Chapter 777: Annihilating an Entire Sect, and the One Who Understands Me, Locke!

Above Locke's head, the giant's palm descended from the sky. The vast magic pressure bore down upon the Stygian River, pressing out a crater-like depression, and under that immense pressure the Moon of Evolution steadily descended, visibly about to fall back into the Stygian River.

'The only option is to gamble. But this gamble carries a certain degree of danger for me as well.'

'If the Moon of Evolution is struck down into the Stygian River, I do not know what will happen to me.'

'I must judge the last possible moment to disengage. If I cannot complete the graft, I must leave the Stygian Plane.'

At this moment, the Jade power descended upon the Second Circle fern lance, causing the fern lance to magnify enormously. Its entire form turned to jade, becoming a jade fern lance.

This jade fern lance had gathered a tremendous amount of the Jade Dream's power. Its entire body shimmered with a dream-like quality, and vast life energy gathered without cease.

Locke directed the fern lance toward the mysterious Stygian iron tree. In comparison, the fern lance looked like nothing more than an embroidery needle before it.

With a ringing sound, the jade fern lance struck the Stygian iron tree's bark, and spell sparks erupted one after another. The Stygian iron tree's bark was so tenacious that it did not seem to be any kind of special energy. It was simply that kind of iron tree bark, purely tough and nearly indestructible.

The jade fern lance collided with the Stygian iron tree's bark three times, and each time it was deflected, causing not even the faintest trace of damage.

This embroidery needle struggled repeatedly in the grain lines of the iron tree's bark, trying to pierce through the folds between those grain lines, yet gained nothing whatsoever.

"Blast, it is too hard!"

The savage light between Locke's tiger eyes intensified. Behind him, a presence seemed to emerge of a three-eyed tiger cat hunting prey within a forest.

"World Tree Leaf!"

The Second Circle fern lance produced a ring of jade-green leaves, and energy concentrated into a single point.

The jade fern lance struck the branch, and it was like heaven and earth colliding, even disturbing the surrounding Stygian River water as the surface surged and churned.

But in the next instant the jade fern lance slid across the Stygian iron tree's branch, friction producing a spell spark.

Locke watched this and furrowed his brow.

"Is my magic pressure still insufficient?"

The Moon of Evolution refracted its light and deployed the Alternation of Generations, transforming the jade fern lance into gametophyte and sporophyte in sequence, cycling through six complete alternations. In the final cycle, reflecting Pinellia's summer magical power attribute, it became a flame fern lance that flew out, condensed to a single point, and struck that Stygian iron tree.

A dull thud.

At this moment the Stygian iron tree stood completely unmoved, without so much as a scratch.

Locke raised his right hand and made fine adjustments to the spell model. The jade fern lance flew out from within the flames like a swimming dragon, circling around the Stygian iron tree's branch in flight.

The Moon of Evolution's moonlight shone upon the magic pressure scattered through the air, using the moon's spiritual mist to gather as much of the magical force obtained through the Alternation of Generations as possible, concentrating it back onto the fern lance.

At this moment, the giant's palm was almost directly above his head.

The Moon of Evolution had been pressed down to within five meters of the Stygian River's surface. The last possible moment of disengagement was visibly approaching.

Locke clenched his teeth. "If I miss this opportunity, the Crimson Deep Court will certainly repair the breach, and it will be extremely difficult to recreate today's conditions. For this situation to arise at all required an enormous number of coincidences in the first place."

"This magical plant is so mysterious. If I withdraw now, the loss would be too great."

"I still have the Small Golden Jujube Arrow. I can use the Small Golden Jujube Arrow to absorb damage on behalf of my main body. Using the Small Golden Jujube Arrow in my place can buy me another three seconds of disengagement time."

"Open for me!"

A fierce light blazed in Locke's eyes.

The jade fern lance circled the Stygian iron tree's branch in flight, colliding with the iron tree's bark countless times, each impact sending magical force shockwaves rippling outward.

The jade fern lance flew from the Stygian iron tree's trunk to the middle section of a branch, then to the tip.

A dull thud.

The jade fern lance, unable to withstand Locke's forceful driving and the repeated impacts, snapped in two from the middle.

