Rumble!
Several world-ending bolts of lightning descended, shattering the barrier above the valley floor and engulfing everyone below without distinction.
Bang!
Liang Yunnan and the others were swallowed by the lightning. When it faded, only several deep pits remained. They and their bones had been burned to ash in an instant, without leaving so much as a trace.
Shi Lan wasn't particularly concerned. She had the soul tokens of Liang Yunnan and the others, and they were still alive—they had merely been expelled from this world.
Shi Lan was wrapped in a transparent azure barrier. The lightning, brimming with destructive force, was stopped three feet from her body and couldn't advance a single inch.
The instant the lightning descended, Shi Lan had already connected to the location of her true body and prepared to return, but the azure barrier had held her back.
The barrier hadn't been her doing. It was the Empress System protecting her.
Her soul wasn't strong enough yet, and her yin energy was weak. If she faced such blazing yang lightning directly, she would likely have been scattered into oblivion on the spot. Perhaps it was because of that thin shard that she had connected to the system, activating its self-protection protocol.
Cold notifications sounded one after another beside Shi Lan's ear.
[Absorption complete. Analyzing energy...] [Disassembled 3 units of nine-star energy body.] [Ancient ruins coordinates discovered x1.] [World core discovered x1. Fuse?]
A strange light flashed in Shi Lan's eyes. She had only ever seen a nine-star energy body atop the Dao Fruit of the Cloudreturn Sword Emperor.
The ancient ruins coordinates could wait. That world core also seemed to be something extraordinary.
Lin Mo bathed in the lightning, uninjured. He stared at the bolts surrounding him, bewildered.
As he stood there