Chương 480: Realm in Chaos (VI)

Hmm? Long Tao paused in his steps, feeling alert; Qi shot through him as he looked around aggressively, but there was nothing, just an endless expanse of sand.

"Master? Are you hiding from me?" he called out, but only the soft howl of the wind replied. It was odd--the very same sensations he felt when around that strange man, such as the sense of clarity, had returned. That was why he thought that he'd come across the man, but as he wasn't there...... did he somehow manage to make it so all those bonuses ignored the distance between them? Long Tao shuddered and took a deep breath, his heartbeat quickening.

It was unlikely that it was for him alone, which meant the other kids would have felt it, too; just how many secrets was he hiding? Hundreds? Thousands? It came at just the right time, too, as his gaze shifted further southward, about four miles or so. Though it looked as though it was just more of the same, with endless swaths of desert going onward and onward, beyond the mirage was a set of arrays, all converging towards the heart where an aged woman sat, slowly taking in the Life Qi.

Long Tao didn't care about that particular part, but rather the disjointed connection about three miles west. They must have noticed it, too, as there were six or seven martial artists hiding, protecting it. Most were inconsequential, with only one inspiring a slight sense of unease in Long Tao; the man was a Demigod, with a rather unique variety of Qi. He paused, mulling over what to do for a moment; he did have to destroy the array, without question, but he didn't have to kill anyone there.

Practically only an Emperor would be able to see through him, and even if they did spot him by some miracle after the fact, he was more than confident in being able to run away from them. But that man... had a scent of a Sage. Not that he was an actual one, far from it, but it was likely that he was close with one. And if there was a chance to double-screw them... Long Tao grinned, slowly stalking forward through the sand without leaving his footprints behind.

His figure was cloaked in the light, disappearing, as did any sound of him shuffling forward. As though a ghost, he pressed forward and slowly reached the point of corruption; even as he was standing four to five feet from the Sage-adjacent man, he was none the wiser. Ignoring him for a moment, he looked at the array--lines webbed out into hundreds of thousands of threads, spinning and spanning out, interacting, intersecting, colliding, destroying...

He felt a small headache approach; though he studied formations as every Emperor did, they had always been one of his least liked subjects, second only to alchemy. At the highest level, formations consisted of literal millions of nodes and points connected in an impossibly complex web of lines. Trying to decipher even just one of the Divine-grade arrays would take centuries even for the most experienced. Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!

The only reason he saw the flaw was because it truly was obvious. Whoever made this array did their best, but it was clear they lacked the ability to properly finalize it and likely even the necessary materials to maintain it. Sandy dunes rolled out all around them as he looked up; they were in a slight dip, hidden in the faint shade.

Long Tao casually took out the sword and stabbed to his right, seemingly at nothing; the tip of his blade imperceptibly hit the crux point of the array, further destabilizing the already dangerously damaged one. He sent in just the faintest shimmers of Qi, which was more than enough for the entire thing to explode.

"What just happened?!!"

"Array! Somebody attacked the array!!"

"AAGHHHHH!!!" As the formation unraveled, spacetime around them began to crumble; long, thin lines began to feather out of the invisibility as the spatial cracks tore open in the air above them, revealing the unseen machinations. Flurries of pulsating colors intersected in a strange web; lines were mostly flat and straight, occasionally curling into half-circles and arches. The old adage, as far as Long Tao could remember it, was that the formations were 'inspired' by the body's veins and blood vessels.

The notion that something so complex could be interwoven and co-dependent was, supposedly, the first inspiration. He didn't see it, however. What he did see was most of the people who were guarding the spot be swallowed up by the spatial riptides that ensued as the cracks expanded and then healed back up. In fact, by the end, only one person remained--the man connected to the sage. Both he and Long Tao stood on the edge of the dune, looking down at the fleshy bits and pieces of bodies strewn about the dip.

"Who's there?!!" the man exclaimed, shooting back a few yards as Long Tao revealed himself. A burst of wind came flying by, kicking up his hair and robes as he held his arms behind his back.

"You've got fairly sharp senses," Long Tao said, glancing over at the man who frowned.

"... where is your Master?" the man asked, looking around, primed to fight.

"My Master?"

"Where is he? Why is he sending out a child as bait, like a coward?"

"Oh," Long Tao smiled faintly.

"Indeed, my Master is a great coward."

"Yes, tell me where he is--I will slay him for you and free you!"

"Oh? You will?"

"Stop annoying me before I kill you, too."

"My Master is a rather childish, frail man," Long Tao said.

"But a nothing like you daring to besmirch him? What gave you the right?"

"You--" Long Tao flashed forward and appeared in front of the man, cutting upward and slicing both his arms off.

"AAGGHHHH!!!"

"Ordinarily, I'm not much of a curmudgeon," he said, crouching down in front of the man.

"And he would be the first one to tell me to simply laugh it off, as he certainly would. But... well, you can blame your Master for this. Had those vile things just elected to die instead of attempting to plunge the world into a deep end, you may still have lived on. Alas."

"You dare--" Another flash of light later, a head flew up. It was rather pathetic, Long Tao sighed. To see somebody like this man having ascended to the realm of a Demigod... Were his expectations too much? After all, this was a rather insignificant corner of the world. In fact, he'd seldom met anyone in the Upper Heavens who even knew of this place. In all his countless years of living, there were no more than ten figures who ascended from here.

There was a reason the realm was called Demigod, and it wasn't a mere decoration. Ultimately, though, Long Tao had realized something in the years he'd lived this new life--quality of cultivators in this corer was abysmal, and it was specifically because the quality of their breakthroughs was equally abysmal. The vast majority always broke through using the worst method, while the 'geniuses' broke through using the slightly better one.

Perhaps only one percent of one percent of one percent broke through using a decent method. Realms, though mattering, were only as good as the means of reaching them; low-quality Spirit might prove to be more a detriment than a boon in the difference between someone at the Foundation Establishment Realm and the Spirit Manifestation Realm.

He set aside the musings and bled back into the shadow, disappearing; from the east, there was a torrent of Qi flurrying over, and he could sense anger, rage, and desperation even this far out.... that woman was losing her mind, completely and utterly.