Chapter 419: The Apocalypse Dragon

Chapter 419: The Apocalypse Dragon

In front of the spaceship loomed a gargantuan gas planet, similar to Jupiter in our solar system. Bands of gray, white, orange, and brown divided the planet's surface into dozens of layers, and it boasted over a hundred natural satellites.

"Breathtaking..."

The walls of the cabin displayed the view from space, and Ji Xinghuo couldn't help but be awestruck as he stared, transfixed.

At the same time, he secretly checked his own situation.

As expected, his Myriad Phenomenon Star Pupils and Ultimate Dark Force Field functioned normally within the Heart's Illusion Realm, just as they did in reality.

Ji Xinghuo's pupils flickered as he perceived the truth, clearly sensing that his physical body was still on the spaceship in Titanium Ring City. Everything he was experiencing was a projection within the Heart's Illusory Realm, and he could exit at any time.

"The virtual technology of the True Dragon Dynasty is far more advanced than Earth's. They're not even on the same level."

"If one didn't know beforehand, ordinary people would never guess that this world is an illusion."

Ji Xinghuo couldn't help but marvel.

The spaceship navigated through space and soon approached a natural satellite of the gas giant. This was where the Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony would take place.

Data about the planet popped up in his field of vision.

"So it's a planet that truly exists in the Milky Way, replicated one-to-one within the Heart's Illusion Realm."

Ji Xinghuo compared "Dragon Guard Seven" to Earth's moon. With a diameter of 3,560 kilometers, it was slightly larger than the moon, and had a surface area of about 40 million square kilometers. However, its gravity was more than three times that of the moon, approaching half of the Star Realm's gravity.

Dragon Guard Seven boasted a rich natural ecosystem, a pleasant climate, and breathtaking scenery.

In reality, it was the garden of the Titanium Cobalt Dragon King.

It was said that the Titanium Cobalt Dragon King spent most of his time on Dragon Guard Seven. He had raised countless rare and exotic beasts and cultivated a plethora of beautiful plants on this planet. Anyone who had been there had nothing but praise for it.

Of course, the Dragon Guard Seven in the Heart's Illusion Realm was quite different from its real-world counterpart. Only the geographic environment was similar, and while there were plants in its ecosystem, there were no animals.

Moments later,

The spaceship entered the orbit of Dragon Guard Seven, gradually descending toward the surface.

Ji Xinghuo spotted four other spaceships, appearing as tiny dots in the vastness of space. They only became visible once they entered the atmosphere.

"Prepare for landing."

A command rang out on the spaceship, signaling that they were cleared for airborne landing on Dragon Guard Seven.

The spaceship was still over a hundred kilometers above the surface, having just entered the atmosphere. Those with insufficient strength wouldn't be able to survive outside. However, there were bold and skilled legends who dared to jump out from the airborne deck, seeking to claim advantageous landing spots.

The five spaceships would orbit Dragon Guard Seven, each following a different route. They gradually lowered their altitude and finally descended to the surface, landing in different locations.

However, very few people waited until the very end to disembark.

Most participants had already made their plans and chosen their landing spots beforehand.

Ji Xinghuo waited in his cabin. At first, only a handful of people left the spaceship early to secure their spots. As the spaceship descended further, more and more people departed, scattering in all directions.

This scene resembled a meteor shower streaking across the sky.

Ji Xinghuo gazed out the porthole, silently taking note of the areas where the airborne landings were more densely concentrated.

When about half of the people on the spaceship had left, he made his way to the airborne deck of this level. It was bustling with legends.

Everyone eyed each other warily.

Jumping out of the spaceship meant the official start, and attacks were permitted during the airborne landing process.

People who landed during the same time period wouldn't be too far apart, and they would become enemies upon landing.

Ji Xinghuo's arrival went unnoticed.

As he made his way toward the jumping-off point, he casually scanned the hundreds of people on the deck, quickly identifying several legends with the most intense energy fluctuations, as well as their physical appearances. Once he reached the edge, he leaped out.

As he passed through the spaceship's protective force field, the temperature plummeted, and silence enveloped him.

Ji Xinghuo extended a flux barrier outside his body, head downward, feet up, resembling a meteor rapidly falling toward the ground.

His speed increased dramatically.

The air density also rose, creating howling winds. The friction between the air and the flux barrier generated heat and a faint glow.

Suddenly, Ji Xinghuo's brow furrowed.

His electromagnetic senses detected someone pursuing him from above, rapidly closing the distance. Without turning back, he already knew it was a female cultivator with a pair of wide, icy wings resembling snow and a longbow in hand.

She wasn't alone.

Ji Xinghuo turned his head to the left and right. At these two directions, about three kilometers away, were two other people, also Golden Core practitioners.

The three of them had formed an encirclement around him.

Teamwork was not allowed during the Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony, but the rules were quite loose.

As long as the distance between two people was not less than one dragon distance, or 709 meters, it wouldn't be considered teaming up.

Of course, teammates could also backstab each other.

