The secret realm, at the highest point of the cloud-based base suspended in the sky.
Fang You stood here alone, feeling the gentle breeze of the secret realm, with scenes unfolding before his eyes.
Scenes seen by the apostles.
A blood-red moon hung high, casting a crimson glow, as cultists emerged, and strange phenomena frequently occurred.
The city shrouded by the blood-red moon also seemed to be gradually enveloped by wisps of gray fog.
"This ritual seems to be dragging seven cities into the world of the strange."
"Once the ritual is successful, the fusion between Blue Star and the world of the strange will greatly accelerate."
However, the ritual would not be completed in a short time.
It had only just begun. As time passed, the light emitted by the blood-red moon would become more dazzling, and in the cities under its glow, blood would gather to form streams, which would then widen into rivers, continuously flowing and converging.
It was a catastrophe.
But correspondingly, once the ritual began, the blood-bearded priest had to remain at the core of the ritual, unable to leave or interrupt it.
The priest was the beneficiary and the officiant of the ritual.
If the ritual failed, the backlash would also inflict great damage upon him.
This was a possibility that Fang You and his team had deduced after obtaining the ritual blueprints.
The ritual was both a disaster and an opportunity to completely eliminate the blood-bearded priest and slow down the fusion between Blue Star and the world of the strange!
"However, the ritual has already begun, and we cannot delay too long."
"The intelligence regarding the ritual's core area, the City of Waves, and the Fog City is still unclear, but for the remaining four ordinary cities, after days of preparation and infiltration, it will not take long to identify all the ritual nodes."
"The combat team led by Qian Mian has already proceeded to their designated locations."
"Once these four cities are fully scouted, it will be time to act, striking the enemy with lightning speed!"
...
The Land of the White Bear, an ordinary city.
Blood-red light, like an inverted giant bowl, enveloped the entire city, isolating it from the outside.
Escaping from the inside to the outside was like crossing an impassable chasm, completely impossible. Yet, entering the city from the outside encountered no obstruction whatsoever; the blood-red light seemed to be merely a luminous barrier.
Sergei, the Ice King, one of the three supreme powerhouses of the Land of the White Bear, did not hesitate to charge into the bloody barrier after sending a distress signal to headquarters.
Upon entering, the elites in the Ice King's retinue discovered that they could now communicate with the mysterious department within the city!
The mysterious department of the Land of the White Bear was known as the White Bear Mysterious Security Bureau, or Mianju for short.
Branches were also established in various cities.
This particular branch had few personnel, and even fewer awakened individuals. Faced with the sudden anomaly and the cultists parading the streets, they were helpless and even afraid to engage the cultists.
They could only turn their attention to investigating the situation within the city and quickly gathered much valuable information, to the point of surprising themselves with their efficiency.
When had ordinary departments become so efficient, especially amidst city-wide chaos?
The Mianju personnel muttered, quickly organizing the intelligence and sending it to the headquarters reinforcement that had just arrived.
At this moment,
To the north of this small city, chaos reigned. In the distance, huge black shadows could be vaguely discerned. These were strange beings revealing glimpses of their true forms, terrifying and monstrous.
A person in a White Bear police uniform hung up the phone. The face, fluid as water, slowly changed, transforming in an instant from a middle-aged White Bear man into a handsome young man.
Even his entire physique had shrunk considerably.
"Mission accomplished!"
"The information about the horde of strange creatures and several major cultist teams has been disseminated. This way, the White Bear Mianzhan Bureau can help us shoulder some of the enemy force."
"Our organization can then concentrate its efforts on dismantling the ritual nodes."
"This identity is no longer useful. It's time to rendezvous with the organization's combat teams."
Jun Moyun, an elite intelligence operative codenamed 'Skylark,' shed his Bear country uniform and darted into the shadows, heading towards another part of the city.
...
At the same time, the intelligence operatives who had long been lurking in these ritual cities moved swiftly.
They either guided local mysterious forces, or tracked cultist teams, investigating energy nodes.
The first to complete their arrangements was naturally in Qian Mian's city, an ordinary city in the Land of Waves!
Elite combat teams had already proceeded to their designated locations and were awaiting orders.
They were waiting for the combat teams from other cities to complete their preparations.
Although the ritual cities were completely isolated from the outside world under the blood-red moon, this did not hinder the communication of the Torch Warriors.
They could still access their mission panels in their minds and receive commands from their superiors.
However, the waiting period was somewhat arduous.
If they acted now, they could disrupt quite a few nodes, but the difficulty of disrupting the remaining nodes would inevitably increase. Simultaneously disrupting multiple nodes with lightning speed was the most feasible strategy.
If not for the fact that the situation in Fog City and the City of Waves was still unclear, Fang You would have wanted to disrupt the rituals in all six cities simultaneously.
But that would drag things out too long.
At this moment, some combat teams were on the move, some were awaiting orders, and many teams had already engaged in battle.
