Chapter 1253 - 1001: Little Zi Who Followed Later

Elma stood dumbstruck on that planet for quite some time. His mind was a jumbled mess, and he didn’t know whether to cry or laugh. He had never imagined that the once exalted Ancient Mage Tower would come to look like this.

Returning to the escape pod, following the prearranged procedure, the escape pod immediately teleported back to the Ancient Mage Tower. From afar Elma saw the top portion of the Ancient Mage Tower accelerating away, with glimmers from a mana explosion flickering continually. That must have been Solis’s doing; perhaps Long Yi was also inside, fighting? But now, Elma was in no mood to care about such matters. The escape pod docked, Elma disembarked, only to see Zulal running over in a flood of tears.

"Master Elma, I am at fault! It’s all my fault!" Zulal cried out.

Elma thought for a moment, shook his head, and said, "No, Master Zulal, nothing has happened. Whatever war may have taken place elsewhere, it’s now of no concern to us. The Ancient Mage Tower is the Ancient Mage Tower, and we shall continue to drift in the cosmos, never to appear again!"

Zulal’s eyes immediately lit up, "Yes, Master Elma! I understand!"

Solis’s difficulty level was a surprise to Long Yi. He had originally thought he could handle him easily, but after several exchanges, Long Yi found that this bastard had actually concealed his real strength!

Yet Long Yi was only stunned for a moment before he regained his composure. After all, a God Chaser was a God Chaser, a parasite of the gods that managed to give even the two great Empresses of the demon realm an extreme headache; naturally, his strength was not to be underestimated.

Solis fought using False Divine Power, a counterfeit divine force far more powerful than mana and faster in spell casting. Long Yi had to use stronger mana to contend with this kind of False Divine Power. Of course, if he could use Divine Power, the effect would be better, but Long Yi’s Divine Status was extremely weak at the moment, and the Divine Power he could generate was even more limited.

However, Solis didn’t want to truly have a showdown with Long Yi; he preferred to have the entire top layer of the Ancient Mage Tower enter teleportation at once.

It seems everything he saw in the illusion was real. To make it feel more genuine, Solis had even used real memories to deceive himself. The embryo hidden on a certain planet probably hadn’t turned into a Giant Monster yet, even though for some unknown reason, among the God Chasers, Solis should be considered quite strong. Long Yi had encountered quite a few God Chasers, and not a single one was as troublesome as Solis.

It seems this Worm had not only concealed his strength, but a significant portion of it.

But no matter how much strength he had hidden, Long Yi was not worried, just as long as he didn’t turn into that Giant Monster. Truthfully, even now, Long Yi had no good way of dealing with that Giant Monster. Although Long Yi wasn’t afraid of a direct confrontation, he always felt that if that bastard wanted to escape, there wasn’t much he could do.

Little Zi had arrived at a desolate planet. Forests, grasslands, but no signs of any human activity could be seen. Moreover, the lushness of these forests and vegetation felt somewhat abnormal.

But where was Long Yi?

According to what Elma had said, Solis had come to this star sector many times, and of this region, this planet had the highest probability. Little Zi released thirteen Avatars to survey the entire planet, and indeed, they discovered a high tower. At the top of the tower was a gem, shimmering with red light. And looking closely, the red light came from a tangled mass of numerous God Chaser fragments!

Little Zi and Long Yi had always thought that if these fragments of the Divine Worm came into contact with one another, they would completely merge, but it appeared that was not the case, at least not to Little Zi’s observation. The red fragments seemed confined within the gemstone, constantly trying to break free, but the fragments didn’t seem very intelligent—they weren’t pushing in a unified direction but instead in their own separate ways. This meant that none of them could break the gemstone’s bonds.

Is Long Yi not here either?

In fact, Little Zi hadn’t even sensed Long Yi on this planet, which she found strange. Long Yi had said that the battle was intense—is it possible the fight wasn’t here?

At this point, Little Zi hesitated; she wasn’t sure if she should move in for a closer look. The sheer number of God Chasers looked like a dense swarm of insects that was quite frightening. Little Zi wasn’t afraid of God Chasers, but her fear of insects made her hesitate. She started to psych herself up, silently chanting Long Yi’s name in her heart.

As Little Zi approached, the fragments of the Divine Worm inside the gem became still, ceasing their chaotic thrashing and suddenly becoming quiet. Little Zi cautiously neared the gemstone, taking every measure to protect herself.

Boom!

A red beam shot out from the gem—a Mental Impact. Obviously, such a level of Mental Impact had little effect on Little Zi. She easily blocked the mental assault and launched her own Mental Impact towards the gemstone in front.

The Mental Impact, solid as it was, struck the Worms, pinning them dead against the inner wall at the far end of the gemstone.

Be careful, Little Zi, don’t be fooled by their performance.

Little Zi warned herself, after all, Long Yi had already been deceived once; there was no telling if the worms’ antics were genuine or not.

Wait, or rather, can I know?