Most truly powerful cultivators scorned such underhanded tactics, but those who sought high rankings would not hesitate.

These three Golden Core cultivators were of the latter sort.

"If I don't provoke you, you actually take the initiative to target me instead." Ji Xinghuo smiled faintly to himself.

He once again increased his descent speed, the ground rushing towards him like a towering wall.

The female cultivator above also followed closely.

The two other enemies drew closer as well, clearly preparing to make their move.

At this moment, Ji Xinghuo suddenly changed direction and dove into a large patch of white clouds, obscuring the vision of the three pursuers. The female cultivator was very cautious and did not dare to pursue him into the cloud layer. Instead, she flapped her wings to change direction, trying to continue locking onto her target.

However, when she flew below the cloud layer, she lost sight of Ji Xinghuo and glanced at her two teammates with questioning eyes.

The two teammates shook their heads slightly from a distance.

The female cultivator was puzzled. The barbarian's descent speed had been so fast, and the cloud layer was not thick. How did he manage to stop within such a short distance? Could he have turned invisible?

"Be careful!"

One of the cultivators suddenly shouted.

An arc of electricity, like an arrow, shot out from the clouds. It was more than twice the speed of sound on Dragon Guard Seven, and the female cultivator, being an archer herself, sensed the danger without her teammate's reminder. She flapped her wings and accelerated, changing direction to dodge downward.

"To think of shooting me from so far away, how audacious!" The female cultivator's profession was Ice Frost Archer, and her specialty was archery.

Before she could finish her thought, the electric arc arrow had already reached her in an instant, its speed unimaginable.

What shocked her even more was that this arrow could turn corners.

Zap!

The electric arc arrow, like a guided missile, precisely hit the female cultivator's glabella. A thick layer of ice armor manifested, but it couldn't stop the arrow at all. It instantly penetrated the ice armor and blew her head up.

Just before she was killed, two more electric arc arrows shot out from the cloud layer, aiming at the other two cultivators.

The one who had shouted a warning had an arrow pierce through his mouth, exploding inside.

The last cultivator reacted the fastest and desperately fell downward.

The electric arc arrow changed direction midway and hit the top of his head. Although he was wearing a Super Nova III helmet and had skull bones as hard as iron, his head was still pierced by the arrow. The high-voltage current exploded in his brain, and he instantly lost consciousness.

The three cultivators died almost simultaneously.

Their bodies turned into ash-like specks of light and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

[Spiritual Source Energy +25]



[Spiritual Source Energy +21]



[Spiritual Source Energy +27]



Within the cloud layer, Ji Xinghuo saw the prompts from the Myriad Phenomenon Star Pupils and was stunned.

"Why is there spiritual source energy?" he wondered.

The Heart's Illusion Realm was just a virtual world, and what entered it was a mental projection. Even if one was killed, it would only force them to exit.

In the spiritual realm on Earth, death wouldn't be a problem. Only if one died too many times would there be some after-effects, as well as an overly realistic death experience, which might leave psychological scars.

"Is the Heart's Illusion Realm different?"

Ji Xinghuo recalled what Cheng Sheng had said—that death in the Heart's Illusion Realm would cause headaches for a period of time. Could this be the reason?

The Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony was a ceremony to sacrifice to the Doomsday Dragon and involved faith and believers.

Previously, Ji Xinghuo had discovered that when he killed the followers of a Star God, he gained more spiritual source energy than when he killed non-believers or ordinary monsters. For example, the highlanders on the Bloody Highland were all followers of the Red Emperor.

Those who died in the Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony would naturally lose some spiritual energy.

This was originally an offering to the Doomsday Dragon.

Now, it had been intercepted by Ji Xinghuo.

At this thought, Ji Xinghuo's heart skipped a beat as he suddenly realized he had been too careless. The Myriad Phenomenon Star Pupils actually had something to do with the faith of the Star Gods!

This so-called spiritual source energy was very likely the energy that the Star Gods needed, the source of their power!

"What if I'm discovered by a Star God..."

Ji Xinghuo dared not think further.

He involuntarily looked around. Titanium Ring City had just held the Ancestral Dragon Ceremony, attracting the attention of the Doomsday Dragon. At this time, if he was found to be intercepting its offerings in the Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony, would he be found out?

"I need to be more careful in the future," Ji Xinghuo muttered to himself. "I must not absorb any spiritual source energy that I'm not supposed to."

Soon, he faced a dilemma.

The absorption of spiritual source energy by the Myriad Phenomenon Star Pupils was uncontrollable, and he couldn't turn it off by himself.

"There are so many followers of the Star Gods, spread throughout the Star Realm and the Milky Way. Just in this Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony, there are over 160,000 people. If I absorb a small portion of it, it would be like a drop in the bucket for the Doomsday Dragon, and it shouldn't notice anything amiss.

During his flight, he lightly tapped the terminal on his left wrist, accessing the equipment that everyone automatically possessed within the Heart's Illusion Realm. He could view the satellite map of Dragon Guard Seven, the kill rankings, and his own information at any time.

