Two hours later.

“Blizzard!” Shangguan Bing Xue swung her milk-white sword and slashed in a wide horizontal arc from the inside out.

From the glowing blade of the white sword, a large amount of frost blasted outwards and in less than 5 seconds covered the entire area in front of Shangguan Bing Xue. It didn’t matter if it was the trees in front of her, the ground more than 700 meters below her, or even the air itself; everything was frozen perfectly.

The now less than forty thousand Third Order gargoyles were immediately frozen into ice statues and began to fall from the sky like wingless flies. However, these gargoyles were still Third Order monsters no matter how one put it or how weak they appeared to be so, slowly but surely, the ice statues began to show signs of cracking. It was only a matter of time before the gargoyles would break free, and they were definitely not dead.

Shangguan Bing Xue was panting slightly and her face was a little pale. Fighting against hundreds of thousands of Third Order enemies was not a simple task at all, even she could not win easily and it took a lot of time and effort. 

She pointed her other sword towards the ground, and at the same time as a magic circle over 500 meters in diameter glowed at ground level, her voice spread far and wide.

“Inferno!”

Temperatures immediately grew exponentially to the point where even tree trunks with metallic properties began to melt rapidly as if they were wax candles. 

The magic circle on the ground flashed with bright yellow light before bursting with terrifying amounts of magical power outward.

Boom!!!!

A whirlwind of yellow fire with golden shades rose from the ground into the sky, soaring straight up over 900 meters and almost breaking beyond the tops of the ever-shrinking trees. The more than forty thousand gargoyles turned into ice statues disappeared from sight as they were swallowed up by the flame whirlwind, and even Shangguan Bing Xue herself did not know with 100% accuracy what their fate had been.

Approximately 10 seconds later, Shangguan Bing Xue cut off her output of magic power and Mana.

Gradually, the flame whirlwind began to become weaker and weaker, smaller and smaller. Three seconds later, all that remained in sight was a large patch of empty land that had been burned to oblivion.

Plants? Grasses? Trees? Gargoyles? Ice? None of it could be seen at all except for the ice tree Shangguan Bing Xue was using as a support to stand at high altitude after losing the support of her Sacred Winter Phoenix.

When Shangguan Bing Xue turned to look back after catching her breath, her cold eyes met Xia Ya’s paper-pale face and tired gaze.

“Good job.”

Xia Ya had been a great help this time. Not only had she cast over 5 curses one after another to weaken the gargoyles greatly for over 30 minutes but she had also buffed Shangguan Bing Xue with ‘Arcane Ward’, an invisible magical shield that protected the user from 5 attacks from any living being below level 200. It was precisely the skill Arcane Ward the one that prevented Shangguan Bing Xue from suffering injuries at times when it was impossible to completely avoid all the attacks launched by hundreds of thousands of enemies whose levels were not too far from hers.

“… It’s nothing.” Xia Ya could barely speak. Her throat was dry as she said between heavy breaths, “Compared to you I feel like I’m still lacking after all.”

Shangguan Bing Xue’s ice-blue colored eyes flashed with a hint of surprise after hearing Xia Ya’s words.

“… Even I can admit the undeniable.” Xia Ya shook her head and pointed, as if she knew exactly what Shangguan Bing Xue’s thoughts were.

Xia Ya was arrogant and proud, but she certainly had the qualifications to be prideful; otherwise why on earth would Bai Zemin attach so much importance to her existence and treat her as an invaluable treasure? However, she was not stupid; she could see things when it was right in front of her eyes.

Shangguan Bing Xue looked away and a flash of coldness shone in her gaze, “Now…”

Her battle was over, but this did not mean she had time to rest.

She took out an Epic grade treasure Mana Stone and quickly absorbed 10% of its content, recovering her Mana to its maximum in less than 5 minutes. Then, she passed the Mana Stone to Xia Ya: “Recover your Mana first. I will go support Bai Zemin.”

Without waiting for a reply, Shangguan Bing Xue jumped off the ice tree causing it to begin to crack. The tips of her delicate feet had barely touched the ground with the softness of a feather when her Agility burst out, disappearing at lightning speed directly charging into the distance from where the most terrifying explosions were coming from.

Xia Ya mounted Little Snow’s back and sighed as she began to slowly recover her Mana. She also needed to rest as she was extremely exhausted after losing almost 85% of her total Stamina.

… 

The battle against the Mana Eater Tree was completely different from any other battle Bai Zemin had fought to date. In the past, his enemies could only stand for a few minutes at most before succumbing to the ferocity of his attacks; even the level 400 9-Headed Immortal Dragon would have fallen in less than 2 hours were it not for Bai Zemin needing to find the secret behind its “immortality” and counter it.

However, the Mana Eater Tree was a separate story to tell.

Even after two full hours, the battle between Bai Zemin and the rare plant-like creature showed no signs of ending at all. 

Explosions rumbled across the sky and earth, the ground split apart, and mana-covered stones of all sizes flew everywhere with enough speed to tear through an armored vehicle from side to side.