The Climbing Fern was originally an ordinary fern, but Locke had bred it into a tree fern, raising its hardness, yet it was still not a true tree, and so the fern lance made of Climbing Fern was still composed primarily of interwoven aerial roots and leafstalk bases, which were relatively soft.

Its microscopic material was similar to an enhanced version of a sheet of paper.

At this moment, the golden fern lance could no longer hold together and split open from the middle, like a sheet of paper being torn apart.

Locke was stunned for a brief instant.

Because aside from the Black Lock Sword Bamboo, this was the first magical plant he had ever worn out.

But in the next instant, a V-shaped incision had been cut into the tip of the Stygian iron tree's branch by his jade fern lance.

At the critical moment, Locke had suddenly recalled something from botanical common knowledge:

The bark of a tree is not uniformly hard at every point.

The hardest part should be at the tree's base, followed by the middle section of the branches.

Because the base of the trunk bears the weight of the entire tree, high-density lignin deposition and wood element crystal cluster wall thickening appear there.

The trunk needs to transport water and natural magical force components, and so its hardness is somewhat lower than the base, but it is not the weakest point.

The weakest point is the tip of the branch.

Because the branch tips of tree-type magical plants are newly grown, the wood element crystal cluster walls have not fully formed, or are still very thin.

And so only by attacking the branch tip could he have any chance at all.

Of course, all his previous strikes had not been wasted, for even among branch tips there are still differences in hardness.

He needed to find and attack the kind of branch tip that had just newly grown out, which was the only vulnerable point of the entire tree-type magical plant.

And in the instant that the Second Circle Climbing Fern snapped, Locke found it.

It was likely the most recently grown branch tip, where every part was still tender.

A V-shaped incision positioned at the cambium layer was cut by Locke, and the Time Shadow Fern that he had long held ready flew out from his hand.

In the instant when the V-shaped incisions of the Time Shadow Fern and the Stygian iron tree aligned, Locke deployed a Second Circle botanical spell model, Advanced Graft Healing.

Without waiting to see the result, he immediately chose to withdraw from the Stygian Plane, breaking Witch Stephanie's ritual magic and departing the Stygian River Plane.

Because the Stygian giant's palm had already come pressing down.

If he stayed any longer, his Moon of Evolution would be pressed directly into the Stygian River, together with the fallen angel and the Stygian River's waters.

At this moment, the fallen angel appeared to be in a tremendous fury, throwing its head back in a roar and slamming the river's surface with tremendous force. But a single palm strike landed upon it and pressed it directly into the Stygian River.

At the same time, the Crimson Deep Court was dispersed, and the continuously flooding river of faith had its source into the Stygian River destroyed.

The Small Golden Jujube Arrow sank helplessly into the Stygian River and disappeared without a trace.

The Stygian giant looked at the Stygian River that had once again stabilized and smiled.

"Good, that resolves the matter. This section of the Stygian River has returned to calm. There appear to be some small insects on the surface of the Stygian River. There have been far too many small insects on the Stygian River lately, causing frequent incidents."

"I shall submit a proposal to the Sovereign requesting a thorough cleansing of the small insects on our Stygian River."

"You two, wait to be held accountable by those above."

...

In the present world, Locke returned to the ruins of Virdantia University.

At this moment, the black wizards looked at him with expressions filled with dread and awe, horror, and desperate flattery and fawning.

Locke stood before the Ghost Sacred Order's high priestess, clasped his hands behind his back, closed his eyes, and began inspecting his Moon of Evolution.

Fortunately.

Although the Moon of Evolution had made a trip through the Stygian River, it appeared to have suffered no effect whatsoever.

Then, had his final actions been successful?

Locke checked the Moon of Evolution's ecological community.

If it had succeeded, the Time Shadow Fern would have been grafted onto the Stygian iron tree, allowing the Time Shadow Fern to live as part of the iron tree.

That would be equivalent to a portion of that mysterious Stygian iron tree having become part of his ecological community.

Yet even though he had ultimately managed to cut that V-shaped incision, the graft cultivation method was still a fairly delicate and high-difficulty technical undertaking.

Especially so for an unknown magical plant.

And so he did not know whether his final deployment of Advanced Graft Healing had succeeded.

