Forty Millenniums of Cultivation
chapter-582

Li Yao was deeply impressed by the scene. He couldn't help but wonder what the outcome would be if qi-trainers and Cultivators of equal number were engaged in a fight.

His conclusion was that, faced with qi-trainers whose fighting will was reverberating, Cultivators would definitely be on the losing side, unless there were multiple Core Formation Stage Cultivators as backup!

However, Cultivators had exploited the potential of spiritual energy in various ways. They had devised countless kinds of brilliant models of spiritual energy and rune arrays, and they had invented many different types of powerful magical equipment, including warships that were tens of thousands of meters long. The qi-trainers were definitely no match for them in this regard.

The two branches of human beings had their own specialties. If they could join hands against a common foe, the Temple of Immortals and the Immortal Cultivators would be eliminated in no time. However, due to the trick of fate, there was still a long way to go before the deep misunderstanding from five thousand years ago was fully resolved.

The first assault lasted three hours. The apocalyptic beasts seemed to be butchered and barely had chance to counterattack. However, according to Xiong Wuji's description about the entire process of a battle against the apocalypse, the real fight had only just begun.

Every battle of the apocalypse was like this. At the beginning, the qi-trainers were full of supplies and spiritual gas and at an overwhelming advantage when they met the enemy.

However, as the battle continued, the True Qi containers they carried and the spiritual gas inside their body would run out after a long fight. Eventually, they would be both exhausted and short of supplies.

To make things worse, when the qi-trainers were in the state of fighting will reverberation, they would know nothing except to march forward. Even if they were worn-out and their vitality was being drained, they would not step back anyhow. Simply speaking, they all went mad during the fight.

Many experts had collapsed to the ground and perished on the spot while they were fighting hard.

The apocalypse would often seize the moment and summon a large batch of dragon-level apocalyptic beasts to retaliate. This had often led to a tremendous loss for the qi-trainers and had nearly broken their battle formations several times throughout history.

Therefore, when the first batch of warriors became tired, the stronger experts would be deployed.

They had to charge at the beast tide without bothering about anything else and replace the qi-trainers who were becoming over-exhausted so that they could rest in the camps and refill their True Qi containers.

The replacement was key to a battle. If the first echelon failed to fall back successfully, it meant that a lot of warriors would be killed even if the battle was won in the end, and the victory would hardly be a victory at all!

"The second echelon, march out!" bellowed Xiong Wuji at the top of his voice.

The headcount of the second echelon was only one third of the first, and yet they were ten times more daunting. Every tribe sent out their best elite squads, including the Fierce Wind Assault Team and the Iron Bears Detonation Team!

BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!

The earth was shaking, with fractures appearing on the ground from which scorching steam was popping out.

The fractures extended deep into the black smoke in which their source was hidden deeply. As the black smoke wriggled, magnificent beasts rushed out of it!

The new apocalyptic beasts were all almost twenty meters tall. They were like moving hills and were surrounded by vague demonic fog that was burning like flames, indicating that they were capable of not only killing with their animalistic instincts but also manipulating spiritual energy in a certain mysterious way!

The dragon-level apocalyptic beasts had finally shown up!

The appearance of the dragon-level beasts greatly refreshed the ghost-level beasts, which had been cast into chaos. As if receiving the same command at the same time, they automatically regrouped around the dragon-level beasts and formed combat squads with their reinforcements as the core!

Some of the qi-trainers could not free themselves from the bloodlust. Although their spiritual gas had run out, they were still charging at such combat squads alone with nothing but their broken blades, only to be torn apart by the dragon-level beasts miserably.

"The first echelon, fall back!"

The elite teams of the six tribes had marched into the battlefield. Many experts above the 50th level of the Refinement Stage soared into the sky and aimed at a dragon-level beast before they lunged at them!

"The third echelon, go forward and cover the retreat of the first echelon!"

At Xiong Wuji's command, the iron line constituted by countless enormous tanks and spider-like war machines pushed forward slowly but surely.

The qi-trainers responsible for the tanks and war machines were not very strong, but they had all received special training to steer the giant machines that were driven by spiritual gas.

Their mission was to push forward and form an iron defense line so that the exhausted warriors of the first echelon would return to safe area sooner.

There was also the fourth echelon after the third echelon, which included Xiong Wuji and the other top experts of the six tribes. As the reserves, they were waiting patiently and silently for the arrival of the calamity-level apocalyptic beast!

Standing on the back of a giant war machine stably as if he had been nailed to it, Li Yao was moving forward together with the third echelon while he observed the situation of the battle coldly.

Since he had never practiced or cooperated with anybody else, he would only be a nuisance if he was enlisted into the battle formation. Therefore, Xiong Wuji had sent him to the third echelon and asked him to decide what to do on his own.

Li Yao condensed his spiritual gas into needles and stimulated his brain cells in order to enter the super perceptive state.

After one month of training, he had grasped the threshold of his brain cell activity in the Refinement Stage, so he wouldn't wreck his cerebrovascular vessels easily now.

By slightly increasing his brain cell activity, his eyes instantly blinked like a rippling lake. Everything happening in the battlefield turned into clusters of dazzling data in his mind.

Now that the war machine was about to enter the battlefield, Li Yao suddenly leapt out. The Sky Scorpion Armor turned into a streak of brightness and reached the edge of the canyon after several jumps.

