Chapter 1193: 941
Elma watched Lyd Jon’s departing figure with a cold laugh in his heart, thinking, "You think controlling the army means you can control my Mage Tower? I am just using you to deal with Long Yi. Once you lose your utility, I’ll let you realize why I, Elma, am the true master of this Ancient Mage Tower! But for now, I’ll let you be arrogant for a few days."
Alone, Elma gazed at the Divine Armor from a distance. He had coveted this massive piece of equipment for a long time. But to his surprise, he managed to get his hands on one today! He had attempted to approach it several times, but the alarm system of the Divine Armor is robust, and his approaches had all ended in failure. It seemed only Ascenders could succeed.
Just then, Zulal rushed over in a hurry.
"Divine Armor! Lyd Jon really got his hands on a piece of Divine Armor?" Zulal said with excitement.
"Don’t mention that bastard! Let’s talk about your mission this time." Elma became angry whenever Lyd Jon was mentioned.
"Yes, Master Elma!" Zulal immediately sensed Elma’s displeasure with Lyd Jon and quickly changed the topic, "This time, I went undercover to investigate several followers’ groups of Ascenders, and I also arranged for some people who are absolutely loyal to us to infiltrate these groups. It has been confirmed that these groups are merely promoting the faith of the Ascenders without any intention to vie for power with you, Master Elma. They also pledge loyalty to you, vowing to dedicate everything they have to the Ancient Mage Tower. And the Thirteen Apostles, just like all ordinary followers, hold no power. Aside from completing their daily tasks, they pray like the rest, occasionally leading the followers in voluntary work."
"So, what about those Holy Knights?" Elma asked.
"Ever since that battle, the Holy Knights have disbanded, and the Ascension Power they had has also greatly diminished," Zulal reported.
"That is to say, these believers are entirely negligible, right?" Elma asked with a smile.
"Yes, Master, that is the conclusion I have reached so far," Zulal said.
"Haha! I knew it! The Ascender Teacher has no such ambitions. Even if it’s his followers, they are all spontaneous! How could he possibly compete with me for the Ancient Mage Tower? This small place is nothing to him!" Elma said happily.
Zulal nodded, saying nothing more. In truth, he had been wary of the Ascender from the beginning, and whenever the Ascender introduced something new, he would carefully investigate the truth behind it. Yet each time, he returned without any success, unable to find any flaws in the Ascender, almost as if this Ascender was truly a being uninvolved with worldly matters. Could this so-called ancient spirit really lack any ulterior motives? Zulal didn’t believe it, but the outcomes didn’t allow him to disbelieve.
Elma’s changes lately left Zulal somewhat unaccustomed. In his memory, Elma had always been a calm and wise individual who seldom overreacted to anything. But since his rebirth, the former composure had gradually vanished, and he became increasingly impulsive, trusting of others, and lacking in maturity and prudence.
Perhaps this was a result of him becoming younger.
Zulal had no intention of giving up: as long as the Ascender was here, he would keep watch over him. This was his loyalty to Alma.
The driver of that Divine Armor was naturally Little Zi’s seventh Female Demon Avatar, referred to as Little Seven by Little Zi. Being an embodiment of Little Zi’s consciousness, she wasn’t much different from Little Zi’s own consciousness, but because she had merged with her own personality, there were still clear differences in her language and daily actions.
With her exquisite acting skills, Little Seven officially became the ’Group Leader of the Holy Knights,’ a post that didn’t require much but to stay close to Long Yi. Long Yi needed the Female Demon’s mental strength and Magic to exert his influence within the Ancient Mage Tower, that is, the so-called faith.
Long Yi once told Alma that he didn’t care about faith, which was purely nonsense; spreading faith is the easiest way to garner support. Long Yi didn’t spread faith to use the followers to overthrow Elma. Instead, he wanted to have his spies throughout the entire Ancient Mage Tower at the most critical moment, to leave no secrets untold for Elma!
This plan could be said to be on a grand scale, especially since Ai Lin and Little Zi hadn’t made significant progress with their research on the accelerator in a short time, forcing Long Yi to think long-term. Precisely because Long Yi had no intentions of overthrowing Elma, he would not reveal any flaws. On the contrary, he often taught his followers to take pride in being residents of the Ancient Mage Tower, which of course made Elma happy. That was precisely why Elma had been turning a blind eye to these so-called followers’ concerns.
Of course, on the surface, Little Seven still showed great resistance. If it weren’t for the ’Magic’ binding her, she would flee immediately. She always looked for opportunities to ’ambush’ Ascenders, while Ascenders showed great patience and ignored Little Zi’s ambushes completely—after all, without Magic, it was utterly impossible to harm an Ascender with bare hands.