“Nature’s Guile!”

Bai Zemin had just forced back a 500-Year General Tree after blowing off its left arm with a punch when his Danger Sense skill alerted him to the imminent danger approaching in his direction.

‘Two from behind, one from the sky, and the other….’ Bai Zemin’s body moved as his senses detected the direction of each attack.

In less than a second, Bai Zemin executed four extremely complicated moves that allowed him to not only defend against the Mana Eater Tree’s attacks but also gave him the opportunity to launch his counterattack.

First, he slashed backwards with his spear before jumping in position in such a way that his head pointed towards the ground and his legs towards the sky. 

Boom!!!! Boom!!!! BOOM!!!

The two jade branches aiming at his back were parried away by his spear while the jade branch aiming at his head was repelled by two continuous kicks as his body spun in the air.

Bang!

Time seemed to slow down before his eyes. The ground in front of him opened up, revealing a peculiarly thin jade root pointing directly at the center of his forehead. 

Any other human soul evolver would definitely have panicked at this moment. At the end of the day, Bai Zemin’s body was spinning in the air making it impossible for him to dodge the attack cunningly hidden by his enemy.

In that split of second, Bai Zemin released Annihilation of the Falling Sky and extended his right hand forward. The golden spear glowed, and in less than a blink of an eye it turned into a dragon claw-shaped gauntlet perfectly covering his right hand.

Boom!!!!!

Bai Zemin’s body hovered in the air without moving an inch. His right palm was open, and right in the center was the jade root that could not move forward no matter how hard it pressed forward.

“Impossible! The Imperial Jade Tree can pierce through any defense and shatter even the toughest armor!” Mana Eater Tree’s disbelieving voice thundered, unable to accept the fact that a mere gauntlet could stop its fatal attack.

Bai Zemin scoffed in his heart. Annihilation of the Falling Sky could turn into any weapon he wanted, and gloves were considered combat weapons; coupled with it being an indestructible Soul Armament, the Mana Eater Tree would be dreaming if it thought it could hurt Bai Zemin easily.

“Crimson Flame!”

Bai Zemin propelled his body upwards after flexing his right arm slightly. Using the jade root’s thrust force, he launched himself over 100 meters into the sky and at the same time as his two legs blazed under the glow of blood-colored flames, his body spun as he kicked in a circle pattern with both legs wide open.

Roar!!!!

Two blood-colored fire dragons shot out from Bai Zemin’s feet. The two fire dragons formed a giant circle around him, incinerating in a flash the over 400 Darkwood arrows that were shot in his direction. 

Only a second had passed since Bai Zemin sensed danger until now, the Mana Eater Tree did not have time to react at all due to the fact that it did not expect its enemy to be able to move like that.

“Shadow Blink!”

After evolving, Shadow Blink had a cooldown time of 30 seconds and allowed the user to jump to any shadow within 500 meters distance. In addition, after opening the door of universal space law a little and learning Shadow Control, Bai Zemin had developed a kind of special move that only belonged to him; but this move would be hidden from the enemy temporarily.

Bai Zemin’s shadow was just 500 meters away, and when he emerged immediately stabbed forward without holding back at all.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!

After receiving an attack composed of more than 5000 stabs all piled up in the same spot that it had already suffered during all this time, the explosion produced was so frightening that two huge chasms of more than 1 kilometer long each and at least 150 meters deep were formed on the sides of the jade tree.

Bai Zemin’s eyes shone with joy when he saw the crack the size of a human arm appear in the trunk of the jade tree. From within, a large amount of mana began to flow out rapidly and for the first time since he set foot in this cursed place, his Mana began to regenerate way faster than it would on the outside.

Finally, after two hours, the second to last facet of his plan had been completed!

In that moment of joy and happiness, Bai Zemin slowed down for a split second. On the battlefield it was unforgivable to be distracted but he could not help it as so far it was all a plan based on theories and analysis; he had no way of knowing whether it would work or not. 

When Bai Zemin sensed danger, it was too late to dodge. However, he did not panic and quickly leaned to the right slightly, willing to take a wound in his left shoulder rather than let his right arm be pierced.

Just at that moment and in sync with a drastic decrease in temperature around the area, a voice as beautiful as that of an immortal fairy made Bai Zemin couldn’t help but smile from the heart.

“Sacred Ice Charm!”

BOOOOOM!!!! BOOOOOM!!!!

Bai Zemin’s body was pushed forward but he quickly jumped to the side after being saved at the last second.

Right after the skill Sacred Ice Charm protected Bai Zemin, the pink ice shield exploded and in an instant, the whole area around the jade tree was engulfed in a kind of pink mist.

When the pink mist disappeared, the jade tree appeared before Bai Zemin’s eyes… but this time, it was imprisoned in an incredibly beautiful pink ice statue.

* * * * * * *

Really thank you very much to all those who send gifts to the novel and support with valuable Golden Tickets. I hope we can all keep it up <3

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.