"You... how could this be?!"
Gu You struggled to speak with his throat gripped tight.
Xiang Tian slammed a fist into his chest, caving the Divine Armor in with a massive dent.
Then Xiang Tian lashed out with another kick, sending Gu You flying backward.
Gu You crashed to the ground and climbed back up. Beneath the Divine Armor, he had already coughed up a great deal of blood.
"Impossible! Your Dharma Idol was shattered—how can you be completely unharmed?!"
Gu You roared, nearly mad. He could not accept it. In his understanding, once a Dharma Idol shattered, even if it was not as serious as damaging one's Life Artifact, the harm inflicted upon a cultivator would still be enormous.
Xiang Tian hovered in the air, his gaze full of mockery. "Who told you that was a Dharma Idol?"
As soon as he spoke, boundless rosy light erupted behind him. One... two...
In the end, more than a dozen towering, majestic phantoms emerged. Each had a different form, each held blades or swords, and each stood at the edge of the sky, no different from a Dharma Idol.
Forget Gu You—even Qiu Changfeng in the void was dumbfounded. This... this aura was clearly that of Dharma Idols! How was that possible? He had never heard of any cultivator possessing multiple Dharma Idols.
The radiant glow veiled the sky. Gu You stood frozen in place, staring in disbelief at the Dharma Idol phantoms filling the heavens like gods and Buddhas.
Little did he know that the Black Abyss conference room was already packed with people, every one of them staring wide-eyed. Xiang Tian's move had directly surpassed the limits of their understanding.
"Send Gu You a message at once! Tell him to come back!"
Lord of the Black Abyss slapped the table. He already understood that the Black Abyss was certain to suffer a disastrous defeat this time. There was no point in Gu You remaining there.
In the Great Wild Desolate Range, Xiang Tian stirred his mind. The longsword in one Dharma Idol's hand suddenly smashed down, leveling a distant stretch of mountain peaks. The few lackeys Gu You had brought did not even manage a cry before they were instantly wiped out.
In the blink of an eye, the footage in the Black Abyss conference room beneath the Endless Sea was cut off.
"Quick! Send him a message!"
Lord of the Black Abyss panicked and roared outright.
Back in the Great Wild Desolate Range, grief surged from Gu You's heart as fury blazed within him, turning his eyes bloodshot.
"Brat, I'll kill you!"
He had gone mad, frantically issuing attack commands to the Convergence Cannon. Yet what he received was an order from headquarters telling him to retreat immediately.
While he hesitated, one of the Dharma Idols brought its blade down upon the Convergence Cannon.
Boom!
The steel monster instantly became a heap of scrap metal.
"Ah!"
Gu You simply could not accept the sight and let out a shriek.
The Convergence Cannon was one of the Black Abyss's ultimate trump cards, yet it had now been destroyed in his hands. How was he supposed to answer for this when he returned?
"Don't panic. You're next."
Xiang Tian laughed loudly and charged straight at Gu You.
With no other choice, Gu You could only meet him head-on. He had never truly believed he could retreat successfully.
But Xiang Tian's methods were simply beyond anything he could withstand.
Xiang Tian drew out his immortal sword again and swung it directly at Gu You's head.
Gu You raised his blade to block.
With a bang, Gu You's legs sank into the ground. The force was so immense that it blasted a deep pit into the earth around him.
His arms went numb, and his fighting spirit plummeted at breakneck speed.
"I'm quite interested in that Divine Armor. Let me borrow it for a little fun!"
Xiang Tian carved his sword toward Gu You's waist, directly digging out the control unit that had once been incomparably sturdy and catching it in his hand.
Without the control unit, Gu You's Divine Armor began to vanish, revealing a burly blood-soaked man covered in wounds, his arms twitching without end.
Xiang Tian bound him up tightly with spiritual power, leaving him alive because he would still be useful later.
Holding the Divine Armor's control unit, he pressed the switch.
Warning: Divine Armor has been damaged and requires repair. Forced summoning may cause the Divine Armor to explode.
Hearing the system prompt, Xiang Tian paused. He was rather curious about this kind of thing. After all, he had seen Sinan Yao's battle records, and that fellow had used this very item.
But damaged was damaged. He could just find someone to repair it when he had the time.
"Wonderful... simply wonderful."