Elma displayed puzzlement toward the Ascender’s actions, yet he did not ask why, because in his view, everything an Ascender did was purposeful.
Soon, Long Yi’s arrangements began to pay off.
It was currently the dead of night within the Ancient Mage Tower, as well as the time when the believers offered their prayers. During this time, the believers would silently recount the day’s observations, approve of what they had done right, and confess where they had gone wrong. This was precisely the way Long Yi accessed the internal news of the Ancient Mage Tower.
During the prayers, a believer mentioned that Elma had just left the Ancient Mage Tower minutes ago aboard a small escape pod, heading towards an unknown destination. This made Long Yi feel as if an opportunity had just come knocking.
His consciousness returned to his own body and, emerging from his hiding spot, Long Yi followed the direction indicated by the believer’s words. The small escape pod’s flying range was limited, so if he had departed from here, his intended destination couldn’t be far.
Long Yi, with his body clad in Iron Rock, sensed the energy traces left in space. Tracking them, it wasn’t long before he passed through an asteroid belt around a massive planet, and the energy in the surrounding space began to thicken. Thus, Long Yi understood that the escape pod should be nearby. He slowed down and retracted all his energy, cautiously exploring the surrounding area. Indeed, near a certain asteroid, a person was slowly emerging from an escape pod, dressed in a fully sealed spacesuit, step by step moving towards a particular direction. To Long Yi’s surprise, there was even a small building there.
No way, is this some kind of trick?
The asteroid was rotating slowly. When it turned to a blind spot, Long Yi used all his strength to suddenly leap forth. His body shot out like a cannonball, fierce but silent, as Long Yi didn’t use any energy, purely relying on brute force. The moment he landed on the asteroid, Long Yi unleashed the power of the rock, entering it as though diving into water, still without a sound.
Circling around the face of the asteroid, Long Yi saw Elma still moving slowly. Because he used no magic, his movement on the low-gravity asteroid was slow. This puzzled Long Yi, why wasn’t he using magic? But the moment Long Yi caught sight of the building in the distance, he immediately understood.
A Purification Tower? No way, built in such a place?
The so-called Purification Towers were devices constructed by the deities, designed as a security measure to prevent powerful beings from rebelling. Normally it was just a tall tower, but should anyone dare to release energy in its vicinity, the Purification Tower would immediately launch an attack. Its attack power was directly proportional to the level of energy released, so the more powerful the individual, the stronger the counterattack received.
If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, Long Yi wouldn’t have believed that such a thing truly existed. According to the Giants’ description, Purification Towers were a very inhumane facility, for although powerful life forms were created, efforts were made to restrict them, an extremely contradictory practice.
At this moment, Long Yi truly began to survey the surrounding Asteroid Belt. He noticed that the rocks around seemed similar, and despite being larger in size, the asteroid he was on appeared more like the remnants of something that had fragmented. The surface only held rocks with no soil or dust.
Elma continued to move slowly ahead, but Long Yi retreated and pulled out the Giant’s tablet to search for information on the planet. To his surprise, there was absolutely no record of this planet on the Giant’s tablet!
According to the corresponding star charts, there once was a small planet here used by the deities as a testing ground for life forms. Following the deities’ disappearance, the place was abandoned. The Giants had visited and investigated once, finding no signs of life, and so they left. But now, such a sizable planet was right before Long Yi’s eyes, not recorded on the Giant’s tablet, which was definitely suspicious.
To follow Elma into that building or to explore the planet?
After weighing the pros and cons, the matter with Elma seemed more important. After all, affairs of the middle planes couldn’t afford delays.
Watching the building’s main gate close behind Elma, Long Yi immediately rushed forward. Just a few steps in, Long Yi felt an inexplicable chill run down his spine, a sensation naturally stemming from the Purification Tower. Although he did not know how long it had been since that thing last activated, he was certain that if he wasn’t careful, it could teach him a harsh lesson in an instant.
Approaching the gate, Long Yi attempted to use the power of the stone, but the moment the power stirred, the eerie feeling intensified. Long Yi hastily dissipated all his energy and honestly approached the gate. The building had a stone door, upon which there was a strange rune. Long Yi pulled out the Giant’s tablet, and thankfully, there was a record on it. It was a divine rune; to open it, there were two ways, the first was for the person who set the rune to arrive, or to break it with Divine Power.
The good news was, Long Yi had Divine Power. (To be continued. If you enjoy this work, please visit Qidian to cast your recommendation votes and monthly votes. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users please browse on m.qidian.com.)
