Chapter 187, Thunder Dragon God Projections (2)
The first projection reached Lin Yi before he had completed the draw. He activated Void Walk, the partial spatial phasing reducing the physical component to nothing and the lightning energy component to twenty percent of its output. The twenty percent hit Celestial Armor at the new Constitution-enhanced values.
He came out of Void Walk with Dragon Sovereign active and deployed Celestial Sword Qi in concentration mode at the first projection, the Abyssal grade’s enhanced output at Strength 7,124 behind it.
The projection absorbed the strike. Not fully. The Abyssal attack at his current attributes reached through the projection’s energy structure and produced a partial disruption, the projection’s form flickering briefly before restabilizing.
He noted the flicker. Not defeated by a single full-output strike, but damaged. The projections were not invulnerable.
The second projection attacked from his left while the first restabilized. He activated Barrier of Heaven, the defensive barrier absorbing the incoming force up to its threshold and shattering, the absorbed force releasing outward and pushing the second projection back by the shatter’s momentum.
The third projection came from above.
He activated Phantom Void Step and repositioned. The third projection’s strike hit the space he had vacated. He appeared at the first projection’s flank and drove a Resonant Strike into the disrupted area his Celestial Sword Qi had produced, the secondary burst detonating from within the flickering structure.
The first projection shattered.
One down.
The EXP notification appeared.
---
[Thunder Dragon God Projection Defeated — Cang Yutian’s entity]
[EXP Gained: +380,000]
[Reward Amplification Triggered — ×10,000]
[New EXP Gained: +3,800,000,000]
---
No redirection. The EXP went to his own experience for the first time since the binding activated.
He did not have time to process the number. The second projection had recovered from the Barrier of Heaven’s shatter momentum and was already closing. The third projection had repositioned from the above angle to a lateral approach, the two remaining entities coordinating.
He activated Absolute Domain and released Heaven’s Judgment within it, the celestial energy column descending from above at the second projection’s position. The domain’s triple amplification applied to the column’s attack. The second projection took the column directly.
It flickered significantly. Not shattered. Flickering, the structure partially disrupted in the way the first had been before the Resonant Strike follow-up finished it.
The third projection hit him during the Heaven’s Judgment activation’s channeling period, the two-second charge window having been the gap the coordinated approach was designed to exploit. The impact landed against Iron Body Fortification and Unbreakable’s twenty-percent cap simultaneously. The Guardian’s Undying Core’s enhanced HP pool absorbed what reached through both passives.
He staggered. One step backward, the force requiring that much acknowledgment.
He activated Final Cut.
The five-second charge assembled every available offensive output simultaneously. Physical, energy, spatial, celestial, all of it compressed through the Abyssal blade. The second projection was still flickering and disrupted from the Heaven’s Judgment strike. He aimed the Final Cut at the disrupted structure rather than the center of the form.
The release fired.
The second projection shattered.
---
[Thunder Dragon God Projection Defeated]
[EXP Gained: +380,000]
[Amplification: ×10,000]
[New EXP: +3,800,000,000]
---
The third projection was the problem.
It had not taken any direct high-output strike yet. The first two had absorbed the Celestial Sword Qi disruption and the Resonant Strike follow-up, and the Heaven’s Judgment plus Final Cut combination respectively. His highest-yield techniques were either on cooldown or about to be. The third projection was at full integrity and it knew, in whatever operational intelligence Cang Yutian’s command provided to it, that the other two had fallen to combination sequences rather than single exchanges.
It did not close to engagement range.
It circled at the outer edge of his movement technique’s effective range, staying mobile, forcing him to either close the distance or wait for it to decide the terms of the engagement.
He activated Attribute Surge and Dragon Sovereign simultaneously, the combined multiplier windows running in parallel. Into both windows he activated Thousand Mile Reach, the extended-range blade technique that treated the air between him and the target as the blade’s physical extension.
He drove the Abyssal Celestial Lord Blade forward at full Attribute Surge and Dragon Sovereign enhanced output through Thousand Mile Reach’s extended range.
The technique reached the third projection.
The projection’s energy structure received the extended strike at Abyssal grade output behind Strength enhanced by both temporary multipliers simultaneously.
It flickered.
But it did not shatter.
It responded. The lightning energy between its scales surged into a concentrated discharge directed at his position, the projection’s own output not consumed by the exchange but redirected into an offensive burst.
The burst was fast. He activated Mirror Stance, the reflection window open for one second. The reflected burst went back at the projection, but the projection’s directive had already repositioned it outside the reflected angle.
The burst hit him instead of the projection.
The impact was the largest single hit he had absorbed in the engagement. Celestial Armor, Iron Body Fortification, Eternal Guard, Unbreakable’s twenty-percent cap, all of them activated in sequence. The Guardian’s Undying Core’s enhanced HP pool provided the reserve that the multiple passive absorption draws had been depleting.
He held.
But the HP picture was unfavorable.
He looked at the third projection. At his skill cooldown states. At the event time remaining. At the HP reserve.
The Third projection moved toward him.
He activated Boundless Step with the Void Step Compression Stone’s sixty percent range enhancement applied, the twelve-second chain window extended from the five-second base, and ran.
Not as a concession. As a repositioning.
He needed distance and he needed the cooldowns to clear and he needed a terrain advantage that the open atmospheric layer did not provide. The cluster zones below offered island surfaces, formation cover, approach angles that could be managed rather than open atmospheric engagement where the projection’s aerial mobility was unrestricted.
He descended into the mid-atmospheric layer at the full speed that Boundless Step’s layered technique combination produced. The third projection followed. It was fast. The extended Boundless Step chain covered ground that the projection’s speed could match but not exceed, the gap maintained rather than closed.
He kept running.
Behind him, the single remaining Thunder Dragon God projection followed through the atmospheric layers of the Allheaven Expanse, the lightning energy of its form trailing discharge arcs through the astral rivers it passed, its operational intent unchanged by the loss of the other two.
Cang Yutian broke the deal, he thought, between Heaven Steps. The mark was released. My life was supposed to be spared. He released the mark and then sent three projections to end me anyway.
He kept moving.
One projection remaining. One day left in the event.
He activated the next Heaven Step in the chain.