Swoosh!

Li Yao moved on the vertical crags as if he were running on the ground. Sometimes, he was crawling on all fours; sometimes, he was gliding forward, pushed by his surging spiritual gas. Both like a sordid lizard and a nimble leopard, he dashed to the center of the canyon within a moment. He stomped on the cliff brutally and rushed out like a rocket with the counterforce, leaving a giant hole dozens of meters in diameter behind him!

Shua!

With the surging spiritual gas, the aura of his giant sword extended out more than a hundred meters and slapped downward like a long whip.

A large apocalyptic insect with transparent wings was hovering four to five three meters in the air and diving down to hunt the qi-trainers. Too focused on the enemies on the ground, it did not notice the incoming attack from the sky. Half of its wing was chopped off by the aura of the blade instantly, making it lose control over its body and fall to the ground.

The spurts all over Li Yao's body were gushing air out fast, accelerating him helically and turning him into a giant revolving drill falling from the sky. Before the dragon-level beast came back to itself, his giant sword had pierced into the critical part on his abdomen and span brutally, breaking the torso of the insect into two halves!

"Careful!"

A deafening bellow from Shi Meng, captain of the Iron Bears Detonation Team, echoed from the right.

Li Yao's heart constricted violently. He concentrated his attention and noticed that a behemothic dragon-level beast was rolling over from his left!

This eccentric beast seemed to have been a certain kind of large armadillo originally. It was covered in solid shell, and a coldly-shining sharp thorn was protruding from every piece of the shell. When it crouched, it would turn into a ball of thorns almost ten meters in diameter which would blow away or simply crush over all the qi-trainers and other beasts in its way into mud of blood!

"You are no match for it! Let me!" roared Shi Meng who had already started sprinting.

Li Yao tried to retreat his giant sword, only to find that the body liquid of the dragon-level beast under his feet was extremely thick and had stuck his blade and his boots to the ground. He only drew long translucent gel out and was not able to either free his sword or himself in the haste.

In the meantime, the stinky smell of the iron armored armadillo had almost reached the back of his head. Li Yao's bloodshot eyes seemed to be exploding in the time of urgency. He extended his right arm and opened his hands. The shoulder plate split, and more than twenty crystal bombs that looked like iron balls rolled out of the arsenal and gathered in the front of his fist!

Li Yao put his right arm below his ribs. His upper body was almost twisted to the opposite direction of his lower body, as if he had become a battering ram that had been compressed completely. His every muscle was nearly torn apart, while helical spiritual gas revolved in front of his right arm rapidly together with more than twenty crystal bombs and formed a cone!

Half of the crystal bombs were smeared black, and the other half remained white. At that moment, the black bombs had been aimed at the iron armored armadillo.

"The 77th level of the Refinement Stage, Explosive Punch!"

After a roar, the muscles all over Li Yao's body shrank abruptly, while his right arm drew an arc as fast as lightning and hit the shell of the iron armored armadillo brutally in dazzling brightness!

BOOM!

Because of the special design of the crystal bombs, together with the spiritual shield condensed by Li Yao's spiritual energy, all the damage had been released forward like an arrow. Pushed by the helical spiritual gas, the more than twenty crystal bombs were detonated almost simultaneously. They congregated into an orange line of flames and pierced through the iron armored armadillo's body directly!

The iron armored armadillo screamed miserably and fell to the ground, unable to roll forward anymore.

The previous attack had cracked the shell on its back. Blood was flowing out from the wounds, and almost all its bones had been broken. Its soft internal organs were exposed to the air, too.

Li Yao took the opportunity and drew out his sword by chopping off the thick gel with his condensed spiritual gas. He then jumped high into the sky and stabbed the giant sword into the body of the iron armored armadillo quickly until the only thing left in the air was the grip of the sword!

Chi—

At this moment, the spurts on the two sides of Li Yao's giant sword showed their second usage. Other than increasing the stability of the sword when it was waved, they could expand the internal injuries by spraying out air currents when the sword was stabbed into the enemy's body!

Li Yao's spiritual gas surged out and blew into the hollow grip of the sword. Sixteen unstoppable streams of spiritual gas jetted out from the spurts of the sword and minced the soft internal organs of the iron armored armadillo like sixteen sharp blades!

The high and mighty ferocious beast finally died amid desperate screams.

Standing behind the iron armored armadillo, Li Yao raised his giant sword and waved the blade to remove the dense blood that was still mixed with the invisible aura of sword.

An unlucky ghost-level beast was precisely on the way of the invisible sword aura that had just been shaken off. It was cut into two halves before it even had the chance to scream!

Slaying two dragon-level apocalyptic beasts within a breath, including an iron armored armadillo, which ranked top ten among all the dragon-level beasts, Li Yao cast the battlefield a hundred square meters nearby into a second of weird silence with his unparalleled brutal behavior.

The qi-trainers were all dazed. The ghost-level beasts that had lost the leadership of the dragon-level beast were unable to move anymore, intimidated by Li Yao's soaring killing intent!

Shi Meng was stunned and soaked in sweat. It was not until this moment that he knew Li Yao had not tried his best in the test. If the guy had collided into him with that punch, his right arm wouldn't be able to move for at least half a month!