Another Enlighter beast had appeared in outer space, above the stronghold.
Lu Yin’s performance during the last battle had been too dazzling. In addition to that, he was also the strongest human Limiteer as well as someone on the Celestial Vanquisher’s List. He was a target that the Astral Beast Domain needed to eliminate, and they now saw him as a target even more important than Liu Qiuyu.
Lu Yin was blasted beneath the ground, but the universal armor protected him, and he was mostly fine aside from being a bit dizzy.
That Enlighter realm astral beast glared at Lu Yin in disbelief. It could not believe that a Limiteer had been able to withstand its attack. After all, not even Hunters could defend themselves against its power.
Lu Yin looked up and locked eyes with the beast as he panted heavily.
“Seventh Bro, we’re doomed! You’ve been targeted! From now on, in every battle, there’ll be Enlighter realm beasts attacking you. We’re doomed!” the Ghost Monkey lamented.
There was another thump, and the Enlighter beast that had attacked Lu Yin was suddenly repelled by a giant thunder shield. Aden had appeared, and he relaxed once he saw that Lu Yin was fine. He then stared into the distance and vanished.
Two more Enlighter beasts emerged from the Astral Beast Domain’s forces and attacked Seasons Fort. One of them targeted Wang Wen while the other focused on Lu Yin.
As for Wang Wen, even an Enlighter realm astral beast could not do much to him since that man instantly hid away in his coffin as soon as any trace of danger appeared. No—as soon as any battle started, he would hide away in his coffin, only to emerge after the battle ended. There were too many people protecting him, and the most nauseating part of it all was that the fellow would vanish for long periods of time, during which no one could find him.
Due to Wang Wen’s disappearing act, Lu Yin had turned into a live target, attracting the attention of two Enlighter realm beasts.
For several consecutive hours, Lu Yin was incessantly chased by the beasts. The two Enlighters took turns attacking Lu Yin, and not even Wen Qichen could stop them.
Lu Yin silently cursed to himself. He decided that he would apply to transfer to one of the lower five strongholds after this battle so that he would not be targeted like this again.
With great difficulty, he finally managed to escape from the two Enlighters’ repeated onslaught, but another Hunter realm beast soon appeared before him.
Fortunately, Huo Qingshan arrived in time to rescue him. Otherwise, even though it couldn’t break through Lu Yin’s defenses, it had been trying to drag him away.
Lu Yin now understood why Wang Wen made sure to hide so well. Even if the astral beasts could not injure him, they could still take him away.
With Huo Qingshan’s protection, Lu Yin did not need to worry about an ambush from any of the Hunter realm astral beasts. He looked up above them, and his pupils shrank. He saw the rune lines of an Enlighter continuously dwindle at a very rapid pace. Before long, the rune lines completely vanished.
An Enlighter had perished.
Lu Yin did not know who had died. It could have been either a human or an astral beast.
“Not good. They’re here again. Your Highness, flee!” One day later, in another corner of the battlefield, Huo Qingshan threw Lu Yin away. From a distance, the spider-like astral beast tore through the void and instantly used its threads to chop off Huo Qingshan’s right arm and attack Lu Yin.
Lu Yin’s face changed as he watched Huo Qingshan crash into the ground, unable to tell if the man was alive or dead. He wanted to flee, but his speed did not allow him to escape from an Enlighter’s attack. The threads instantly bound his right arm right, and if not for his universal armor, then his arm would also have been ripped off just like Huo Qingshan’s.
An enormous strength dragged Lu Yin back, and he scanned his surroundings only to discover that there were no other Enlighters. What about Wen Qichen? Aden? There was no one who could save him.
He gritted his teeth as he pointed his gun towards the spider-like creature. It bared its fangs as its giant body suddenly turned illusory. It drifted to somewhere between reality and fantasy from where it could escape into the void at any given moment.
Lu Yin could not deal with the beast. It seemed that his only option was to use the larger piece of Progenitor Wushang’s hide after the beast drew close.
“Seventh Bro, the poison! Elder Wu’s poison!” the monkey hurriedly reminded him.
Lu Yin’s eyes flashed, and he retrieved a vial of Elder Wu’s poison from his cosmic ring before clasping it tightly in one hand.
