Free Web NovelChapter 552: Chapter 473: Enemy Attack and Response
Jeming stared blankly at the sky.
"These... are all modified from the same biological base."
Jeming murmured to himself, his voice filled with an undeniable sense of awe.
As a fairly skilled Alchemist, Jeming quickly discerned the essence of the creatures above him.
At the same time, he knew better than anyone what this meant.
Different creatures have different Soul structures, Energy circuits, and physical limits.
To modify a First Level Slime into a Sixth Level Creature, it’s necessary to replace not just the physical material but to reconstruct its fundamental existence from the elemental level - which is almost equivalent to creating a new species.
And the legion that Clark showcased, numbering in the billions, had all its individuals, from the lowest Shield Warriors to the highest Shadow Lords, maintaining a certain "same origin."
Like different branches of the same big tree.
This means Clark has mastered a "standardized" technical system capable of stably mass-producing High Tier modified creatures.
Furthermore, the upper limit of this system is high enough to consistently produce Eighth Level Creatures.
"But the professor is only at the Sixth Level now..."
Jeming felt an almost absurd sense of impact.
His proudest creation was the Black Giant, made through the fusion of the Five Viscera Sacrificial God Skill and Elemental Creatures characteristics.
After millennia of cultivation and countless iterations and optimizations, the strongest two leaders barely touched the Seventh Level threshold.
As for the Black Giant Priest?
That is purely an "anomaly" within the Incense Fire Divine Dao system, a miracle spawned from the confluence of billions of Black Giant beliefs, having little to do with his Alchemy Techniques.
But Professor Clark...
"Is this the full extent of the professor’s power?" Jeming instinctively marveled, "I didn’t expect the professor to be so strong..."
"Strong?"
A voice filled with amusement came from the side, belonging to Viola.
The senior sister cast her side glance at Jeming, her pupils reflecting the endless Shadow Legion outside the window, but her lips curled into a faintly mocking smile.
"Junior, is your ’Black Giant Legion’ your complete combat power?"
Jeming was taken aback.
He instantly understood the implication of Viola’s words.
"Could it be... the professor’s actual combat power..."
"They say so." Viola withdrew her gaze and looked out the window again, "But I also heard other High Tier Wizards mention it during idle chats, because the professor hasn’t acted in public for a long time."
She paused, adding:
"But this statement is quite credible. After all, most Wizards... including yourself, are in similar situations, right?"
Jeming was silent.
Indeed.
The root of Wizards’ power is knowledge, which can manifest in various external forms: Alchemy Creations, Rune Array, Summoned Legion, Law Control, Physical Transformation, Elemental Construction...
Most Wizards choose one or two main directions, supplemented by other means.
But very few reveal their entire "actual" strength.
Like Jeming himself... what outsiders see are Talisman Witchcraft and the Black Giant Legion.
But only he knows, the Inner Cycle that tempered the inner world, the Body Forging that created an immortal body, and the Purgatory Sulfur Plane that built the Incense Fire Divine Dao—these are his real trump cards.
Then, for Professor Clark who can showcase a billions-level Shadow Legion as "regular power," just how mighty is the main body hidden beneath the black robe?
Jeming dared not think deeply.
Just then...
Buzz!!!
Suddenly, a piercing alarm sounded in every corner within the fortress.
It was the alarm system installed within the fortress, directly resonating at the Soul level for "crisis detection."
Jeming and Viola simultaneously turned their heads, staring through the observation window towards the distant horizon.
There, flashes of light began to appear at the intersection of the lead-gray sky and the desolate earth.
Initially just a few scattered points, like distant stars in the night sky.
Then, the points of light quickly increased, condensed, and merged into a flickering light belt.
Ultimately, the light belt transformed into a torrential meteor shower with multicolored tails - it was a group of Wizards flying at high speed, continually releasing interception Magic behind them.
The vanguard of the Nolun Workshop returned.
And closely pursuing them was an even denser and more furious stream of pursuit.
"Take position!"
Viola shouted in a low voice, her figure transforming into a purple light, charging down towards the control center of the fortress.
Jeming did not hesitate, the preparatory Rune for Void Step glimmered faintly on his legs.
He stepped out, his figure drawing a faint afterimage in the air, following closely behind Viola, rushing into the passage leading to the core area of the fortress.
The two sprinted through the complex metal corridors, surrounded by other Wizards also running.
No one spoke—only the urgent sound of footsteps, the hydraulic sound of metal gates opening and closing, and the increasingly clear energy explosion rumbling faintly from outside the fortress.
Seconds later, Jeming rushed into a hemispherical control room.
More than thirty wizards were already gathered here, each standing at their respective control stations.
