Chapter 125: The Precipice of the Sea of Consciousness
The dull thud of the alloy cover plate falling briefly isolated the roars of the scaled beasts in the murky, foggy wasteland.
The ventilation shaft was barely two meters wide, its four walls made of rough concrete, excavated when the beacon was built years ago as a combined ventilation and emergency escape route. Only a single emergency light clung to life above, emitting a buzzing electrical sound, its dim yellow glow barely illuminating the tense faces of the five people. The air was foul, a mixture of gunpowder smoke, the metallic tang of blood, and the rotting stench of the fungal carpet seeping in through the cracks.
Outside the cover plate, the scaled beasts kept ramming it. Every tremor of the thick metal plate carried a bone-rattling roar. Purple fungal hyphae snaked their way in through the gaps between the plate and the wall, as fine as hair and glowing with an eerie, pale purple. The moment they touched the air, they writhed gently, attempting to penetrate deeper into the passage.
"We can't hold out for long." Su Wan immediately pressed her detector against the rock wall. The waveforms on the screen fluctuated violently. "The hyphae are gnawing through the sealant layer of the cover plate. In fifteen minutes at most, they'll chew open a large enough hole. Moreover, the illusion web hasn't been severed. The priests over at the air defense bunker are still continuously supplying energy; the psychic suppression across the entire area remains."
Old Guo leaned against the wall, looking down to check the wound on his shoulder. His combat suit had been torn open in a long gash, flesh and blood exposed, the blood already soaking through the inner lining. Gritting his teeth, he ripped open a hemostatic bandage and wrapped it tightly around the wound, cold sweat beading on his forehead from the pain.
"The scaled beasts outside are coming in waves. Hiding in here is like locking ourselves in a cage." Old Guo panted heavily, raising his eyes to look at Lu Heng. "Support is still over twenty minutes away. This ventilation shaft is too small; once they drill in, we won't even have room to dodge or maneuver."
Chen Ye gripped his shock baton tightly, standing guard near the cover plate, his eyes fixed on the purple hyphae constantly extending inward. Fragments of illusions still flashed at the edges of his vision. He fiercely guarded his mind, no longer trying to distinguish whether the phantoms were real or fake, relying solely on the detector's alarms.
Lu Heng said in a deep voice, "Staying here to defend to the death is just waiting to die. The ventilation shaft connects downward to an abandoned drainage tunnel. The map marks it as extending westward toward the ruins of a dried-up underground river. The tunnel is a labyrinth with extremely high risks, but at least it can disperse the enemy's encirclement. We have a chance to bypass the priests' frontal blockade and move toward the supporting troops."
He looked at Lin Yan. "How are you holding up? Is the illusion web's oppression heaviest on you?"
Lin Yan leaned against the opposite wall, slowly regulating his breathing.
Layers of pressure piled up in his Sea of Consciousness: the silent infection, the pulling of the illusions, the continuous impacts of psychic waves, plus the massive mental consumption from the recent knife fight. His Sea of Consciousness was now hanging on the edge of a cliff. It was as if there was only a thin layer of ice beneath his feet, with an abyss waiting below.
If he relaxed even slightly, his consciousness would be torn apart by the illusion web; but if he could endure that moment of collapse in this desperate situation, he would have the opportunity to break through his shackles and step into the third tier of the Sea of Consciousness.
Risk and opportunity had always been bound together.
"I can still hold steady." Lin Yan's voice was calm, though his fingertips trembled slightly. "But the matrix and the priests are watching me. The moment my Sea of Consciousness fluctuates, they will definitely concentrate all the illusion web's power to strike at me first."
"That is the biggest hidden danger." Lu Heng nodded. "So next, do not take the initiative to touch the main trunk of the illusion web. Su Wan will be responsible for locating the fungal nodes inside the tunnel. When we encounter nodes, we will prioritize destroying them with shock rounds. You will be responsible for sensing hidden psychic traps."
Su Wan quickly brought up a simplified blueprint of the old-era drainage tunnel on her instrument. "The tunnel has many branches, and many sections have been blocked by rock collapses. We will take the main passage, heading west, trying to avoid the marked secondary rift zones. Once we encounter a large-scale fungal carpet cluster on the way, we will change course immediately."
The group quickly reached a consensus.
