Chapter 1320: The Sixth Trial

The surface of the sea frothed with angry waves, like dragons emerging with the tide. The entire sea roiled, and lightning crackled amidst the void.

Countless serpents swam across the raging sea as lightning flashed ominously overhead, a scene right out of an apocalypse.

As Zhang Lie struck, an underworld river hurtled into existence, roaring into the sea. The sword energy roiled like black waves. The sea had morphed into a boundless battlefield. The sea breeze was as a horn to action, and the serpents, thousands of courageous soldiers heeding its call.

The dragon heads succumbed to the pressure of the endless ocean.

"[The Boundless Blade: Dragon's Wrath]!"

Guicang unleashed a barrage of sword energy in the form of a blood dragon.

A dragon's roar shook the void as the pitch-black genetic energy turned blood-red. The underworld river roiled, forming a gigantic blood-colored hurricane which disintegrated the dragon in an explosion of terrifying force.

Crystalline shards flashed through the air as the will of the realm's voice rang out in Zhang Lie's head.

[You successfully killed a disaster-grade scarlet dragon whelp. By consuming the core of the disaster-grade scarlet dragon whelp, you may receive one to ten disaster gene fragments.]

He picked up the disaster-grade core on the ground, a crimson one.

The fifth trial involved only two disaster-grade lifeforms, but they were among the peak of disaster-grade. It wouldn't be a far cry to call them halfway to monarch-grade, but they were still quite a bit weaker than Zhang Lie himself.

Zhang Lie also retrieved the core of the other disaster-grade lifeform, the golden roc.

The golden roc's core was, as expected, golden in color, with what seemed to be a golden sky within.

The world of the trial had been battered almost to the point of collapse by the fight between Zhang Lie and the disaster-grade dragon.

There were cracks in the ground so deep that they could see beyond the pocket world.

No third disaster-grade lifeform had shown up; the trial had likely concluded with just two.

Zhang Lie immediately began to absorb the two cores, starting with the golden roc's.

Zhang Lie cut his palm with his sword, then dripped blood onto the core. The moment it touched the core, the blood was quickly absorbed into its interior. It sucked up more and more of Zhang Lie's blood until it turned blood-red.

Zhang Lie opened his wounds again and again until the core became perfectly transparent. Then, he closed his eyes and began pouring concentrated, black genetic energy from his body into the core.

As Zhang Lie clutched the crystalline orb, he felt some unusual sense of kinship with it, as though it was already part of his body.

Zhang Lie swallowed it whole without even daring to chew it. The core was cold and prickly as it slid into his stomach. Subsequently, all that energy contained within the core burst apart.

Almost immediately, Zhang Lie took on the color of a boiled prawn.

As the energy in the disaster-grade core gushed through his body, golden light erupted from him. A pair of wings manifested from his back in a burst of light, and Zhang Lie began to float in the air.

The energy from absorbing the core propelled his floating body upward. While he assimilated the disaster gene fragments into his body, Zhang Lie gave off stronger and stronger beams of light.

He circulated genetic energy through his body at an incredible pace, his framework fully activated to capture and transform his newfound strength. but as an emperor-grade lifeform, Zhang Lie could withstand the discomfort.

Then, Zhang Lie pulled out the second core.

To him, absorbing these disaster-grade cores was an ordinary affair, nothing more.

Zhang Lie cut his palm with his sword, then dripped blood onto the core. The moment it touched the core, the blood was quickly absorbed into its interior...

Following the usual routine, while floating in the air, Zhang Lie absorbed the second core.

Blood-colored radiance surrounded him, as though a dragon were coiled around his body.

[Ninecarp Transformation] activated; genetic energy circulated around the technique faster and faster, clashing against each other even as they merged together into a strength that was wholly Zhang Lie's.

In the fourth realm, Zhang Lie had evolved once more.

𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

Zhang Lie: an emperor-grade lifeform

Techniques: Rippling Walk (pinnacle), Three-Wave Crescendo (pinnacle), Calm Waters (pinnacle), Fists of the Silent Sea (pinnacle), The Boundless Blade (pinnacle), Eclipse (pinnacle), Syzygy (pinnacle), Ninesoul Dragonblade (pinnacle), Blade of the Heavens (pinnacle)

Genes: Basic, 160; Mutated, 150; Superior, 150; Peak, 150; Disaster, 110; Monarch, 0; Emperor, 0

Soulshards: White Grub (superior), Blood Ant (superior), Potbellied Toad (mutated), Eternalspring Cocoon (superior), Dragonwolf (superior), Moonlight Wyrm (peak), Golden Roc (peak), Dragonwhale (disaster), Mistmeld Clam (disaster)

After the transformation, Zhang Lie returned to the trial-taker's chamber for the sixth trial. Passing the sixth trial would allow him access deeper into the chamber, allowing him access to its secrets, to its purpose and the reason for its existence, to follow in his parents' footsteps.

Zhang Lie couldn't help but grow excited.