At this moment, Locke closed his eyes and perceived a scene.

He saw the Stygian iron tree returned to its position beneath the Stygian River. And this time, the Stygian River's water level appeared to have risen due to the earlier disturbance, resulting in the tree being completely submerged below the surface.

The Time Shadow Fern was fully immersed in the Stygian River's waters, gradually withering and turning grey.

It was simply unable to survive within the Stygian River's waters.

At the same time, the graft healing site showed severe rejection. Black pus appeared at the interface between the two magical plants.

The mysterious ancient tree had rejected the Time Shadow Fern.

Locke furrowed his brow. So it truly had not worked after all?

In that case, he could only memorize that location and wait until he had become a moon ring wizard, or even a sun ring wizard, before going back to explore further.

Alternatively, he could seek outside assistance. Perhaps he could invite his senior fellow Wizard Trajan and Team Leader Cis to come and help explore, if they had any interest.

When he had left earlier, he had left the Small Golden Jujube Arrow behind not only to absorb the damage from the Stygian giant's magic pressure on his behalf, but also for a second reason.

To mark the Stygian River's location.

He had driven the Small Golden Jujube Arrow into the bed of the Stygian River's course precisely so that one day he might find his way back there.

"Hmm?"

The vision in Locke's mind suddenly shifted slightly.

"Does that mysterious iron tree have some connection to the World Tree?"

For in the vision, the Time Shadow Fern had almost completely withered, even reaching the point where virtual root breakage had begun to occur. But as part of Locke's ecological community, it naturally carried within its core spirituality a thread of Locke's own spirituality.

It was this single thread of spirituality that saved the magical plant.

The spirituality within the mysterious iron tree unexpectedly resonated with this thread of spirituality, and through it established some kind of resonance with Locke himself. In the next instant, the iron tree completely reversed course and accepted the Time Shadow Fern's graft, even actively providing the Time Shadow Fern with nourishment.

In this way, although Locke's graft cultivation method had half-failed, because the mysterious ancient tree had actively assisted, the graft was completed regardless.

The Time Shadow Fern thus took root and grew upon the iron tree's branch, and Locke could observe a portion of it through the Time Shadow Fern.

'My power and will are strictly confined to the section occupied by the Time Shadow Fern.'

Locke reflected, "But whatever the case, the graft has still succeeded. This is the greatest gain of this journey."

"With this foundation, I can begin subsequent research. The Second Circle wizard shoe project has at last found its direction."

Locke thought for a moment, then decided to abandon his plan to return to Corfu Island.

It was a question of trade-offs.

Return home to take a look, or begin the research immediately.

Considering how cutthroat the competition at Golden Crown Mountain was, and that he had already missed this year's special grant, he had no desire to miss next year's as well.

The time he had to gather preliminary experimental data and finish writing the application, calculated generously, was perhaps around half a year at most.

Moreover, he had just now come into contact with such an enormous secret. That Stygian ancient tree was simply far too mysterious.

This left Locke with no room for any other thoughts. At this moment he wanted nothing more than to immediately begin the research, obtain preliminary data, submit the project application, and then use the academy's resources and personnel to conduct an in-depth study of that mysterious tree.

Why had that mysterious iron tree, upon sensing the special connection between himself and the World Tree, suddenly ceased resisting his graft cultivation method?

What was the relationship between that tree and the World Tree?

Had it grown within the Stygian World on its own, or had someone planted it there?

Who had planted it, and for what purpose?

And whether he could, like the Ghost Sacred Order's founding wizard, make use of that mysterious ancient tree and turn it into a public server for his own products.

And then there was that special domain upon the mysterious ancient tree, from which he still lacked the ability to extract anything.

All of these were worth exploring.

At this moment, Locke had made considerable gains.

He looked at the Ghost Sacred Order's high priestess, fixed his gaze on her, and said, "High Priestess, you are a perceptive person. I am giving you two choices: the first is to be killed by me, the second is to surrender voluntarily."

"As long as you agree to let me place a magic upon your soul and come with me, I will not make a move."

At this moment, the Ghost Sacred Order's black wizards, having learned that Locke was a Second Circle wizard, no longer had anyone bold enough to step forward and obstruct him.

Witch Stephanie herself was utterly drained of color.

