Bearing the blue sky

Chapter 323 Battle of Wits

washing?

Intelligence?

unimportant.

Even if he personally created this river demon, he would not show any mercy.

At this moment, Zhu Ge was simply hiding with the [Stealth] trait, waiting for the right opportunity to take over the two in front of him.

"this----"

The sorcerer's movement to withdraw his hand was very subtle, but Zhu Ge caught the slight tremor.

That's a sign of excessive energy expenditure.

A newly awakened demon facing a river demon that has accumulated water power for ten thousand years is like a newly drawn sword cutting through a surging river.

A knife can cut through a stream of water, but the water will immediately recede.

"Hahaha, weak!" The river demon had clearly noticed this as well.

He stood in the center of the surging curtain of water, his dark blue body gleaming with a damp, cold sheen in the moonlight, his voice carrying the deep, rumbling sound of a river during the rainy season.

"Your power is waning! Haha!"

The river demon's voice wasn't loud, but it made the soldiers on the city wall behind the Grand Sorcerer turn pale.

The barbarian soldiers who had been holding bows and arrows had now laid down their weapons, as if awaiting some predetermined fate.

The sorcerer did not deny it.

He looked down at his palm, where the dark green light lingering was slowly dissipating, like water evaporating in the sunlight.

"yes."

He suddenly laughed, his voice no longer as sharp as before, but with a calmness that came from seeing through the ending: "But the speed at which I fade away is slower than you think."

6

Before he finished speaking, the dark green light in his palm suddenly exploded.

It is not expanding outward, but rather collapsing inward.

The ball of light seemed to be squeezed tightly by an invisible hand, rapidly shrinking into a black dot no bigger than a fingernail.

The space around the black dot began to distort, as if some of the air had been drawn away, forming a hazy halo, like the surface of water that had been disturbed.

The river demon's laughter sound effect got stuck in his throat.

He sensed something.

The black dot was emanating an extremely dangerous aura, like a seed compressed to its limit, about to release energy far exceeding its size in the next moment.

"Are you insane?" For the first time, a flicker of emotion appeared in the River Demon's voice: "You will destroy yourself along with it."

"No." The great sorcerer shook his head: "I just concentrated all my power into one point. You can withstand scattered attacks, but you can't withstand this one."

He pushed the black dot forward.

The movement was very light, like releasing a butterfly. The palm was slightly tilted, allowing the black dot to slide along the invisible slope towards the river demon.

The black dot moved very slowly, slower than the night breeze, like a feather slowly drifting down.

However, its trajectory caused the river to automatically part and create a channel, as if the river was actively avoiding its path.

"Not good!" The river demon's pupils shrank sharply.

He did not retreat, because he had no way out.

His true form is right below!

"Water wall!"

He suddenly raised his arms, and the water on the river surged into the sky, forming a thicker wall of water than before, blocking the river demon from the black dot.

The water wall was several meters thick, its surface shimmering with a deep blue luster; it was a barrier formed by him mobilizing all the water power of the entire river.

The river demon's arms trembled slightly, and the water-like patterns on his forehead became clearer, as if he were pressing the weight of the entire river onto his shoulders to maintain the water wall.

The black dot touched the water wall.

There was no sound, no explosion, no expected violent energy release. The black dot, like a drop of ink falling into water, silently merged into the interior of the water wall.

But the next moment, cracks began to appear on the surface of the water wall.

The cracks spread along the paths the black dots had penetrated, expanding outwards at a visible speed, as if being torn apart from the inside by an unseen force.

The river demon let out a deep roar, veins bulging on his arms, and the water on the surface of the film accelerated, as if desperately trying to fill the spreading cracks.

But the cracks spread faster and faster, soon exceeding the area he could fill.

The water wall began to crumble from the inside out. First, the surface luster dimmed, and then the cracks gradually expanded to a visible extent.

In the end, the entire wall of water appeared to be sliced ​​open by a sharp blade, splitting in two from the middle.

The river water poured out from the crack, splashing onto the riverbed and making a rushing sound.

The river demon's body trembled suddenly, and fine cracks appeared on his body, like the ice cracks on the surface of porcelain. Although small, they were particularly noticeable.

