Lu Yin himself was stunned as well. He hadn’t put much force into that attack as he was afraid that Zhanlong Daynight would recognize him. However, the moment that their attacks collided, power had uncontrollably come out of his body, as if its sole purpose was to suppress the Daynight Restoration Technique. The result of this was Lu Yin being unable to control his strength and releasing that powerful counterattack.
Zhanlong Daynight stared hard at Lu Yin. “It’s you!”
Lu Yin’s heart skipped a beat. This is bad! It seemed that he wouldn’t be able to hide his identity any longer, so his best course of action was to prevent Zhanlong Daynight from even speaking.
While Lu Yin was in the midst of processing the situation, the void distorted as martial power and all sorts of other energies swept through the area. The energy became tangible and surrounded the fifth level of the Tower of Resonating Light, sealing off the sixth level.
Back down on the sixth level, Yue Xianzi was just about to charge over, but she was stopped by the rampant shockwaves coming from Lu Yin and Zhanlong Daynight’s battle. By the time she was able to head over, it was already too late. All she could do was helplessly watch on as the sixth level was sealed off.
Han Chong rushed up from the seventh level while waving his arms in the air. He used his martial power to draw a painting of mountains and seas that surged forth at the materialized energy seal. However, his efforts were in vain, and the seal did not budge in the slightest.
“Where’s the target of this operation, Han Chong? The Shenwu Continent’s done for the moment our objective is destroyed. If we complete this task, someone will eventually save us,” a trialtaker said.
Han Chong had a sullen expression. “The area below is too big, so I haven’t found it yet.”
Yue Xianzi recalled what Lu Yin had said to her earlier, and her heart sank. However, it wouldn’t be a good idea to bring it up right now since the information would likely drop morale. She could only treat what Lu Yin had said as a lie and keep searching.
“Let’s all work together and see if we can break the seal!” a girl exclaimed. She seemed to be quite popular, and about a dozen trialtakers immediately attempted to follow her suggestion and rose to attack the seal. However, it still refused to budge.
“You won’t be able to do anything unless a Lockbreaker is directing the energy. This is a materialized set of various mixed energies that have combined together to form this unique seal. Only a Lockbreaker has a chance of undoing this sort of thing,” Han Chong said sternly as he eyed the fifth level. Amongst all the trialtakers on the continent, it appeared that the only Lockbreaker here was Lu Yin.
“Since they have the gall to seal us here, they clearly aren’t worried about us finding it. All of this will be for nothing,” someone else retorted.
“Then should we just wait here to die?”
…
“Stop arguing. Let’s just try to find the control node for now. It might be our only way out,” Han Chong stated firmly before darting back down towards the seventh level once again. The others were left with no other choice but to follow him.
The fifth level was still rife with intense battles. Seven trialtakers had managed to escape from the seal’s grasp in time, and they were currently stuck on this level. Aside from Zhanlong Daynight, there were two other members of the Daynight clan and five additional trialtakers who were currently caught in battle with experts from the Shenwu Continent.
Earlier, during the battles on the sixth level, both sides had suffered considerable damage. However, there were now less than a dozen people left on the trialtakers’ side to contest against all of the remaining defending experts from the Shenwu Continent. Furthermore, the defenders had four people who were on the List of Tempering. Their battles had nearly destroyed the fifth level.
Rumble!
A loud explosion blasted out, causing the very air to distort. Lu Yin and Zhanlong Daynight both pulled back at the same time while keeping their eyes on each other.
With a whoosh, Li Zimo swiped his sword at Zhanlong Daynight. He had switched to a new sword after his last one was damaged.
Zhanlong Daynight used his fingers to tap it away. He retreated a few more meters and snickered, “You’re such an idiot! You can’t even tell who’s your friend and who’s your enemy.”
Li Zimo paused, frowning hard. He glanced back at Lu Yin with a guarded expression. He had a clear idea of Zhanlong Daynight’s strength, and even he found it difficult to block his attacks, but this person seemed able to do so with ease. Since when had a powerhouse like him existed on the Shenwu Continent?
“Who are you?” Li Zimo suddenly said as he glared and pointed his sword at Lu Yin.
Lu Yin knew that he wouldn’t be able to get out of this. “It doesn’t matter who I am, Commander Li. Rather, what’s more important is the fact that the person before you is our true enemy. He’s definitely a foreigner, and the responsibility of our Ming Vanguard squad is to eliminate them.”