Old Guo raised his hand, taking out two high-explosive shock rounds and gripping them tightly. This type of ammunition had limited lethality against biological flesh, but its shockwave could violently shake the structure of the fungal hyphae, temporarily paralyzing a small patch of the illusion web. Chen Ye stepped forward, using his baton to crush the few purple hyphae that had already drilled in. The crushed hyphae emitted a faint buzzing sound and quickly withered and turned black.
"Prepare to move down," Lu Heng signaled, raising his hand.
The glow of the emergency light moved downward with the group. The sound of the cover plate being struck slowly became isolated above, but it didn't disappear; it still faintly echoed through the soil layer, like the drumbeats of a harbinger of death. The depths of the tunnel were pitch black. Su Wan turned on the cold-light searchlight built into her detector. The pale blue beam pierced the darkness, illuminating the ground covered with碎石 (gravel) and dry mud accumulated over many years.
The rock walls on both sides were damp, with sporadic specks of purple hyphae attached to them. Unlike on the surface, they weren't woven into a net; they were merely scattered in the crevices of the stones, like countless eyes quietly opening. Every wisp of hyphae was the eyes and ears of the illusion web.
"A very thin underground fungal network is laid beneath this entire tunnel," Su Wan said in a low voice. "The priests can receive our location in real time. From the moment we entered the ventilation shaft, we haven't shaken off their tracking."
"We never expected to shake them off anyway," Lu Heng said as he walked. "Our goal isn't stealth; it's to buy time and stall until support arrives."
The group advanced in a single file. Lu Heng took the lead, Su Wan stayed in the middle to continuously scan, Chen Ye and Old Guo guarded the left and right flanks, and Lin Yan brought up the rear, spreading out his wisp of Sea of Consciousness to guard the rear and sense psychic traps hidden in the crevices of the rock walls.
The deeper they went into the tunnel, the stronger the aura of the illusion web became.
The lethargy rolled back, mixed with fragmented illusions. Lin Yan's ears constantly heard his master's voice, gently calling him to return; at the edges of his vision, the sinister silhouettes of the two priests in the underground corridor and the boundless, dark-buried consciousness of the illusion web matrix kept flashing.
Every single image precisely struck the deepest vulnerabilities in his memory.
The matrix had seen fragments of his Sea of Consciousness; it knew his obsessions and regrets. The illusions it wove were a hundred times more real than the simulations in the training pod.
Lin Yan clenched his jaw, his ancient martial arts internal energy flowing rapidly through his meridians, repeatedly washing over his restless Sea of Consciousness. Gather, gather again. He kept Instructor Wen's mental cultivation methods firmly in mind, locking his core consciousness down tightly, leaving only the wisp of perception to probe his surroundings.
But the load on his Sea of Consciousness had already reached its absolute limit.
A dull pain spread from his temples to his entire head, as if countless fine needles were pricking him. He could clearly feel that his Sea of Consciousness barrier was slowly developing cracks. The fissures were multiplying; just one more psychic shock of sufficient intensity, and his entire Sea of Consciousness would shatter with a bang.
"Lin Yan, are you alright?" Su Wan, walking in front, noticed his slightly faltering steps and looked back at him.
"I'm fine." Lin Yan suppressed the metallic tang rising in his throat. "It's just that the psychic pressure from the illusion web is continuously accumulating."
The moment he finished speaking, Su Wan's detector suddenly erupted with a piercing alarm.
"Thirty meters ahead! A massive fungal cluster! It's not an ordinary node; it's a transit energy storage point! The energy concentration is extremely high. The priests have diverted some energy to store here to seal off the tunnel!"
The cold-light searchlight extended forward.
In the wide tunnel space ahead, a massive clump of purplish-black fungal carpet was firmly attached to the rock walls and ceiling. Countless hyphae stretched and intertwined in all directions, weaving a semi-closed barrier in the center of the passage. In the center of the fungal carpet, the ripples slowly undulated, continuously releasing psychic waves outward.
Behind the barrier, the low shrieks of scaled beasts echoed from the darkness.
They had been waiting here all along. The priests had predicted they would choose this drainage tunnel to break out and had set up a second blockade here in advance.
"Two shock rounds aren't enough; the volume here is too massive." Old Guo frowned. "If we charge hard, we'll inevitably take the full brunt of the illusion web's impact head-on."
Lu Heng's gaze quickly swept over both sides of the fungal carpet barrier. There were narrow side caves on the rock walls on both sides, but the cave entrances were pitch black, and their internal conditions were unknown.