"Let you place a magic upon my soul."

"Does that not mean my life and death are in your hands entirely? The life and death of the entire Ghost Sacred Order are in my hands, and if my life and death are in your hands, then is not the entire Ghost Sacred Order effectively yours?"

Locke asked her in return, "Is your life and death not already in my hands at this very moment?"

Witch Stephanie's expression was deeply troubled as she rapidly weighed her gains and losses.

She was soon struck with a horrified discovery: after Locke had deliberately allowed himself to be caught by her ritual magic, she found she could no longer connect to the core of the Ghost Sacred Order's magical system, that ghost iron pillar.

All of the Ghost Sacred Order's magic was fundamentally tinged with a trace of ritual magic throughout.

Without that ghost iron pillar, even for a crystallization wizard, more than half of their ghost studies magic had been rendered useless.

Because a crystallization wizard could not possibly deploy ritual magic at every moment, unable to bear the corresponding cost that came with it.

Witch Stephanie screamed.

"Augustine, what have you done? You made one trip into the Stygian River and now every single magic of our Ghost Sacred Order has ceased to function?"

The Ghost Sacred Order's formal wizards found their magic pressure beginning to decline, one after another.

Every formal wizard, except those who had already become crystallization wizards, found their permanent defensive force fields beginning to crumble.

One formal wizard after another died of soul decline as their permanent defensive force fields shattered, each one becoming an echo residue.

The scene was quite spectacular.

Even Hussein could not help turning to look.

Locke stood alone in the midst of more than a hundred of the Ghost Sacred Order's formal wizards, hands clasped behind his back. As those formal wizards perished, the effect was like stars falling from the sky, or like a whale fall.

Quite spectacular.

One whale falls, and ten thousand things are born.

And all of it had been caused by Locke.

Even Hussein was left staring in a daze.

'The Eye Demon Wizard's efficiency at killing people is even higher than mine. He really does not hold back.'

'Terrifying.'

Locke himself had also worked it out.

'That is right. The permanent defensive force field spell models of these Ghost Sacred Order formal wizards all use ghost studies magic.'

'Since they are ghost studies magic, they all depend on that pillar. And now that section of the Stygian River has been disturbed enough by me that the water level has risen enormously, submerging the entire iron tree.'

'These people cannot connect to the iron pillar, which means their permanent defensive force fields will collapse. When their permanent defensive force fields collapse suddenly, of course they will die immediately.'

Locke understood clearly. 'If that is the case, then this was always a weakness inherent to the Ghost Sacred Order's ghost studies magic. Anyone below the First Circle crystalline level will die immediately the moment they lose access to that iron pillar.'

'Wait.'

Locke realized something. 'These people were always meant to be the Pale Pilgrimage's food, were they not? This was deliberately built in as a failsafe. In this way, the formal wizard black wizards who learned the Ghost Sacred Order's magic would have no capacity to resist whatsoever and could have their soul power harvested with ease.'

'Ghost studies has always been fond of using wizards who study ghost studies as material for crafting magical artifacts.'

'These people are the finest crop of leeks imaginable.'

'Only by learning ghost studies can one qualify to be used as raw material for magical artifact crafting.'

Locke then connected this to Hussein's current predicament and suspected that Hussein, as a wizard from the Blood Curse Court lineage, also fell within the harvesting range.

Moreover, having obtained the ancestor wizard's inheritance and becoming a Second Circle wizard as a result, he was still within the harvesting range.

In all likelihood, all of the black wizard inheritances of the southeastern quadrant carried the risk of being harvested by the Pale Pilgrimage.

Looking at it this way, the Pale Pilgrimage was an extremely dangerous black wizard organization.

The only question was what connection they had to the lich-kings.

Having realized that these fallen ghost studies wizards would very likely become prime raw materials for high-quality ghost magical artifacts, Locke did one thing. He took out Pinellia and deployed Lone Tree Cannot Form a Forest.

In an instant, the summer magical power descended, and the entire sky was set ablaze like a fire-scorched cloud.

The echo residues and souls of those fallen ghost studies wizards were all ignited by Locke.

"Since these leeks, once cut, might easily be harvested anyway, it is better to burn them."

Locke smiled.

