen, they could have joined the Divine Realm First Martial Meeting and easily advanced into the top 20 spots of the finals.
If these characters were alone then Lin Ming could easily defeat them, even instantly kill them.
But when 36 of them were gathered together to form a large battle array formation, their combat strength increased by many times over. This caused Lin Ming to feel that this situation was becoming increasingly tricky.
Origin energy runes continued to cascade from the skies, burning down all around him.
Then, suddenly, Lin Ming hurtled forwards, the Phoenix Blood Spear in his hands thrusting outwards.
He didn’t wait for these 36 golden-armored warriors to suck up all the power from the burning origin energy runes. He immediately attacked, his target still the same essence gathering system warriors.
The phantom of the Heretical God Tree reappeared behind him. The power of thunder and fire wove together – this first attack was one of his killing moves, Heavenly Dao Judgment!
Spear light split through the void, emitting a horrifying screeching sound. A roiling wave of thunder and fire rolled up all around him, swept around by his spear, forming a massive red and purple vortex as it shot towards a golden-armored warrior!
This golden-armored warrior did not hurry at all. The array diagram beneath his feet began to spin as power poured into his body. At the same time, the 11 other golden-armored warriors behind him stepped forwards, their hands reaching towards the first golden-armored warrior’s back as they pooled their strength together to resist Lin Ming’s spear strike!
Bang!
A crazy collision rang out. The earth shook and cracked, causing countless stones to fly into the skies before they were dissolved into powder by the chaotic energy.
By coordinating their strength, the 12 golden-armored warriors forcefully resisted Lin Ming’s attack.
As Lin Ming saw this, his mind turned cold. He didn’t think it was strange that his Heavenly Dao Judgment wouldn’t be able to break through the array formation; how could this second, stronger version be so easily broken?
But for just 12 golden-armored warriors to resist his attack, this caused a deep sense of crisis to rise in Lin Ming’s heart.
Hu – hu – hu –
At this time, Lin Ming felt the wind behind him begin to howl, killing intent rising from all around him. The other two groups of golden-armored warriors attacked Lin Ming together.
The array diagram sparkled beneath their feet as countless Law runes spun around. Lin Ming grimaced. If he had to receive both of these attacks at once then it would be extremely hard.
The power of space distorted beneath his feet. He instantly used the Space Laws, wanting to teleport away from here.
But at this time, a terrifying power covered him. Lin Ming felt the power of space around him be immediately locked down, rending his Space Laws useless!
“What?”
Lin Ming was surprised. He immediately realised that this strength was the domain he had felt before!
During the first battle this domain had also existed. But, it was completely suppressed by Lin Ming’s grandmist space and was unable to be used.
But during this second battle, this domain was far stronger than before. Even though Lin Ming was using the grandmist space, he still wasn’t able to completely nullify it.
In this critical moment, this domain had bound Lin Ming’s ability to flee through space.
“Damn!”
Seeing two terrifying beams of strength hurtle towards him, Lin Ming grit his teeth and erupted his energy to the limit. The Eight Inner Gates were opened all at once and he used the grandmist space to protect his body. For a time, Lin Ming’s body emitted an endless string of popping explosions as the phantom of an Azure Dragon materialized behind him. With a loud shout, Lin Ming smashed out with his spear, forcefully resisting these two attacks!
Bang!
The void shook, nearly collapsing. Even the star-heavy grandmist energy was torn apart by the terrifying energy. In the final moment, Lin Ming had used the Phoenix Blood Spear to defend against one attack. Then, he used a barrier of protective astral essence and his powerful body granted by the Eight Inner Hidden Gates to withstand the other!
Without any fancy collision, Lin Ming was sent flying hundreds of feet away. Blood tumbled within him, his armor was torn apart, and he was injured all over!
“What a strong attack!”
Lin Ming wiped the blood from the corners of his lips. By relying on his formidable mortal body he had only received minor wounds in that strike just now. But if this were to continue, he simply wouldn’t be a match for the 36 golden-armored warriors.
These small wounds would slowly accumulate over time as his physical strength was exhausted.
As for the golden-armored warriors and their array formation, the origin energy runes burning all around them would constantly supply them with additional energy. Perhaps they could never be exhausted. If he couldn’t break through their formation then no matter how tenacious Lin Ming was or how fast he restored himself, he still wouldn’t be able to avoid defeat.
“This array formation must have a weakness.”
This thought flashed through Lin Ming’s mind. His own Heavenly Dao Judgment had already been blocked by just one group of the golden-armored warriors.
Lin Ming was confident that although his striking power might not be the absolute highest amongst all the top young geniuses of the various races, it was close to that level. If even his attacks didn’t have any effect, just what could anyone else do?
Woosh! Woosh! Woosh!
The 36 golden-armored warriors attacked once more. And at this time, Lin Ming didn’t meet them in a head-on collision. He began to distance himself, relying on his speed to avoid them. As long as he didn’t fall into their domain then it wouldn’t be a problem for him to use his Space Laws to avoid their attacks.
Before he found out the method to break their array formation, Lin Ming didn’t want to waste any more strength.
Like this, the trial had turned into a protracted battle.
And at this time, in the outside world, a full four hours had passed.
Even if Lin Ming’s final battle was in a deadlock, he still used far less time than the other martial artists had.