"There's no other way. Bypassing the side caves carries unknown risks; we might drill straight into a deeper trap. We can only concentrate our firepower to tear open this barrier and rush through quickly. We cannot stay. Su Wan, calculate the detonation timing of the shock rounds and simultaneously interfere with the illusion web's waveform; Chen Ye, prepare your psychic baton, prioritize suppressing the scaled beasts that rush out; Old Guo, provide frontal firepower; Lin Yan—"
He turned to look at Lin Yan, seeing his pale face, and paused.
The trembling of Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness was visibly affecting him, a layer of cold sweat seeping from his forehead.
"Do you want to fall back and let us take the main attack?"
Lin Yan slowly shook his head, raising his eyes to look at that undulating, writhing purplish-black fungal carpet, and at the sinister psychic imprint of the priest lurking in the darkness behind the barrier.
He knew he couldn't dodge this hurdle.
The matrix had meticulously woven this net, driving him all the way here, just to force him to make a choice under extreme limits. Either his Sea of Consciousness would collapse here, and he would sink forever into the illusion; or he would endure the pain of having his consciousness crushed, complete his transformation, and step into the third tier.
"I will coordinate to break the web." Lin Yan gripped his short blade tightly, his voice calm. "I will not trace back alone. I will only aim at the energy storage core of the fungal carpet and strike synchronously with the shock rounds."
Lu Heng looked deeply at him, no longer dissuading him, but only saying in a deep voice, "Remember the bottom line. The moment your Sea of Consciousness can't hold, retreat immediately. We will cover you."
"Understood."
Everyone prepared. Old Guo gripped the shock rounds with both hands and pulled the safety pins; Su Wan stared at the waveforms on the detector, waiting for the trough window; Chen Ye planted his center of gravity, his baton蓄势 (poised to strike); Lu Heng raised his gun, aiming at the gaps in the fungal carpet, locking onto the scaled beasts that would rush out.
Lin Yan closed his eyes, gathering his Sea of Consciousness one last time.
In the next second, he猛地 (fiercely) released a portion of the restraints,凝聚 (concentrating) his Sea of Consciousness power, and slammed it straight into the energy storage core of the fungal carpet in sync with the shockwave of the shock rounds.
Weng—
The invisible psychic shockwave and the tangible shockwave exploded simultaneously.
The purplish-black fungal carpet churned violently, large patches of purple patterns dimming, and the suppressing force of the illusion web suddenly stalled. The scaled beasts lurking behind the barrier were blown into chaotic roars by the shockwave.
This was the gap!
"Charge!" Lu Heng gave a low shout, taking the lead in the forward thrust.
But merely an instant later, two streams of cold, violent psychic power crashed down from the direction of the distant air defense bunker.
The two priests, sensing Lin Yan's full-power burst, no longer spared their energy. They poured all the accumulated power of the illusion web directly onto him alone.
This was a strike prepared specifically for him.
The violent torrent of psychic power slammed fiercely into Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness, which was already covered in cracks.
Crack.
As if something deep within his consciousness had shattered.
Agony instantly swallowed him. Countless illusions exploded wildly: his master's smiling face, the faces of the soldiers who died on the wasteland, the ferocious phantoms of the underground priests—all rushed into his perception in a chaotic flood. His legs went soft, his vision blackened, and his body swayed.
"Lin Yan!" Chen Ye cried out in alarm, reaching out to support him.
"Don't touch me!" Lin Yan gritted his teeth and gave a low shout, steadying his stance.
The excruciating pain of his Sea of Consciousness collapsing swept through his entire body. Yet, deep within that shattered consciousness, a faint but incredibly stable point of light was slowly凝聚 (gathering) amidst the ruins.
Collapse, and then rebirth.
The threshold of life-and-death tempering had finally arrived at this moment.
Inside the tunnel, the fungal carpet barrier was still writhing and repairing itself. The scaled beasts roared as they broke through the chaotic hyphae, pouncing toward the group. The priests' psychic assault did not stop; wave after wave crashed down, wanting to completely devour his consciousness the moment his Sea of Consciousness shattered.
The remaining four fought desperately to intercept the swarming scaled beasts while nervously watching him.
They could block the scaled beasts, but they couldn't block the invisible illusion web.