The control stations were arranged in a circular pattern, with a three-dimensional projection sand table over five meters in diameter suspended in the center, showing the battlefield situation within a 3,000-kilometer radius centering the No. 7 Fortress in real-time.
At the edge of the sand table, blue dots representing the Nolun Workshop’s vanguard legion were swiftly contracting towards the fortress.
Behind them, red dots representing the Chaos Secret Sect and Tower of Annihilation alliance flowed like a blood-red flood, pursuing relentlessly.
"Lock onto Interception Zones 1-7 through 1-12!"
In the center of the control room, a Sixth Level Wizard with white hair and single-sided glasses ordered in a deep voice.
He was the tactical commander of the fortress, specializing in large-scale battlefield deployment.
"Rune Array charging, countdown five seconds!"
"Five..."
Jeming quickly sat down at his control station labeled "No. 7-Alchemy-09".
On the table, dozens of crystal panels of different colors lit up simultaneously, showing the real-time status of twelve "super-heavy Elemental Disintegration Cannons" outside the fortress.
Each shot from these weapons required energy equivalent to a Fifth Level Wizard’s entire spiritual power, powerful enough to instantly vaporize the flesh of Sixth Level Creatures and seriously harm Seventh Level entities.
Operating them consumed immense energy, but they served perfectly as firepower anchors for fortified defensive structures.
"Four..."
Jeming pressed his hands on the sensing region of the control station, his consciousness diving into the control network.
View switched.
He "saw" the scene outside the fortress.
In the sky, leading the pursuit at the forefront were nearly a hundred figures emitting Seventh Level fluctuations.
They were the Chaos Secret Sect and Tower of Annihilation’s elite forces, leading the charge, their pointed formation like a sharp tip, biting at the tail of Nolun Workshop’s rear guard forces.
The Chaos Secret Sect wizards were easily recognizable.
Most wore dark red, dark purple, or jet-black robes, with bodies exhibiting non-human features: some have a third eye on the forehead, some with tentacles emerging from their backs, and some with liquid runes flowing over the skin surface.
Chaos Secret Sect’s wizards seldom used direct attack witchcraft, instead employing invisible curse ripples, reality-twisting illusion force fields, soul-impacting shrieks, and various negative state-inducing "pollution".
A Seventh Level Wizard from Nolun Workshop attempted a counterattack. Just as he formed a thunderstorm cloud, he was struck simultaneously by three curses.
One made a logical paradox appear within his spell model, causing the cloud to self-annihilate; another distorted his spatial perception, making him misjudge enemy distances; the final one implanted a seed of "self-doubt" in his consciousness, causing a momentary delay in his casting.
Just at that moment, an attack from a Tower of Annihilation wizard arrived.
The attack was simple and unpretentious—a light beam interwoven with black and white colors.
Yet wherever the beam traveled, the space itself emitted a strained lament.
The beam contained two fundamentally opposing yet origin-related forces, forcibly fused and guided toward the most intense conflict and annihilation.
Boom!!!
The black and white beam struck the Nolun Wizard’s hurriedly raised shield.
No explosion, no flames.
Just a piece of absolute "nothingness" expanding from the impact point, shield, light, sound, energy, even part of the spatial structure, all turned into the most basic disordered particles by that annihilating force.
The Nolun Wizard groaned as his shield shattered, with his left shoulder and a part of his torso disappearing.
Yet he didn’t even look back, instead accelerating forward using the impact, as his flesh frantically squirmed, beginning to regenerate.
Wizard of Tower of Annihilation excelled in researching conflict and usage of opposing energies.
Thus, their mode of battle starkly contrasted the Chaos Secret Sect, prioritizing simple and brutal attacks.
Collision of water and fire producing high-temperature, high-pressure plasma steam explosions.
Annihilation of light and darkness creating a field of absolute nothingness swallowing everything.
Contact between matter and antimatter releasing pure energy destruction torrents.
Fortunately, Nolun Workshop’s rear guard wizards were elite meticulously selected.
Besides combat prowess, they excelled in mobility, survival capability, and tactical adaptation.
Though outnumbered, through exquisite coordination and a plethora of life-preserving techniques, familiar with pre-arranged traps in the area, they forcibly dragged the pursuit into a fighting retreat skirmish.
"Two..."
On the sand table, blue dots representing the rear guard finally crossed an invisible "boundary".
That boundary was a curved defense line extending 120 kilometers outward from the frontline No. 1 Fortress.
Behind the line was the fortress cluster defense zone Nolun Workshop initially completed.
"One..."
The commander’s countdown struck cold and hard like hammer blows in every control room wizard’s consciousness.
Jeming took a deep breath.
On the control station before him, twelve icons representing "super-heavy Elemental Disintegration Cannons" simultaneously turned from yellow to glaring red.
Charging completed.
"...Fire!"