The threads quickly pulled him over to the spider-like beast. Along the way, the threads continuously cut at the universal armor, but it was not damaged in the least. The spider-like beast was stunned. “Human, your universal armor is decent. Take it off, and I’ll spare your life.”
Lu Yin sneered. “Do you think that I’m an idiot?”
The spider-like beast let out an ear-piercing cackle. “Then I’ll trap you forever beneath my belly where you’ll watch on as I eat people and spit out their carcasses.”
Lu Yin’s face paled, as he might as well die if he was destined for such a fate.
The spider-like beast kept its promise, and the threads soon bound Lu Yin beneath its plump belly. His hands in particular received special attention and were entwined with multiple layers of threads so that he could not retrieve his gun.
Lu Yin’s eyes were ruthless as he crushed the vial with a bang. The poison flowed along his armor and into the threads. From there, it traveled along the threads and into the body of the spider-like beast.
It did not notice anything at first and leaped into the void to target a male Hunter, but then, suddenly, its wails could be heard throughout the region as it retrieved its threads and dropped Lu Yin. A massive portion of its plump underbelly had already vanished.
Lu Yin was horrified, as some of the vials of poison had so many rune lines that they surpassed what he had seen on Karthika, and he had used one such vial just now.
The spider-like beast was an Enlighter who had only recently broken through, and its rune lines were less than Karthika’s. After the poison entered its body, it was currently in a state worse than death.
“Human, what did you put on my body?” The spider-like beast bellowed in agony as it rolled about in space.
Lu Yin did not answer. Instead, he aimed his gun at the spider-like beast, but it suddenly vanished.
Lu Yin felt that it was a pity, as he had not managed to kill it.
In the distance, the Hunter who had just been targeted by the astral beast stared at Lu Yin in shock. This Limiteer had actually sent an Enlighter retreating in miserable defeat, and this toppled his understanding.
Beep beep beep beep!
His gadget beeped urgently, and Lu Yin looked down. His expression abruptly changed, and he instantly charged back towards the stronghold.
‘Everyone in front of the stronghold, retreat immediately. Pyrolyte will explode in one minute. Everyone in front of the stronghold, retreat immediately. Pyrolyte will explode in one minute…’
This was the message that Wang Wen had just sent to everyone stationed at Seasons Fort.
Lu Yin had no time to question why Seasons Fort had any pyrolyte, but the only thing on his mind at the moment was to rush back to the fortress as quickly as possible. There was no way that the higher-ups would use only a small amount of pyrolyte in this battle.
He had been taken into outer space by the spider-like beast, and he was still some distance away from the fort. Even with the monkey’s help, it would not be very realistic for him to return to the stronghold in less than a minute. Fortunately, there was still the Hunter nearby, and the man grabbed Lu Yin and tore through the void.
One minute later, space itself was warped as rune lines that surpassed an Enlighter erupted above the stronghold. It was rather stunning.
Lu Yin stood inside the fort and stared past the sky. Quickly, violent winds swept through the fortress, and the various planets and mainlands that formed the stronghold began quivering. Tsunamis struck the coasts as volcanoes erupted.
There was a terrifying explosion unfolding before their eyes, and yet they heard nothing.
Lu Yin only knew that everything he saw was warped, but he had no way of knowing how widespread this effect was.
After a while, everything returned to normal. This battle had also ended.
Lu Yin crouched down and held both knees with his hands as he hyperventilated.
This battle had been incredibly difficult for him. First, he had been chased around by Enlighter beasts. Then, if not for Elder Wu’s poison, he would have been captured and taken back to the Astral Beast Domain, which would have been a truly desperate situation. He could not imagine what he would experience in that place.
One battle had ended, but what about the next? Lu Yin would still be a person that the Astral Beast Domain needed to eliminate.
Not good—what about Huo Qingshan? Lu Yin’s face changed, and he charged to where he had seen Huo Qingshan fall.
When he saw the heavily injured Huo Qingshan, Lu Yin immediately moved to help the Hunter apply some of Shamrock Enterprises’ special medications before taking the older man back to a treatment room.
Seasons Fort had no lack of medical facilities, and Huo Qingshan had only suffered from having his arm torn off. With the state of modern medicine, it would be rather easy to reattach it since Lu Yin had been lucky enough to find the arm.