Whether he could survive, whether he could complete the breakthrough, now depended entirely on Lin Yan himself.
End of Chapter.
The ventilation shaft was barely two meters wide, its four walls made of rough concrete, excavated when the beacon was built years ago as a combined ventilation and emergency escape route. Only a single emergency light clung to life above, emitting a buzzing electrical sound, its dim yellow glow barely illuminating the tense faces of the five people. The air was foul, a mixture of gunpowder smoke, the metallic tang of blood, and the rotting stench of the fungal carpet seeping in through the cracks.
Outside the cover plate, the scaled beasts kept ramming it. Every tremor of the thick metal plate carried a bone-rattling roar. Purple fungal hyphae snaked their way in through the gaps between the plate and the wall, as fine as hair and glowing with an eerie, pale purple. The moment they touched the air, they writhed gently, attempting to penetrate deeper into the passage.
"We can't hold out for long." Su Wan immediately pressed her detector against the rock wall. The waveforms on the screen fluctuated violently. "The hyphae are gnawing through the sealant layer of the cover plate. In fifteen minutes at most, they'll chew open a large enough hole. Moreover, the illusion web hasn't been severed. The priests over at the air defense bunker are still continuously supplying energy; the psychic suppression across the entire area remains."
Old Guo leaned against the wall, looking down to check the wound on his shoulder. His combat suit had been torn open in a long gash, flesh and blood exposed, the blood already soaking through the inner lining. Gritting his teeth, he ripped open a hemostatic bandage and wrapped it tightly around the wound, cold sweat beading on his forehead from the pain.
"The scaled beasts outside are coming in waves. Hiding in here is like locking ourselves in a cage." Old Guo panted heavily, raising his eyes to look at Lu Heng. "Support is still over twenty minutes away. This ventilation shaft is too small; once they drill in, we won't even have room to dodge or maneuver."
Chen Ye gripped his shock baton tightly, standing guard near the cover plate, his eyes fixed on the purple hyphae constantly extending inward. Fragments of illusions still flashed at the edges of his vision. He fiercely guarded his mind, no longer trying to distinguish whether the phantoms were real or fake, relying solely on the detector's alarms.
Lu Heng said in a deep voice, "Staying here to defend to the death is just waiting to die. The ventilation shaft connects downward to an abandoned drainage tunnel. The map marks it as extending westward toward the ruins of a dried-up underground river. The tunnel is a labyrinth with extremely high risks, but at least it can disperse the enemy's encirclement. We have a chance to bypass the priests' frontal blockade and move toward the supporting troops."
He looked at Lin Yan. "How are you holding up? Is the illusion web's oppression heaviest on you?"
Lin Yan leaned against the opposite wall, slowly regulating his breathing.
Layers of pressure piled up in his Sea of Consciousness: the silent infection, the pulling of the illusions, the continuous impacts of psychic waves, plus the massive mental consumption from the recent knife fight. His Sea of Consciousness was now hanging on the edge of a cliff. It was as if there was only a thin layer of ice beneath his feet, with an abyss waiting below.
If he relaxed even slightly, his consciousness would be torn apart by the illusion web; but if he could endure that moment of collapse in this desperate situation, he would have the opportunity to break through his shackles and step into the third tier of the Sea of Consciousness.
Risk and opportunity had always been bound together.
"I can still hold steady." Lin Yan's voice was calm, though his fingertips trembled slightly. "But the matrix and the priests are watching me. The moment my Sea of Consciousness fluctuates, they will definitely concentrate all the illusion web's power to strike at me first."
"That is the biggest hidden danger." Lu Heng nodded. "So next, do not take the initiative to touch the main trunk of the illusion web. Su Wan will be responsible for locating the fungal nodes inside the tunnel. When we encounter nodes, we will prioritize destroying them with shock rounds. You will be responsible for sensing hidden psychic traps."
Su Wan quickly brought up a simplified blueprint of the old-era drainage tunnel on her instrument. "The tunnel has many branches, and many sections have been blocked by rock collapses. We will take the main passage, heading west, trying to avoid the marked secondary rift zones. Once we encounter a large-scale fungal carpet cluster on the way, we will change course immediately."
The group quickly reached a consensus.