Little Zi released thirteen avatars, surrounding the gemstone. At the same time, she blessed them with her divine power, and at this moment, with more than two thousand times the divine status, Little Zi’s divine power was nearly inexhaustible. Each avatar layered divine power within their mental power, ensuring that any psychic magic attacks would be imbued with divine force.

"Are you a unified entity, or are you independent existences?" Little Zi asked through mental power.

The worms did not answer and showed great confusion toward the mental power message sent by Little Zi.

"Who confined you here, was it Solis?" Little Zi asked again, and this time, the worms still offered no response.

Something was off, according to Long Yi’s words, these worms should pledge their allegiance immediately upon seeing a divine status, shouldn’t they? Why do they all seem so foolish now?

Little Zi boldly moved closer and released a stream of divine power into the gem. The gem had no reaction to the divine power, allowing it to flow straight through, and as soon as those worm fragments detected the presence of divine power, they swarmed over in an instant, completely devouring all the divine power.

Clearly, they were Divine Worms, just a bit foolish.

Little Zi decided to conduct a bold experiment.

This time, she had all her avatars prepare while she herself placed her hand on the gem. She wanted to see what exactly this gem was. As soon as she laid her hand on it, she immediately laughed; the gemstone was actually a Cosmic Stone, just that it had been transformed by magic into a prison, so it could no longer demonstrate the characteristics of a Cosmic Stone, but it was undoubtedly a Cosmic Stone. Little Zi tried a little, and a corner of the stone melted a bit, proving that she still had control over the Cosmic Stone.

Then, Little Zi slowly extended her finger into the Cosmic Stone, making her fingertip identical to the prison that was the Cosmic Stone. Although the worm fragments noticed Little Zi’s finger penetrating, they made no move. Then, suddenly, Little Zi released a bit of divine power at her fingertip, and the fragment of the worm closest to it pounced like lightning. A bead-sized piece of Cosmic Stone prison immediately formed on Little Zi’s fingertip, imprisoning that worm fragment inside.

After extracting the small bead, Little Zi herself felt extremely nervous; after all, dealing with the worms was brave enough without relying on Long Yi.

After giving herself a few compliments as usual, Little Zi held the bead in her hand, and with divine power accompanied by mental power, she began to pressure the worm fragment. The single fragment of the worm was limited in strength and was easily suppressed by Little Zi, with its entire mental world laid bare before her.

"Come on, let’s see your consciousness... wait, your consciousness isn’t here?" Little Zi was very surprised, because she found that this worm fragment only contained the instinct of life energy, with absolutely no consciousness! That was impossible!

Over and over, Little Zi extracted some fragments of the worms, and they were all like this. They had only biological instincts, with no consciousness.

"Let me look, what exactly happened to you!"

Little Zi gathered impressive divine power and completely disassembled a worm fragment in her hand, observing it carefully.

"Aha! Not completely void; there’s still a bit of memory hidden here!"

Little Zi extracted those memories and saw a fragment: Solis’s eyes emitting a strong red glow, and with a hideous laughter, he said, "Your consciousness is mine! As for your bodies! I will first send you to a suitable place, and when the time is right, you will fully merge into my body! Hahaha..."

The memory was short and very vague, but it allowed Little Zi to understand what had happened. The disassembled worm fragment immediately dissipated into smoke. Little Zi quickly grabbed a new one, disassembled it, and from the slightest clues, pieced together the entire incident.

This planet was actually Solis’s hiding place. For thousands of years, he had been hunting his own kind—the Divine Worms. Solis awakened those worm fragments, then forcefully devoured the consciousness of the worms, imprisoning their instinct-based bodies in fragments of Cosmic Stone. Using the resonating traits between the worms, he lured more Divine Worms here. Any Divine Worms that came close were immediately hit by the released Mental Impact, with their consciousness absorbed by the embryo below the planet, while their bodies continued to be imprisoned.

"An embryo below?" Little Zi’s eyes widened, so there was more than just these things?

Within the Cosmic Stone, only a single Divine Worm remained. Little Zi was about to disassemble it completely but after some thought, ultimately refrained. Instead, she shrank the remaining Cosmic Stone prison a bit and sealed the worm completely, stuffing it into her private space. Although she couldn’t articulate the specific reason, Little Zi felt it was better not to destroy this fragment for now.

There was a hollow within the high tower, large enough to accommodate the gemstone’s movements. Little Zi retracted her thirteen avatars and descended, shrinking in size as she landed. And from below, rhythmic pulsations were emanating! Those pulsations were like the beating of a heart, but the force behind them was akin to divine power.

Finally, Little Zi appeared in a vast underground cavern. Before her, an immense embryo curled up there, with structures like thick roots constantly absorbing nutrients from the surroundings. And that power, similar to divine power, was coming from that embryo! (To be continued. If you like this work, please come to Qidian (qidian.com) to vote and recommend tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users please read at m.qidian.com.)