At the same time he looked toward the only remaining members of the Ghost Sacred Order, High Priestess Stephanie and a single surviving crystallization witch at her side.

High Priestess Stephanie clenched her teeth. Between the failure of the ghost magic and Locke's ruthlessness, she had been terrified entirely out of her wits.

She had still been thinking of pulling some small trick, but now, facing this ferociously brutal, legendarily renowned Eye Demon Wizard, she found herself completely cowed, no longer harboring even the faintest thought of resistance or deception.

High Priestess Stephanie felt that Locke looked more like a black wizard than she did.

How could she have imagined that the young wizard she had caught only a fleeting glimpse of back then would grow to become what he was now, standing before her in this form.

High Priestess Stephanie said, "Very well. I will let you place a magic upon my soul."

"I surrender."

In the next instant, Locke swept Pinellia and ignited the one surviving crystallization witch who had already been half-ruined. That witch was immediately reduced to ash and smoke.

'The Ghost Sacred Order's ghost studies system is really far too easy to sweep away in a single stroke,' Locke reflected with a slight shake of his head.

'This is simply not a magical system designed to cultivate people.'

'I wonder whether the Pale Pilgrimage itself possesses a form of ghost studies.'

Witch Stephanie was so startled that her eyelids twitched violently. She had assumed that Locke intended to take the two remaining wizards of her sect captive.

Who could have guessed that after she surrendered, Locke immediately killed the remaining elder.

In an instant, a chill ran down Witch Stephanie's back. Black wizards all followed the principle of letting fellow travelers die so long as one survived oneself, and so she had no feelings about so many of her colleagues dying.

She did feel some distress at losing all of those wizards who had once belonged to her.

Though since those wizards had already lost their ghost magic before Locke killed them and been rendered useless, she did not feel it too deeply.

But High Priestess Stephanie then thought: what if that elder had been the one to surrender to Locke first?

Would Locke not have instantly killed her?

Ruthless.

Truly ruthless.

Witch Stephanie looked at Locke in terror. She felt that Locke's moods were completely unpredictable and entirely unreadable, and at this point she had lost even the slightest will to resist, not even the shadow of a thought of playing tricks.

Locke came to her side and pressed a finger to her forehead. Because Witch Stephanie had voluntarily opened her soul and dispelled her permanent defensive force field, Locke placed the gametophyte of a Royal Climbing Fern, specifically its heart-shaped frond, into her soul. That heart-shaped frond parasitized itself upon her magic pressure, drawing on her magic pressure as nourishment to sustain the gametophyte form of the Royal Climbing Fern.

This was in fact one application of the Alternation of Generations.

Once a magical plant had transformed into its gametophyte form, it could parasitize itself upon another person's magic pressure, treating a wizard's magic pressure as soil.

From this point on, whenever Locke wished, he could instantly deploy the Alternation of Generations to transform it into a sporophyte, bypassing the permanent defensive force field to strike at this witch's main body directly.

In this way, Witch Stephanie was effectively under his control.

Locke nodded with satisfaction. All that remained now was to honor his agreement with Hussein, destroy the Blood Curse Court, and in doing so he would gain a Second Circle wizard to assist with his plane exploration.

At this moment, a Second Circle wizard appeared at his side.

The wizard's voice was cold and carried a considerable degree of fury. "Sir, killing this many subordinate wizards of my Pale Pilgrimage is one thing. They are only a crop of leeks after all. Cut them down and they will grow back."

"But why burn even these leeks to ash, leaving us without a single leek to harvest?"

"The Eye Demon Wizard is being rather too overbearing in his methods, is he not?"

"You are not one of our black wizards. Why wade into our affairs? This woman carries some of the Pale Pilgrimage's secrets. You cannot take her away."

At this moment, Locke sensed two Second Circle magic pressures appear at his and Hussein's sides.

And rather than alarm, Hussein's expression showed delight.

Because the fish had finally taken the bait.

Locke looked toward Hussein.

"So this was your true purpose all along?"

The life and death of those First Circle wizards had been entirely beside the point. For Hussein, the real impact was minimal. What he had truly been trying to do was fish.

Hussein burst into loud laughter.

"The one who truly understands me is you, Locke!"