He looked down at the slowly spreading cracks on his body, his voice hoarse with disbelief: "You—"

"My attack—" The great sorcerer shook his head: "wasn't a waste to use it on you."

The river demon stopped speaking, because as he spoke, the cracks on his body were spreading rapidly, extending from his arms to his torso, and from his torso to his neck.

He looked down at his shattering body, as if confirming a fact he didn't want to accept.

Then he raised his head, his gaze passing over the city wall and landing on the distant horizon.

There, a wider river flows ceaselessly in the darkness before dawn, seemingly intertwined with his fate, yet completely unaffected by his passing.

The river demon's body shattered, turning into countless tiny water droplets that fell into the river.

The water on the river surface paused for a moment, then resumed flowing.

The great sorcerer stood there, his face as pale as paper. The dark green light in his palm had completely dissipated, leaving only a few tiny specks of light floating slowly in the air before extinguishing one by one.

He is losing control of his body.

His knees were slightly bent, as if bearing some unseen weight, and his shoulders trembled slightly before quickly regaining their balance.

His eyelids drooped, and his breathing became rapid and shallow.

He raised his head and looked down at the city wall.

Zhu Ge retracted her bone wings and emerged from her hiding place.

"boom!!"

Without a word, the two resumed their fierce battle.

However, during the fierce battle, the patterns on the great sorcerer's body suddenly began to flow.

The tattoos formed black arms.

These arms seemed to be reaching for something in the void.

The next moment, countless barbarians from Dahe City who were fighting against Zhuge's army suddenly let out screams of agony.

"Oh no! The master sorcerer is casting a spell!"

"Run! Run!"

"There's no escaping it! We're all his sacrifices!"

"Ouch!! It hurts so much!!"

As these barbarians screamed in agony, their heads and spines were inexplicably ripped from their bodies.

Heads floated into the air like balloons, and bloody vertebrae swayed in the wind, dripping with blood.

All of these heads and vertebrae flew towards the Great Sorcerer.

"I am invincible!"

The great sorcerer let out a hoarse roar.

Then, a powerful soul force rushed towards Zhu Ge.

When that soul power rushed in, Zhu Ge did not dodge.

He stood on the pebble beach by the riverbank, his bony wings slightly open, the wingtips drooping at his sides like two fan ribs slowly unfolding.

That soul power carried a thick, blood-soaked aura, like a dark, sinking body of water, covering the area where he stood.

His consciousness wavered for a moment as the impact arrived, like a pebble thrown into water, briefly losing some of its outline.

But soon, he felt the literary energy within his body surge up like deep water being stirred up, seeping out from the gaps between his bones and joints, forming an almost invisible film of light on his skin.

The light membrane emitted a slight hissing sound when it came into contact with the dark aura, like a drop of cold water falling on a hot iron plate, producing a wisp of extremely thin white smoke.

The Grand Sorcerer hovered in mid-air, surrounded by heads and spines that were slowly rotating. Each head faced a different direction, and the empty eye sockets glowed with a faint green light, like lamps that had been relit.

The vertebrae resembled snakes stripped of their flesh and blood, slithering around him with their tips slightly upturned, pointing downwards at the retreating barbarian soldiers.

"Your will is indeed strong." The great sorcerer's voice came from above, echoing as if rising from the bottom of a deep well: "But you cannot stop my sorcery. My power is that of the entire city."

He was telling the truth.

Zhu Ge could sense that the city was transmitting power to the Grand Master of Sorcery through some secret passage.

The flesh, blood, faith, and fear of those barbarian soldiers were being transformed by that dark green light into some kind of energy that the Grand Sorcerer could absorb.

Instead of trying to sever that connection, he did something that seemed like accepting the status quo.

He retracted the bone wings, letting them lie completely flat against his back.

Then he bent down, picked up a dry twig smoothed by the water from among the pebbles at his feet, and drew a shallow line on the damp sand in front of him.

The line didn't seem to be some kind of sophisticated magic; it looked simple and casual, like a mark a child had casually dragged in the mud with a twig, without any complicated patterns or structure.

He placed the withered branch across the starting point of the line, then stood up, his gaze sweeping across the line to the great sorcerer suspended in mid-air: "Your power comes from that city, from those who are still breathing. And my power?"