In addition to the final survival ranking, the Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony also had a kill leaderboard, and there were rewards based on the final kill rankings.

Many participants valued the kill leaderboard even more, believing that it was a better demonstration of one's strength.

This was especially true for the Dragon Lords.

They had already obtained true dragons, so they weren't interested in the top ten rankings. Their sole focus was to climb higher on the kill leaderboard.

Ji Xinghuo had 3 kills, placing him in the 200s.

At the top of the kill leaderboard was a familiar name, Tai Cob Zhenhe, with 24 kills.

Following closely behind him were several Dragon Lords.

The Dragon Lords had a significant advantage during the descent, as they excelled in aerial combat. They began their hunt as soon as they left the spaceship.

Ji Xinghuo chose a landing spot in the Northern Hemisphere, over a hundred kilometers away from the equator. Below him lay a vast primeval forest with sprawling mountain ranges, but not very tall, with altitudes of only a few hundred meters. The geographical environment was relatively complex.

The more intricate the area, the more it favored those with electromagnetic sensing and darkness-piercing abilities.

When he was a kilometer above the ground, Ji Xinghuo finally slowed down.

Then, he gently landed on top of a tall tree, looking up at the sky. The spaceship loomed larger in his field of view, and people kept jumping out one after another.

However, when they landed on the surface, everyone spread out and maintained their distance from each other.

Ji Xinghuo extended his electromagnetic sensing to a radius of a hundred kilometers.

"1, 2, 3..."

Ji Xinghuo discovered that within a hundred kilometers of his location, there were over 2,000 people. Like him, they had chosen this primeval forest, most likely due to their exceptional perception or powerful stealth capabilities.

Before entering the Heart's Illusion Realm, his original plan had been to focus on stability and not to aim for too many kills.

His strategy was to gradually move towards safer areas until he was the last one standing.

Even with the knowledge of spiritual source energy, Ji Xinghuo didn't dare to absorb it recklessly. This was like stealing food from under the Star Gods' noses, too dangerous. Even if he killed a thousand opponents, he would only gain a little over 20,000 points of spiritual source energy, which wasn't worth the risk.

"Stick to the plan," Ji Xinghuo muttered to himself.

He activated his invisibility and quietly waited on the tree.

Moments later.

The terminal notified him that everyone had left the spaceship, and Dragon Guard Seven began its destruction.

"Roar..."

A terrifying roar reverberated across the globe.

Ji Xinghuo's heart trembled as he looked towards the direction of the roar. In the distance, he could make out a dragon shadow that blotted out the sky. Even from hundreds of kilometers away, the immense dragon exuded an aura that struck fear into his heart.

"Luexing-level true dragon!"

Luexing-level was equivalent to a Seventh-Ranked Extraordinary, a Dragon King, or a Star Shepherd Saint.

At this level, monsters, spiritual beasts, and true dragons were further categorized into three grades: extinction, apocalypse, and star-destroying.

Extinction referred to the ability to wipe out a race on a planet; apocalypse meant destroying the planet's surface and erasing traces of civilization; while star-destroying entailed the complete annihilation of the entire planet, leaving nothing behind.

The Apocalypse Dragon Ceremony involved the use of a virtual "Apocalypse"-grade true dragon to devastate the surface of Dragon Guard Seven.

This true dragon would start at a random point and circle the planet, relentlessly destroying the surface. The safe areas would gradually shrink, and if there was more than one survivor when the surface was completely obliterated, they would all perish together, resulting in no ultimate victor.

The areas ravaged by the Apocalypse-grade true dragon would be uninhabitable.

In reality, no one could even get close to an Apocalypse-grade true dragon. Its breath alone was something that even a Star Shepherd Saint would hesitate to withstand, and it would instantly kill any legend that came into contact with it.

Several minutes later.

A terrifying dragon shadow loomed in the high skies, growing larger by the second. Against the backdrop of the massive gas giant, it was like the harbinger of death.

Ji Xinghuo drew in a sharp breath.

"Black Flame Dragon!"

It belonged to the Flame Dragon species, its entire body covered in jet-black scales. Molten lava-like flames spewed from the gaps between its massive scales, and its wingspan exceeded a kilometer. A pair of hundred-meter-long dragon horns swept back to form a coronet, and its crimson dragon eyes and terrifying maw spewed a pitch-black flame that stretched for several kilometers, incinerating everything in its path and leaving behind a scorched zone several dozen kilometers wide.

From a distance, the Black Flame Dragon seemed slow, but in truth, its flying speed exceeded the speed of sound!

Those who couldn't dodge in time were engulfed by its fiery breath, instantly turning into ashes.

And it was heading straight for Ji Xinghuo's location.

"What bad luck," Ji Xinghuo muttered, shaking his head. Taking advantage of the Black Flame Dragon still being dozens of kilometers away, he quickly took off to avoid its path of destruction.

(End of Chapter)

Chapter end