Old Guo raised his hand, taking out two high-explosive shock rounds and gripping them tightly. This type of ammunition had limited lethality against biological flesh, but its shockwave could violently shake the structure of the fungal hyphae, temporarily paralyzing a small patch of the illusion web. Chen Ye stepped forward, using his baton to crush the few purple hyphae that had already drilled in. The crushed hyphae emitted a faint buzzing sound and quickly withered and turned black.
"Prepare to move down," Lu Heng signaled, raising his hand.
The glow of the emergency light moved downward with the group. The sound of the cover plate being struck slowly became isolated above, but it didn't disappear; it still faintly echoed through the soil layer, like the drumbeats of a harbinger of death. The depths of the tunnel were pitch black. Su Wan turned on the cold-light searchlight built into her detector. The pale blue beam pierced the darkness, illuminating the ground covered with碎石 (gravel) and dry mud accumulated over many years.
The rock walls on both sides were damp, with sporadic specks of purple hyphae attached to them. Unlike on the surface, they weren't woven into a net; they were merely scattered in the crevices of the stones, like countless eyes quietly opening. Every wisp of hyphae was the eyes and ears of the illusion web.
"A very thin underground fungal network is laid beneath this entire tunnel," Su Wan said in a low voice. "The priests can receive our location in real time. From the moment we entered the ventilation shaft, we haven't shaken off their tracking."
"We never expected to shake them off anyway," Lu Heng said as he walked. "Our goal isn't stealth; it's to buy time and stall until support arrives."
The group advanced in a single file. Lu Heng took the lead, Su Wan stayed in the middle to continuously scan, Chen Ye and Old Guo guarded the left and right flanks, and Lin Yan brought up the rear, spreading out his wisp of Sea of Consciousness to guard the rear and sense psychic traps hidden in the crevices of the rock walls.
The deeper they went into the tunnel, the stronger the aura of the illusion web became.
The lethargy rolled back, mixed with fragmented illusions. Lin Yan's ears constantly heard his master's voice, gently calling him to return; at the edges of his vision, the sinister silhouettes of the two priests in the underground corridor and the boundless, dark-buried consciousness of the illusion web matrix kept flashing.
Every single image precisely struck the deepest vulnerabilities in his memory.
The matrix had seen fragments of his Sea of Consciousness; it knew his obsessions and regrets. The illusions it wove were a hundred times more real than the simulations in the training pod.
Lin Yan clenched his jaw, his ancient martial arts internal energy flowing rapidly through his meridians, repeatedly washing over his restless Sea of Consciousness. Gather, gather again. He kept Instructor Wen's mental cultivation methods firmly in mind, locking his core consciousness down tightly, leaving only the wisp of perception to probe his surroundings.
But the load on his Sea of Consciousness had already reached its absolute limit.
A dull pain spread from his temples to his entire head, as if countless fine needles were pricking him. He could clearly feel that his Sea of Consciousness barrier was slowly developing cracks. The fissures were multiplying; just one more psychic shock of sufficient intensity, and his entire Sea of Consciousness would shatter with a bang.
"Lin Yan, are you alright?" Su Wan, walking in front, noticed his slightly faltering steps and looked back at him.
"I'm fine." Lin Yan suppressed the metallic tang rising in his throat. "It's just that the psychic pressure from the illusion web is continuously accumulating."
The moment he finished speaking, Su Wan's detector suddenly erupted with a piercing alarm.
"Thirty meters ahead! A massive fungal cluster! It's not an ordinary node; it's a transit energy storage point! The energy concentration is extremely high. The priests have diverted some energy to store here to seal off the tunnel!"
The cold-light searchlight extended forward.
In the wide tunnel space ahead, a massive clump of purplish-black fungal carpet was firmly attached to the rock walls and ceiling. Countless hyphae stretched and intertwined in all directions, weaving a semi-closed barrier in the center of the passage. In the center of the fungal carpet, the ripples slowly undulated, continuously releasing psychic waves outward.
Behind the barrier, the low shrieks of scaled beasts echoed from the darkness.
They had been waiting here all along. The priests had predicted they would choose this drainage tunnel to break out and had set up a second blockade here in advance.
"Two shock rounds aren't enough; the volume here is too massive." Old Guo frowned. "If we charge hard, we'll inevitably take the full brunt of the illusion web's impact head-on."
Lu Heng's gaze quickly swept over both sides of the fungal carpet barrier. There were narrow side caves on the rock walls on both sides, but the cave entrances were pitch black, and their internal conditions were unknown.