Aden also appeared in the treatment area, and he heaved a sigh of relief when he saw that Lu Yin was fine. “I’m sorry. I was caught up with an Enlighter beast.”
Lu Yin nodded. “It’s not easy for you to hold off an Enlighter beast. It’s fine so long as you survive.”
Out of everyone who had traveled from the Great Yu Empire to reinforce Fort Seasons, only the three of them had survived. Lu Yin had not been able to protect the rest of them.
It was no wonder why Lohar had used the Hall of Honor’s authority to force all of the weaves to send reinforcements. Otherwise, no one would have come. This weave was a blackhole of death where Explorers, Cruisers, and sometimes even Hunters were unable to protect themselves.
“Featherking is dead,” Aden said in a deep tone.
Lu Yin’s heart trembled, and he felt his mood drop. Featherking, who was Nightking Feather, had been a powerhouse of the Nightking clan. He had defended Ironblood Fort for many years and never left the place.
Although Lu Yin did not care for the Nightking clan, Featherking still deserved his respect.
An Enlighter had died so casually, and now, his name would be removed from the Ironblood Rankings.
“It was precisely because of Featherking’s death that Liu Qiuyu and the others weren’t able to withstand the assault anymore. Hence, Wang Wen had Wen Qichen blow up some extremely volatile material called pyrolyte, 50 grams to be exact, and blast away countless beasts. Unfortunately, not a single Enlighter beast had died in the explosion since they all were too quick to escape,” Aden explained.
It was no wonder why Wen Qichen had not stopped the spider-like beast, as he had gone to ignite the pyrolyte. Lu Yin felt that something was strange. “Why is there pyrolyte here?”
Aden was shocked. “You know about pyrolyte?”
Aden had been in self-imprisonment this whole time, so he had not heard anything regarding the universe’s major events. He had not even known about Undying Yushan’s passing since no one had bothered to tell him about it.
Lu Yin gave a simple overview of the events that had occurred with pyrolyte, and Aden commented, “From what you’re telling me, the various great powers of the Innerverse have never given up on searching for more pyrolyte. It’s been more than half a year since the Sea King stole it from them, so it’s not surprising that they were able to find some more.”
Lu Yin suddenly thought of something, and he immediately checked the ranking list. He saw that Wen Qichen’s Ironblood Points had increased and jumped to seventh place on the rankings. From this, Lu Yin was able to guess that the pyrolyte had belonged to the Wen family and that Wen Qichen had been left with no alternative but to donate the pyrolyte to the defense of the stronghold.
Since Wen Qichen had evidently obtained some pyrolyte, the Sword Sect should have some too. It was simply a question of whether they would use it all up during this war to hold back the Astral Beast Domain invasion or if they would still have some to bring back.
This made Lu Yin want to get his hands on some pyrolyte and try to upgrade it a bit.
The pyrolyte explosion had not killed any of the Enlighter realm astral beasts, but it had been tremendously destructive against the weaker beasts since it had been an explosion with a power level in the several hundreds of thousands. This led to four days of peace for Seasons Fort.
Huo Qingshan had his arm connected after just a day, and he was able to recover from a significant amount from his injuries with the remaining time.
The special medications in Lu Yin’s cosmic ring had all been taken from Enlighters, so their efficacy was better than normal.
During these few quiet days, Lu Yin kept an eye on the rankings list and saw that Wendy Yushan’s name never disappeared. He knew that she was at least alive.
He had no other way to confirm her status since the battles in Ironblood Weave were just too intense. He also wasn’t able to contact her through his gadget since their signals were being intercepted by the astral beasts. Aside from the battle system rankings that were accessible from anywhere in the weave, anything else that required a network connection had been cut off.
The astral beasts did not stop the various strongholds from looking at the Ironblood Points rankings, as the rankings were a double-edged sword. If the humans dominated in a battle, then the list could be used to improve morale. If they fell to a disadvantage, then the list would cause the other forts to fall even further into despair. At this moment, it was clear that the astral beasts were dominating all of the battlefields. Thus, they wanted all of the humans to pay attention to the rankings list and give in to despair. The intelligence of the astral beasts was not to be underestimated.