Seeing that the situation had stabilized, Qiu Changfeng revealed himself. He did not even know what words could describe this battle, though he wisely did not ask about the Dharma Idols.
When Xiang Tian saw Qiu Changfeng, he smiled faintly. "I've truly troubled the headmaster. You're so busy, yet you still had to come along and protect me."
The moment Gu You on the ground heard the word "headmaster," his whole body jolted. So Qiu Changfeng of Changning Immortal Academy had been watching from the shadows all along, and he had not sensed a single thing.
He desperately wanted to ask the Abyss Master how this fight was supposed to be fought.
Even if he had somehow managed to defeat Xiang Tian, there was still a True Immortal Realm cultivation expert here. One slap from him would have crushed Gu You to death. Gu You was utterly despairing.
Qiu Changfeng glanced at him curiously. "What? Why did you keep this fellow alive?"
Xiang Tian smiled as he glanced at Su Tong, who lay on the ground, then said to him, "Take a close look at this girl."
Qiu Changfeng found it strange, but he began circulating his divine ability and truly discovered a clue.
There seemed to be something implanted in her body after birth.
"There's an assistant device inside her. I've looked into these things before—it belongs to the Black Abyss."
"What?"
Qiu Changfeng was greatly shocked upon hearing that. Someone from the Black Abyss had infiltrated his academy, and he had not noticed in the slightest.
"No need to be surprised. It may have been implanted after she entered the academy, which was why they slipped through a crack back then."
Qiu Changfeng had already made up his mind. After returning, he would conduct a complete academy-wide inspection and see just how many people had planted pieces on his academy's chessboard.
Xiang Tian told Qiu Changfeng to hide quickly, then walked over to the unconscious Su Tong and the other two.
With a small trick, he woke all three of them.
Their heads still felt as though they were splitting apart, and they could not tell east from west. Once the three recovered their senses and saw the devastation covering the ground, their hearts jolted.
When they saw Xiang Tian again, they were all astonished. Su Tong in particular was filled with disbelief.
"Hehe, we were attacked by the Black Abyss. This time, the blame lies with me. It should have been the Ding Family's doing—I got everyone involved."
The Black Abyss?
Upon hearing those two words, Lou Yi and Du Guang Kang both shuddered. How had it turned out to be that baleful organization?
Lou Yi was even more enraged. "You bastard, do you know you nearly got us killed? You really are a—"
Du Guang Kang hurriedly covered his mouth. Under normal circumstances, he would have been delighted to see this guy speak to Xiang Tian that way, but there were only four of them in this entire place now.
Xiang Tian's face had already darkened. Du Guang Kang feared that this pig teammate would speak without restraint, anger Xiang Tian, and drag both Su Tong and himself down with him.
Su Tong's face was deathly pale. She did not dare speak at all. She could not understand how Gu You had already acted, yet still failed to kill Xiang Tian.
Xiang Tian dragged Gu You out from behind him, and Su Tong's pupils abruptly shrank.
The dignified Eighteenth General of the Black Abyss had actually fallen to such a state?
"This is the fellow. I spared his life precisely so the three of you could vent your anger. Go ahead."
Xiang Tian looked at the three with a smile, but none of them moved.
This was a member of the Black Abyss. How could they dare lay a hand on him?
"Oh? What, aren't you three classmates angry?"
Xiang Tian asked in confusion.
"Fuck, beat this bastard to death!"
Lou Yi spat out a mouthful of sand that had somehow gotten into his mouth, picked up a chunk of broken stone beside him, and hurled it at Gu You.
Seeing this, Du Guang Kang decided to go all the way once he had started and joined in as well. Only Su Tong remained, trembling all over.
"What? Su Tong, aren't you going to do it?"
Xiang Tian asked again. Su Tong suddenly snapped back to her senses and looked at him.
Xiang Tian's face was expressionless. Not a trace of emotion could be seen in his eyes, and in that instant, Su Tong felt utterly helpless.
She could only pick up a stone beside her and smash it down at Gu You as well.
For Lou Yi, this primitive and direct method seemed to be the best way to vent his anger. The other two had merely followed the crowd.
Gu You's miserable howls did not last long before he breathed his last. From beginning to end, Su Tong did not say a single word.
As for any mission or not, none of them mentioned it again. Their lives had nearly been lost—was the mission still important?
Before you continue