"There's no other way. Bypassing the side caves carries unknown risks; we might drill straight into a deeper trap. We can only concentrate our firepower to tear open this barrier and rush through quickly. We cannot stay. Su Wan, calculate the detonation timing of the shock rounds and simultaneously interfere with the illusion web's waveform; Chen Ye, prepare your psychic baton, prioritize suppressing the scaled beasts that rush out; Old Guo, provide frontal firepower; Lin Yan—"
He turned to look at Lin Yan, seeing his pale face, and paused.
The trembling of Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness was visibly affecting him, a layer of cold sweat seeping from his forehead.
"Do you want to fall back and let us take the main attack?"
Lin Yan slowly shook his head, raising his eyes to look at that undulating, writhing purplish-black fungal carpet, and at the sinister psychic imprint of the priest lurking in the darkness behind the barrier.
He knew he couldn't dodge this hurdle.
The matrix had meticulously woven this net, driving him all the way here, just to force him to make a choice under extreme limits. Either his Sea of Consciousness would collapse here, and he would sink forever into the illusion; or he would endure the pain of having his consciousness crushed, complete his transformation, and step into the third tier.
"I will coordinate to break the web." Lin Yan gripped his short blade tightly, his voice calm. "I will not trace back alone. I will only aim at the energy storage core of the fungal carpet and strike synchronously with the shock rounds."
Lu Heng looked deeply at him, no longer dissuading him, but only saying in a deep voice, "Remember the bottom line. The moment your Sea of Consciousness can't hold, retreat immediately. We will cover you."
"Understood."
Everyone prepared. Old Guo gripped the shock rounds with both hands and pulled the safety pins; Su Wan stared at the waveforms on the detector, waiting for the trough window; Chen Ye planted his center of gravity, his baton蓄势 (poised to strike); Lu Heng raised his gun, aiming at the gaps in the fungal carpet, locking onto the scaled beasts that would rush out.
Lin Yan closed his eyes, gathering his Sea of Consciousness one last time.
In the next second, he猛地 (fiercely) released a portion of the restraints,凝聚 (concentrating) his Sea of Consciousness power, and slammed it straight into the energy storage core of the fungal carpet in sync with the shockwave of the shock rounds.
Weng—
The invisible psychic shockwave and the tangible shockwave exploded simultaneously.
The purplish-black fungal carpet churned violently, large patches of purple patterns dimming, and the suppressing force of the illusion web suddenly stalled. The scaled beasts lurking behind the barrier were blown into chaotic roars by the shockwave.
This was the gap!
"Charge!" Lu Heng gave a low shout, taking the lead in the forward thrust.
But merely an instant later, two streams of cold, violent psychic power crashed down from the direction of the distant air defense bunker.
The two priests, sensing Lin Yan's full-power burst, no longer spared their energy. They poured all the accumulated power of the illusion web directly onto him alone.
This was a strike prepared specifically for him.
The violent torrent of psychic power slammed fiercely into Lin Yan's Sea of Consciousness, which was already covered in cracks.
Crack.
As if something deep within his consciousness had shattered.
Agony instantly swallowed him. Countless illusions exploded wildly: his master's smiling face, the faces of the soldiers who died on the wasteland, the ferocious phantoms of the underground priests—all rushed into his perception in a chaotic flood. His legs went soft, his vision blackened, and his body swayed.
"Lin Yan!" Chen Ye cried out in alarm, reaching out to support him.
"Don't touch me!" Lin Yan gritted his teeth and gave a low shout, steadying his stance.
The excruciating pain of his Sea of Consciousness collapsing swept through his entire body. Yet, deep within that shattered consciousness, a faint but incredibly stable point of light was slowly凝聚 (gathering) amidst the ruins.
Collapse, and then rebirth.
The threshold of life-and-death tempering had finally arrived at this moment.
Inside the tunnel, the fungal carpet barrier was still writhing and repairing itself. The scaled beasts roared as they broke through the chaotic hyphae, pouncing toward the group. The priests' psychic assault did not stop; wave after wave crashed down, wanting to completely devour his consciousness the moment his Sea of Consciousness shattered.
The remaining four fought desperately to intercept the swarming scaled beasts while nervously watching him.
They could block the scaled beasts, but they couldn't block the invisible illusion web.
Whether he could survive, whether he could complete the breakthrough, now depended entirely on Lin Yan himself.
End of Chapter.