“Impossible…. This is impossible….” Celestial Virūpākṣa looked around, trembling, his eyes blank from the terrifying nature of the ten giants’ energy!
Although it wasn’t quite on the archaean level, it was immeasurably close. This was only a trial by fire, but at the moment, Celestial Virūpākṣa had completely forgotten about that point. The enemies he now faced were so outrageously powerful that he almost wondered if the damaged fan were playing a practical joke on him!
There was simply no way that he could fight enemies like this. Rumbling booms echoed out as the ten giants unleashed heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing power onto Celestial Virūpākṣa.
They were like ten vicious beasts, all of them stamping down without mercy….
It was such a fearsome sight that even Bai Xiaochun couldn’t help but gasp….
Bloodcurdling screams filled the world of the eighteenth level, but thankfully, they didn’t last long. Celestial Virūpākṣa soon vanished. After all, this trial by fire was not deadly in nature, and did not permit fatalities. Anyone who failed would, at worst, be teleported out of the level.
As for Celestial Virūpākṣa, although he wasn’t dead, he felt like he was. All of his pride, all of the momentum he had built up through the levels, vanished.
He could only be grateful that the natural laws within the damaged fan kicked in and pulled him out. If that hadn’t happened, he would have been in a truly miserable and hopeless state.
Outside in the main square, teleportation light glittered, and Celestial Virūpākṣa appeared. The first thing he did was cough up a huge mouthful of blood, and stagger backward to look at the fan rib he had just come from, his eyes shining with disbelief.
“How could this be happening…? It’s impossible!! That level of difficulty… if the eighteenth level is really that hard, the levels after it would have to be outrageously difficult. There’s something strange going on here!” Not only was Celestial Virūpākṣa completely crestfallen, he was also starting to get a bit angry.
The others who were gathered in the main square could see how confused Celestial Virūpākṣa was, and how badly he was trembling. Obviously, it didn’t take much guesswork to come to the conclusion that he had failed to pass the level.
“Celestial Virūpākṣa is still on the eighteenth level? And he actually failed!?”
“There must be something unusual about that level. Otherwise, how could the incredible Celestial Virūpākṣa possibly have failed, and come out of it looking so out of sorts?!”
As the talk spread, Bai Xiaochun sat there, clearing his throat and blinking. Peeking out of the corner of his eye at Celestial Virūpākṣa, his heart swelled with excitement and pride.
“I guess you shouldn’t have cheated, huh? How dare you try to contend with Lord Bai!?” The corners of his mouth even turned up into a slight smile.
Celestial Virūpākṣa’s bedraggled state eased some of Bai Xiaochun’s anger. After all, the man had openly provoked him, and then even threatened him. Considering that, simply making the level a bit harder was actually going easy on him.
“Ai, that’s my biggest weakness. I'm too kind. In the cultivation world, the law of the jungle prevails! I really shouldn’t be this nice.” Sighing, he looked over again at the dazed Celestial Virūpākṣa for a moment before checking on the situation with some of the other trial-takers. In one fell swoop, he increased the difficulty level for all of them.
Before long, teleportation light began to flicker as demigod and devas from both dynasties were sent back to the main square. All of them were coughing up blood, and looking very confused.
“Impossible! Yesterday in the third level, I fought three beasts. But today, there were three hundred!!”
“Heavens! You guy have no idea what just happened. In the fifth level, I actually had to fight a celestial-level puppet!!”
“That’s nothing! Dammit. I was really getting places in the seventh level, but right before reaching the end, the maze came to life and started changing around me!”
Everyone was crazily talking at once until Celestial Virūpākṣa’s eyes suddenly began to turn very grim.
“The level of difficulty increased!” Even as everyone started to come to this conclusion, Gu Tianjun, Sima Yunhua, Prince Ur-Demon, and Reverend Devourer all teleported out. That entire group of celestials had been stuck in the sixteenth level, a fact they could have lived with, until the difficulty increased. At the moment, all of them had very unsightly expressions on their faces.
Bai Xiaochun was obviously delighted, but didn’t let it show on his face. Instead, he wore a scowl. To further the act, he hurried into the seventh level as if to look around.
Upon emerging, he exclaimed, “The seventh level did change! Heavens! You people wouldn’t believe what I saw in there. Absolutely terrifying!”
On any other occasion, Bai Xiaochun’s exaggerated cries would have provoked cold laughter. But right now, everyone was so grim-faced that they didn’t even notice.
All of them were trying to figure out why, all of a sudden, all of them had experienced failures!
The trials of the damaged fan had only been open for half a month, and now all of them were feeling very dazed and bereft of any hope.
Bai Xiaochun’s plan was just to wait for the time limit to run out two months later. However, who could have predicted what was to come only half a month later? Suddenly, the spirit automaton of the damaged fan, which had faded away into slumber after being assailed by the power of the spirit enhancement, woke up!
Rumbling sounds filled the entire damaged fan, and all of the levels instantly went back to normal. None of them had increased levels of difficulty anymore!
Furthermore, after awakening, the spirit automaton locked its attention onto Bai Xiaochun, as though it wished to wrest full control of the fan back. That was quite startling to Bai Xiaochun, who sat there rotating his cultivation base and doing his best to maintain his strange connection to the fan!
He was like a rowboat on stormy seas, his mind reeling as his connection was attacked ferociously. If he had been in the Demigod Realm, his mind would have already collapsed, and his connection broken.
But Bai Xiaochun was a celestial now, and although he couldn't fight back, he could defend himself. Unfortunately, he didn’t know how long he could hold out!
No one in the area had any idea what was happening, not even the celestials. This was a level of combat that far surpassed them, and they couldn’t even detect it!
Four hours passed in which Bai Xiaochun trembled, his face slowly turning ashen. He was pushing his cultivation base to the limits, and was reaching the point where his mind couldn’t handle the stress. At that point, right when his strange connection to the fan was about to be severed, he heard a howl of defiance as the spirit automaton slowly faded away into slumber again!
Bai Xiaochun opened his eyes. He was drenched with sweat, and was mentally exhausted. It had been a vicious struggle in which he could clearly sense how much the damaged fan hated him.
“Thankfully, the spirit automaton is also damaged, and can’t stay awake for very long….” He took in a shaky breath. However, now that he had full control of the fan back, his face suddenly fell. “Dammit, they took advantage of me again!”
As of this moment, he realized that in the four hours that he had been struggling with the spirit automaton, quite a few people had gone back into the challenges!
Li Donghao had passed the sixth level! Preceptor Seadeep was in the ninth level! Gu Tianjun and the other celestials were in the sixteenth and seventeenth levels!