"From heaven and earth!"

As the founder of the Yi Dao, it would not be difficult for Zhu Ge to deal with people who draw their power from the entire city.

Formation!

The essence of formations is to gather and utilize the power of heaven and earth.

Not to mention that Zhu Ge is also proficient in thunder magic.

However, combining formations with the I Ching and the Eight Trigrams is indeed more suitable for the current situation.

After all, his clone is a bone monster, which can use the Dao and power of his original body, such as blood energy and literary energy.

However, for the original body, the most suitable thing is still the power of witchcraft, and the power of heaven and earth that can be activated by witchcraft.

It should be understood that among demons, ghosts, spirits, and gods, demons possess demonic energy, ghosts are associated with yin energy, and gods possess the power of faith.

Divine power.

There are only spirits and monsters, no terms like "spirit power" or "superhuman strength" are used; they are all uniformly called "spiritual power."

Spiritual power is most compatible with witch power and immortal power.

At this moment, it is most appropriate to use magical power.

"Qian, Kun, Kan, Li; Xun, Zhen, Gen, Dui."

Zhu Ge gave a soft shout, and an enormous array appeared beneath his feet.

The formation spread out from him, vast and boundless.

The powerful blood energy and literary energy, through the "Return to Origin" understanding comprehended by Zhu Ge, were all transformed into witch power and inputted into the great formation beneath their feet.

The great array beneath their feet lit up the instant the witch power was injected.

It wasn't the kind of dazzling, ostentatious light, but rather the moist sheen of moss soaked by rain in the morning light, flowing slowly along the contours of the patterns.

It spreads outward from the center, layer by layer, like a scroll being unrolled.

The array pattern starts from the tip of Zhuge's bone wing and extends outwards with eight main veins, each corresponding to a trigram: Qian, Kun, Kan, Li, Xun, Zhen, Gen, and Dui.

They intertwine to form a huge pattern covering the entire riverbank, with edges extending all the way to the base of the city wall. Even when they reach the seeping brick seams, they do not stop, but climb up the wall for a distance before disappearing beneath the moss-covered brick surface.

"This formation—" The great sorcerer's gaze fell on the expanding array pattern.

His body remained stable in mid-air, and the rotation of those heads and spines slowed down, as if reassessing the coverage and extension of the array patterns.

Zhu Ge did not stop what she was doing.

The tips of the bone wings hung down at the edge of the array pattern. When the sorcerer's power was injected into the array pattern along the outline of the wing bones, a very faint blue light appeared on the surface of the array pattern.

The bluish-gray bricks and stones on the surface of the city wall also changed as the array patterns passed by.

The moisture seeping from between the bricks became more concentrated than before, moving slowly along the direction of the patterns, like tributaries being redirected.

Those tributaries crossed the surface of the city wall, extended along the direction of the street, flowed through the ditches under the eaves, passed the steps in front of several houses, and finally converged in the city square, forming a pattern made of water vapor that covered the entire city.

"Your formation isn't meant to trap me," the Grand Sorcerer's voice held a certain understanding after confirmation, "but rather to guide the city's course once again."

"You're trapped now," Zhu Ge said.

As soon as he finished speaking, the array patterns beneath his feet suddenly lit up for a moment.

A very subtle vibration emanated from the center of the array pattern and spread outwards, as if something was changing within the area covered by the array pattern.

The heads and spines that had been removed by the black magic paused for a moment.

The spine that was originally rotating around the great sorcerer is now twisting in a different direction than before.

The tip no longer pointed towards the barbarian soldiers below, but towards the eight nodes of the array pattern, dispersing in a way that was being redistributed.

"No! You are cutting off my connection to this city!!" The Grand Sorcerer's voice was no longer calm.

However, the flow of the dark green light around him had changed noticeably, dispersing in a way that was being redistributed.

The magical power was flowing continuously along the main vein of the array, like eight unseen tributaries extending in different directions simultaneously.

It seeped slowly through the streets, over the rooftops, and along the gaps between the walls and the ground, covering every corner of the entire city.

The eight main veins of the array pattern are continuing to extend, and the angles between them are slowly adjusting.

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