Lin Ming wasn’t in a hurry. As he dodged, he began to adjust his breathing and frequency at which he absorbed heaven and earth origin energy, reaching a balance between consumption and replenishment.
Slowly, Lin Ming discovered that although these 36 golden-armored warriors belonged to the three great cultivation systems of essence, energy, and divine, there were still different cultivation methods used between all of them.
Amongst the body transformation technique group, there was the saint race’s body transformation technique, the Nine Saint Transformations, the human race’s body transformation technique, the Nine Stars of the Dao Palace, and also the monster race’s body transformation technique, Nirvanic Rebirth.
Although the 12 body transformation technique warriors each belonged to a different race, there were differences among each one of them.
Their cultivation methods were each a single one of the Concept of the 33 Layered Heavens. As for these puppets’ attacks, they matched with the postcelestial dao diagram beneath their feet, complementing each other in an impregnable and impeccable manner.
“What wonderful skills. To form this type of array, perhaps the one who did so was the supreme elder who created the Asura Road. They must have mastered 33 types of cultivation Laws, or perhaps… it was 36 kinds!”
Lin Ming focused his eyes on the leaders of the three groups of golden-armored warriors. His original assumption had been that the saints, humans, and spiritas were the strongest of the three great system thus they had to be the leaders. But now, it seemed that he was wrong.
The leader of the body transformation system warriors was not a saint and the leader of the essence gathering system warriors was not a human. The three leaders among the 36 golden-armored warriors were an even purer form of energy than the rest.
This was particularly true for the golden-armored warrior that led the soul forging system group. Lin Ming could feel a familiar aura from him…
It seemed as if this were… mm?
Lin Ming was shocked. This aura actually seemed similar to the Magic Cube!
This thought flashed through Lin Ming’s mind. Then, after several more breaths of time, he finally understood. The reason that the golden-armored warrior array formation was composed of 36 individuals and not 33 individuals was because not only did this array formation represent the foundation of the 33 Layered Heavens, but also the Magic Cube, Demon Bead, and the mysterious Purple Card that he had yet to hear any news about.
Within the 33 Layered Heavens, essence, energy, and divine each corresponded to 11 different Heavens. Moreover, there was a divine object that corresponded to them too. These were the Magic Cube, Demon Bead, and Purple Card. According to what Divine Dream had said, the Magic Cube, Demon Bead, and Purple Card each represented a single layered heaven, a universe unto itself.
It was only that these divine objects had yet to evolve. They were considered ‘universe seeds’!
If these three divine objects could evolve into a true universe, then there might be 36 Layered Heavens instead. This was the principle which this array formation came from.
Thus, the three leading warriors of the three groups did not belong to any race, but were instead pure energy bodies.
After realizing all of this and looking at the array formation of the 36 golden-armored warriors once more, Lin Ming suddenly had an inspiration. If he wasn’t wrong, then even though these three leading warriors were the strongest points of the array formation, they were also where its weakness lay.
As long as he could block these three warriors from interacting with the other 33 warriors, then Lin Ming would only need a single breath of time.
After realizing this, Lin Ming’s blood began to boil over with fighting spirit.
After he dodged several continuous attacks, he then hurtled himself towards these three groups.
This time, the one he targeted was the not essence gathering system group, but the soul forging group! This was also the group which resonated with the Magic Cube!
Amongst the three groups of golden-armored warriors, Lin Ming was most familiar with the essence gathering system. But in terms of only the leader, Lin Ming’s familiarity with the Magic Cube had reached the same as his own flesh and blood.
“God Forbidding Seal!”
In just a fraction of an instant, Lin Ming formed thousands of seals!
The black hole seed was summoned by Lin Ming. The surrounding heaven and earth origin energy began to rush towards him, forming a dark gray vortex. Tens of thousands of God Forbidding Seals began hurtling towards the 12 warriors of the soul forging system!
Lin Ming no longer attacked the golden-armored warriors themselves but the energy connections between them. He could already see that they were freely exchanging energy through the array diagram beneath their feet. As long as he could sunder this connection, he could instantly strike down the leader of the soul forging system warriors.
“Seal!”
The God Forbidding Seals were in essence miniature black holes. They had the ability to swallow all and seal away all. For a time, countless energy routes were severed between the golden-armored warriors!
But these golden-armored warriors clearly had some sort of wisdom. They seemed to understand Lin Ming’s plan and began to immediately attack the God Forbidding Seals, wanting to destroy them all.
At the same time, the other two groups of golden-armored warriors also attacked Lin Ming!
Lin Ming ignored them all. From within his inner world, a gray stone door appeared.
This stone door was originally the size of a book, but as it appeared it began to rapidly increase in size. Above the stone door, a series of mystical patterns and runes appeared, circulating all around it as if they contained the most ancient of secrets.
This was the Primordius Gate.
“Suppression!” Lin Ming shouted out loud. With a loud explosive sound, the massive Primordius Gate came slamming down, cutting off the energy connections and also resisting a great number of attacks.
The attacks of the many golden-armored warriors were originally extremely fierce and sharp. But as these attacks struck the Primordius Gate they were like hail striking a steel plate, unable to do anything at all.
At the same time, Lin Ming attacked. His target was the leader of the soul forging system warriors!