Zhanlong Daynight laughed maniacally. “Are you still trying to hide even now, Lu Yin? I can’t believe that you had the guts to sneak into the Ming Constables as a foreigner! You’ve got balls.”
Li Zimo had a stern look as he focused hard on Lu Yin.
Lu Yin sighed. “I thought that the Daynight clan was filled with only condescending assholes, but you’re pretty blunt.”
Zhanlong Daynight disgustedly replied, “Don’t lump me in with those morons.” He then glanced at Li Zimo. “Things have gotten pretty interesting now, sword guy. So, who are you going to fight?”
Li Zimo narrowed his eyes. “I’ll kill both of you!”
“How dare you!”
“How dare you!”
Lu Yin and Zhanlong Daynight both attacked Li Zimo at the same time. Regardless of the circumstances, it was an undeniable fact that they were both foreigners, and as such, could be considered to be on the same side. Li Zimo wasn’t weak either, so they wanted to end the battle as soon as possible before other reinforcements had a chance to arrive.
When Li Zimo saw two experts simultaneously attacking him, his gaze went cold as he slashed downwards with his sword before then slashing it across horizontally as well. There was a clang, and the sword was shattered into bits by Lu Yin while Li Zimo himself was hit in the stomach by Zhanlong Daynight. Li Zimo spat out a mouthful of blood as he half-knelt on the ground. He was obviously slightly weaker than either of them, so the final result was nothing surprising.
Lu Yin was about to continue attacking when Li Zimo interrupted and said, “You can kill me, but the two of you will still be enemies.”
Zhanlong Daynight became surprised, and even as Lu Yin’s attack towards Li Zimo continued, the black-and-white haired young man fired off an attack to his side. Lu Yin suddenly turned around. “I knew that you people from the Daynight clan couldn’t be trusted!”
There was a loud crash, and the fifth level nearly collapsed. Lu Yin was also forced back several steps by Zhanlong’s attack. With a wave of his right hand, Lu Yin sent shockwaves pulsing through the area as five-lined battle force burst out. Its dark-gold radiance illuminated the entire level and left everyone in awe.
At this moment, there were only about a dozen or so people still engaged in battle. The foreign trialtakers and the native experts of the continent were on rather even grounds. Crown Prince Ming Hao had not arranged for very many experts to lie in ambush at the Tower of Resonating Light so as to avoid alerting the foreigners beforehand. Hence, without the seal, the Shenwu Continent experts would have stood no chance against the trialtakers. Even now, the two groups were only evenly matched at best.
Lu Yin’s explosive power shocked everyone on the fifth level, and he drew much attention to himself.
“I’ll show you my true strength today,” Lu Yin said with a cold glint in his eyes. He then used Flash to approach Zhanlong Daynight before striking down with a palm. When he had advanced to the Limiteer realm, the Rainmaster had helped him upgrade his Nine Stacks technique to the Thirteen Stacks technique. Some time had passed since then, and he was now able to use it.
“Thirteen Stacks, Twentyfold Shockwave Palm.”
“Daynight Restoration Technique.”
Boom boom boom…
Rampant shockwaves snaked throughout the entire fifth level of the Tower of Resonating Light like a rampaging python. The fifth level soon completely collapsed, causing the ground itself to tremble. The soldiers who had been guarding the tower pulled back and watched as the tower collapsed.
Meanwhile, within the imperial palace, Ming Hao turned around, and something flashed across his eyes as he fought back the urge to act.
Elsewhere, Long Yun was leaning against a hill. If Ming Hao or any other Explorer intervened, then he would do the same.
At the celebrations within the imperial palace, Ming Zhaoshu abruptly stopped moving while in the middle of taking a drink. After a brief pause, he continued.
Starsibyl’s expression changed as she sensed an extraordinary aura.
Behind Ming Zhaocai, Grandini Mavis raised her eyes.
The collapse of the tower caught the attention of quite a few experts, but nobody moved to interfere. This was because the numerous battles covered too large of an area, and the sky was periodically tearing. The entire capital was being affected by the battle, and Ming Zhaoshu occasionally had to take action to block the remnant shockwaves.
It felt as if the sky of the continent itself was being torn open. It looked like the apocalypse.
The fifth level of the Tower of Resonating Light had been completely reduced to dust. The damage extended into the fourth layer as well. During this chaos, Lu Yin had managed to critically injure Zhanlong Daynight with one attack, causing the latter to collapse atop the energy seal. Even after receiving Lu Yin’s attack, the seal had merely cracked a little, but it repaired itself in an instant.
