Chapter 458 - 57: Treasure Manual (Part 2)

Alien Pseudo-Men, Evil God Followers, and masked men of unknown origin...

They had banded together at some unknown point, secretly infiltrating the Safe City before suddenly launching their assault.

Their offensive was swift and their methods varied, catching the Treasure Manual’s protection team completely off guard.

However, as the Federation Imperial Guard and Guardian Martial Saints recovered from the initial shock, the attackers’ forward momentum immediately stalled.

As the most precious heirloom of the Human Race, the safety of the ’Treasure Manual’ was of the utmost importance. Every one of its protectors was one in a million, not to mention they were armed with the Federation’s most advanced weaponry.

Though the attackers were powerful, they were still far from being a match for the defenders.

"Ah!"

Seeing their advance blocked, the facial muscles of one of the men contorted and his limbs began to tremble wildly. He roared:

"I, the believer Sou Daiman, respectfully invite the Deities to enter my body! I offer this mortal shell to be driven by Your will."

A sacrifice!

This expert, who possessed the Martial Saint’s Power, was actually sacrificing himself to an Evil God in exchange for immense strength.

"BOOM!"

A pillar of light connecting heaven and earth materialized out of thin air, enveloping Sou Daiman’s body.

The next instant, a terrifying aura erupted.

A Holy King Beast?

Far away, standing atop a skyscraper, Zhu Ju’s eyes shifted. Surprise flickered in his gaze, and his expression turned solemn.

"ROAR!"

Sou Daiman roared at the sky as his skin split open inch by inch. Ghastly white bone spikes erupted from his spine, countless black patterns appeared on his face, and his mouth and nose twisted into a grotesque shape.

"BANG!"

Amidst a boom of Powerful Qi, the transformed Sou Daiman shot forward like a cannonball, charging straight for the council hall.

"Stop him!"

"Quick!"

"..."

Four figures shot out of the council hall. Without a word, they unleashed their Powerful Qi, and time and space seemed to freeze.

Myriad Phenomena Celestial Attraction!

Polarized Golden Bell Shield!

Strong Core Star Grasp!

Entropy Silence Dust!

These four Martial Saints were top-tier experts of the current era, each having cultivated one of the Federation’s Secret Techniques.

These four Secret Techniques were derived from the four fundamental forces, and when combined, they displayed an inconceivable power.

Just like this moment.

As the four Martial Saints made their move, the void twisted and time stood still. An invisible force field enveloped the entire council hall, and outside, the attacking Alien Pseudo-Men and Evil God Followers began to rapidly decay and die.

This power of decay was terrifyingly potent; even their alloy bodies visibly corroded and broke down.

Sou Daiman, corroded by the Power of the Evil God, found his charge slowing as his Physical Body began to dissolve bit by bit.

At this rate, he would probably turn to ash before he even reached the council hall doors.

"What a move!"

Zhu Ju clapped his hands and sighed softly in admiration.

"Truly worthy of being the Federation’s strongest team. With this kind of power, killing a Holy King Beast would be a simple matter."

"However..."

"This time is truly different."

His gaze shifted to another direction, where a dozen or so mysterious figures stood.

Although Zhu Ju had never met one of them, he had seen his file, courtesy of Qiann Lan.

Evil Mountain!

The underground overlord who had arrived in Funeng City a few months ago.

"ROAR!"

With a low roar, several figures joined the battlefield.

Their auras were extremely bizarre—human-like, yet not human, a confusing mixture. But they gave Zhu Ju a strangely familiar feeling.

’So...’

’The Ten Thousand Spirits Body Forging Technique!’

Zhu Ju mused,

’That Wuh Ping kid is pretty smart, thinking to spread the risk like this. A shame he’s probably just setting the stage for someone else to steal the show.’

Meanwhile, Evil Mountain and his group charged into the fray.

Each one of them possessed speed exceeding that of sound, strength capable of shattering Refined Gold, and Defensive Power that could ignore artillery shells...

Although their auras were weaker than a Holy King Beast’s or even a Martial Saint’s, the power they unleashed was in no way inferior to that of a Martial Saint.

With a dozen or so strange Martial Saints charging into battle, more and more Evil God Followers sacrificing themselves, and the Pseudo-Human ’Royal Family’ revealing their true forms, the Federation’s defense was suddenly on the verge of collapse.

Just then,

"ZWHIP!"

"ZWHIP! ZWHIP!"

Dozens of laser beams descended from the sky, striking the Pseudo-Humans and Evil God Followers with perfect accuracy.

The lasers were no thicker than a thumb, yet they effortlessly pierced through sturdy skulls and extinguished all signs of life.

In just an instant, a large section of the battlefield was cleared.

