’Now I have two options... either I find what his world authority is and try to make some loophole to bypass it...’
’Or I would have to go in the direction it’s staring at and find out exactly what this monster waiting for...’
The cube of possibilities was fixed on the shadow dragon king’s mutated body, and it refused to change its directions, so Rio had no other choice but to start thinking about what he should do next.
’I mean, if he was awake, I would have at least gotten a chance to fight or spot his weak points but...’
Looking at the gigantic tree-like distorted body, Rio could only sigh in helplessness.
’But now there’s no way to find any weakness, as it’s not eve moving or anything...’
Opponents who can move and retaliate are actually more vulnerable in front of Rio, as his sword skills have hundreds of techniques to bypass defenses of tanky targets.
But if a target stands still and seals himself using all of his power defenses while focusing solely on defense alone, it would make it extremely difficult for Rio to deal with them unless, of course, they are weaker than him.
’This is like... what if Link stands still, gets blessed with Riya’s strongest continuous healing magic, overloads his entire body with pure defensive skills and covers himself in thick ’Dao Rhythm’ coatings...’
’All stacked together in one place and then putting world authority on top of it all... it’s a real mess...’
Not only the soul of the shadow dragon king, but also many other adult dragons were inhabiting that massive and gigantic body; all of their powers combined made that being so strong that it seemed undefeatable!
’I doubt that this thing can even tank attacks from people like Ashtel Rex and even the current dragon king... unless, of course, they go all out and use their strongest attacks...’
’But with how brittle the space-time fabric in the spirit realm is... it might not be able to withstand an all-out battle of such powerful SS-rankers...’
The giant tree’s focus was completely on that distant unknown thing far away in the sky, and it didn’t even seem to care that Rio was standing right beside it and inspecting it up and down.
’Is it ignoring me or is it really just unable to focus on anything but the sole thing its determination is stuck on?’
While sitting on a giant boulder, Rio couldn’t help but think of various speculations in his mind.
’Is it so focused on its goal because it knows that if it lost sight of it even for a single second, it will lose its mind to miasma for all eternity?’
Just like humans, all beings in the world have emotions, and emotions like hope, determination, love, etc. help you fight against miasmic corruption the most effectively.
For many SS-rankers, their homeland and their family members are not only their shackles that keep them anchored to their humanity, but they are also their method of keeping their emotions from falling toward miasma and corruption.
Rio himself is a perfect example of this; his love for Lia is the sole thing keeping him from reaching ’Perfect Sword Intent’ mastery and truly becoming a weapon of mass destruction with no equal in the world.
The same could be true for this gigantic monstrous dragon tree; it’s focused its final sanity on one final determination that whatever it is waiting for will eventually return to it for sure.
’But what are you waiting for?... a thousand years of wait... for what purpose?’
If it were able to talk, Rio would have liked to have this conversation with it, but alas, it had no sanity left to carry out such a complicated conversation.
Just when Rio was getting more and more confused about what to do next, one of the pure soul fluctuations of the gigantic tree somehow made it out of the range of its world authority.
It wasn’t anything new, though; Rio had already seen it happen with many people.
Even Ashtel’s Rex’s soul fluctuations and mental power waves used to spread in all directions whenever he used his world authority.
Rio already knew that an SS-ranker’s ’World Authority’ was actually nothing but their control over particular ’laws’ of the ’world,’ and they needed to use mental power and soul power to use that.
There was usually no need for mana or any other energy to boost it, as world authorities in themselves were powerful and destructive enough.
Rio knew it all, but today’s dilemma caused him to suddenly remember the fight he had with Lia back in the ’Supreme Talents Tournament.’
Back then, Lia went toe-to-toe with him by reading his ’mana flow,’ and later she even told Rio that she had awakened a unique talent that helped her read a person’s mana flow, their soul fluctuations, and their fate for the next few seconds.
Using that, she could see a few seconds in the future, and with the amazing intuition of Kai as a peak SS-rank divine spirit, it was easy for her to predict almost everything an opponent was going to do.
Rio managed to defeat Lia because he could block Lia’s ability to read his soul fluctuations and his fate with ’True Immunity,’ and then he controlled his mana flow using sword intent to deceive her.
’If... Come to think of it... can Lia’s future sight ability work on someone clad in world authority head to toe?’
Rio’s ’true immunity’ skill was very bizarre and powerful; it was almost at the level of a ’world authority’ with how powerful it was.
But Lia could not bypass it back then.
’Was it because she was the same Rank as me or was it because her skill is clearly unusable on people with ’world authority’ or other unique abilities like mine?...’
’No, that’s not it... I have a feeling that she was not able to bypass the restrictions because she was not strong enough back then...’
’Her ability might reach new heights as she reaches higher levels in the future...’