Li Zimo lowered his sword and gazed at Lu Yin in shock. His last attack had left the Ming Constables commander thoroughly terrified, especially since he knew that there was no way he could ever withstand such an attack himself.
He glanced over at Zhanlong Daynight, who was still lying motionless on the seal. There was a deep palmprint that had nearly penetrated through his chest, and it looked as if the young man was dead.
The rest stared at Lu Yin in shock. Where had a monster like him come from?
When Lu Yin was just a Melder, he was already able to defeat Nightqueen Yanqing with just his Nine Stacks, Seventeenfold Shockwave Palm. Although Zhanlong Daynight was much stronger than Nightqueen Yanqing and even possessed the Daynight Restoration Technique, Lu Yin had advanced to the Limiteer realm and attacked with a Thirteen Stacks, Twentyfold Shockwave Palm. It would be a miracle if Zhanlong Daynight had managed to survive!
Lu Yin was breathing heavily nearby. That move had taken a lot out of him. It wasn’t easy for him to use Thirteen Stacks, but he had gone all out purely because he did not want to give Zhanlong Daynight a chance to recover. His right arm was currently aching terribly.
He glanced over at Li Zimo. “I’m sorry for deceiving you, but I have my reasons.” He then used Flash to appear next to the latter.
Li Zimo naturally wouldn’t sit there and wait to die. He turned his sword horizontally and attacked everything around him, but Lu Yin had activated his Cosmic Art and was able to completely see through the attack. The sword qi that Li Zimo had used had too many gaps, and Lu Yin easily maneuvered past it to smack Li Zimo on the back. The Ming Vanguard commander was sent crashing down and ended up falling on the seal, right next to Zhanlong Daynight.
The onlookers were all stunned.
The two remaining experts from the Daynight family were enraged. “HOW DARE YOU!? LU YIN!”
Lu Yin snickered and used Flash at the highest speed that his body could handle. In just a few seconds, there was nobody else standing on the fifth level besides him. On his own, he had managed to sweep through the entirety of the fifth level, defeating both Zhanlong Daynight and Li Zimo, who were both regarded highly due to their exceptional power within their own realm.
Was there anyone in the Limiteers realm who was even a match for Lu Yin? He had no idea as to the answer, but Lu Yin was sure that no Limiteer of the Daynight clan could hold their own against him.
“Bro! Seven, I admire you so much! My admiration for you is like water that keeps flowing, like…”
“Shut up.” Lu Yin curtly cut the monkey off. The Ghost Monkey’s voice could be incredibly irritating at times.
“Do you really not realize what it means to defeat the Daynight Restoration Technique, Seven? That’s the Technique of Immunity! And you took him out with one attack!? Damn, those Daynight clan people will probably kill themselves if they find out about this,” the Ghost Monkey exclaimed in an exaggerated manner.
Lu Yin looked down at his own palms. He was certainly more powerful than Zhanlong Daynight, but he didn’t actually have the strength to destroy the Technique of Immunity in a single move. He had only defeated Zhanlong Daynight with a single palm because his Technique of Life and Death was able to suppress the Daynight Restoration Technique. Otherwise, it would have been impossible for him to seriously injure Zhanlong Daynight in just one move.
Lu Yin did not bother to respond to the monkey, and he merely stood silently above the energy seal. He looked through the seal to the sixth level, waiting for Han Chong and the others to approach him.
There had to be a connection between the Darkmist Weave’s all-out attack and the trialtakers’ attack on the Tower of Resonating Light. Additionally, Lu Yin wasn’t worried about Ming Zhaotian and the others coming over. The two sides had already mutually agreed that this battlefield would decide the results of the ongoing war between the continent and the foreign invaders.
Han Chong and the rest were just too important. Even if the Darkmist Weave wanted to use them as chess pieces, these pieces couldn’t actually be sacrificed. Their deaths would affect many organizations in the Innerverse, and the cons far outweighed the pros.
Not long after, a figure on the sixth level appeared within Lu Yin’s vision. It was a trialtaker who had failed to find the location of the control node.
The person looked up and gazed at Lu Yin through the energy seal. At that point, Lu Yin had returned to his original appearance, and the trialtaker thought that he looked familiar. After staring for a bit, the trialtaker’s eyes widened into saucers. “Y-You’re Lu Yin?”