Warships!

Zhu Ju looked up.

His gaze pierced the clouds, landing on a patrolling Warship hundreds of thousands of meters away.

And it wasn’t just the Warships.

Dozens of satellites were also adjusting their trajectories, helping the Federation lock onto the battlefield below.

"BANG!"

"RUMBLE..."

Following a series of loud bangs, the corpses on the ground suddenly erupted into clouds of blood mist, blanketing half the Safe City.

The blood mist possessed a distorting power that not only interfered with electromagnetics and machinery but also prevented the Warships from locking onto targets below.

Clearly, the attackers were well aware of the Warships’ power and had come prepared, obscuring the satellites’ view.

Thus, hesitating to act for fear of hitting their own, the Warships dared not fire.

"ROAR!"

"Attack!"

Waves of powerful auras surged forth.

Holy King Beast!

Peak Martial Saints!

Mecha!

A host of the era’s top experts engaged in a chaotic battle around the council hall. The earth itself tore apart from the collision of their Strength, and the entire Safe City shook nonstop. If not for how extremely condensed their power was, such high-intensity clashes would have long since leveled everything for hundreds of miles around.

"WHOOSH!"

A phantom, barely visible to the naked eye, appeared underground at some unknown moment and thrust a beam of black light toward the Treasure Manual.

"DING..."

For the first time in hundreds of years, something other than a Guardian had touched the ’Treasure Manual’.

"BEEP BEEP..."

Zhu Ju frowned slightly and instinctively shut off the communication. At a time like this, he was in no mood to pay attention to anything else.

"Mr. Zhu, you have to come see this! Something’s wrong in the lab, the data has changed!"

Wuh Qing’s panicked voice rang out.

"Oh?"

Zhu Ju raised an eyebrow. He glanced at the chaotic battlefield, then flickered and vanished.

*

*

*

The data in the laboratory was refreshing frantically, and the various monitoring instruments were twitching rapidly as if having a seizure.

Wuh Qing’s face was deathly pale as she stared at the data before her, her eyes filled with panic.

She had never seen a situation like this before, and her first instinct was to call Zhu Ju.

After all, her experiences over the years had cemented an impression of Zhu Ju in her mind as someone unfathomably capable.

If there was trouble, find Zhu Ju!

"What’s going on?" Zhu Ju’s figure appeared silently beside her. He frowned at the instruments and asked instinctively:

"Signal interference? Instrument malfunction?"

"No!"

Wuh Qing turned her head, her expression terrified.

"It’s... it’s a genetic mutation!"

Zhu Ju frowned. If it were just a genetic mutation, while rare, it shouldn’t warrant such a major reaction.

But he quickly came to his senses, his expression hardening as he looked at the test subjects in the experiment pods.

"Genetic..."

"Fusion?"

"Yes!" Wuh Qing’s voice trembled.

"I don’t know what happened just now, but the test subjects’ genes started changing, evolving in the same direction. In just a few breaths, they... they seem to have become the same kind of thing."

Zhu Ju narrowed his eyes.

The test subjects were, of course, not the same species, but now they had become one.

Moreover, two of the Flowercap Pheasants had actually fused, becoming a two-headed monster.

"The time?"

"At 9:12 and 36 seconds."

’That time...’

A thought struck Zhu Ju.

That was precisely when the ’Treasure Manual’ was attacked.

"Are you saying that from that moment on, the genes of the lab’s test subjects began to align?"

Zhu Ju asked,

"Different organisms started turning into the same organism?"

"It’s more than that." Wuh Qing raised her hand slowly, a bitter look on her face.

"I..."

"I’m the same!"

Hm?

A thought stirred in Zhu Ju’s mind. His gaze fell upon Wuh Qing, and he took a deep breath as his brow slowly split open.

"Ah!"

Seeing the vertical eye appear on his forehead, Wuh Qing instinctively cried out and stumbled back before catching herself and saying:

"Body of Ten Thousand Spirits..."

"Silence!"

Zhu Ju’s expression was grave. The vertical eye on his brow emitted a faint glow, and its halo enveloped their surroundings.

His expression grew heavier and heavier.

"This world..."

"Something’s wrong!"

In his ’vision’, a faint ripple was sweeping out in all directions.

Wherever the ripple passed, all things were changing, twisting toward a single, identical state.

It wasn’t just living things.

Zhu Ju took a step forward and touched the wall of the room, the astonishment on his face now impossible to contain.

This wall,

It was as if it had come alive, fusing with the alloy, optical cables, and bacteria within it.

He turned his head.

In a room not far away,

a lab technician was fast asleep, unaware that his body was slowly fusing with the bed.

"What is happening?"