Ritual city in the Land of the White Bear,
Gazing at the giant black shadows rushing towards the urban area in the distance, the Ice King Sergei gritted his teeth. "First squad, third squad, follow me to confront the horde of strange creatures. The rest will deal with the cultists in the city."
He looked up. The blood-red moon in the sky seemed to have grown a size larger.
Cultists were wreaking havoc within the city, and outside the city, powerful strange creatures were approaching. Once these creatures stormed into the city, the danger would be even greater!
However, there were too few combat personnel.
The Ice King had brought several elite teams with him. Regardless of the mission, even blocking a gate to hell, their strength would have been more than sufficient.
But facing a city under a blood-red moon with a large number of enemies both inside and outside, the Ice King deeply felt the shortage of personnel and regretted not bringing more elites.
His expression remained calm as he looked at the team members beside him.
"Reinforcements from headquarters will arrive soon. Our task is to hold on and buy time."
However,
The blood-red moon hung high, the bloody light was dazzling, and he felt uneasy in his heart. No one knew what would happen next.
Suppressing his unease, 'Ice King' Sergei stepped forward and unhesitatingly activated a mystical artifact on his person. A crystalline ice-blue gem emitted a radiant glow.
His hands, calloused and weathered, spread their fingers open, and a torrent of icy breath surged from his palms. The ground began to form ice fangs, and the buildings on either side were lightly dusted with frost.
Not far away,
Two slowly approaching flesh giants were completely encased in massive blocks of ice, along with several large strange creatures.
With a single blow, over a dozen large strange creatures were killed, and two exceptionally large strange creatures were frozen.
Although it was with the aid of a mystical artifact, it still highlighted the extraordinary power of Sergei, the Ice King, one of the three supreme powerhouses of the Land of the White Bear!
Combined with the ice-sealing abilities, the elite teams swiftly eliminated the two terrifying flesh giants.
"General Ice King is invincible!"
"Wait, more strange creatures are coming!"
The strange creatures seemed to be intentionally encircling them. The weakest were large strange creatures, and among them, three exceptionally large strange creatures appeared!
The smiles of the Mianju awakened individuals, who had been cheering moments before, froze on their faces.
The Ice King Sergei once again activated the ice crystal artifact, and a chilling frost spread outward. However, at this moment, the Ice King's hair was visibly turning white, and his once middle-aged face gradually aged, wrinkles appearing.
Even so,
The icy power unleashed this time was not as potent as before.
With a series of "crackling" sounds, a terrifying bone knight was gradually breaking free from the ice, and the flesh giant roared, while other strange creatures around them, their bodies covered in frost, slowly approached.
Piercing roars blasted against their eardrums.
The awakened individuals in the elite team, their eyes and ears began to bleed.
However, at this moment, the battle had only lasted a few minutes. The Ice King and other awakened individuals even despairingly discovered that their retreat routes had been cut off by strange creatures. At this point, even if they wanted to maneuver or retreat, there was nowhere to go.
These strange creatures...
'Ice King' Sergei's pupils contracted sharply. However, at this moment, he had no time to ponder further and could only continuously output his power, attempting to break through the encirclement.
But power had its limits, his peak condition was gone, and the side effects of the mystical artifact were constantly draining his life force, causing his aura to rapidly decline.
'If only I had paid more attention to that mysterious letter.'
Boom——
A deafening roar jolted the Ice King back from his daze.
In his field of vision, circles of white ice waves exploded, the ground, already covered in frost, was now coated in another thick layer of ice. The dilapidated buildings on either side were heavily frosted, and ice pillars stood tall.
A cold wind howled, carrying gusts of frost that swept across the faces of the Mianju awakened individuals.
They shivered violently.
Despite being awakened individuals, despite being White Bear people most accustomed to icy and snowy conditions, at this moment they still felt a chill, as if they were wearing thin clothes in a blizzard.
The approaching strange creatures were increasingly covered in frost, their bodies frozen.
Was it Lord Ice King?
No, it didn't seem like it!
As soon as the thought crossed the minds of the Mianju awakened individuals, they saw something descending from the sky, followed by intense flames erupting from the horde of strange creatures. Accompanied by a thunderous roar, the bodies of the large strange creatures exploded, and a violent energy storm swept outwards, continuously impacting their surroundings.
Buildings cracked, walls crumbled, and steel bars rained down.
Trees were snapped by the storm, stones tumbled, and the White Bear awakened individuals were also swept away by the violent storm, crashing into the walls of the ruined buildings.
After a while,
When the awakened individuals, spitting blood, struggled to get up, they saw scattered limbs before their eyes: arms several meters long, heads as large as truck cabins, eyeballs thicker than buckets...
The few remaining standing strange creatures were also quickly destroyed in bursts of explosions, their bodies torn into several pieces.
In the blink of an eye,
The terrifying horde of strange creatures that had plunged them into despair was annihilated in a torrent of ice and fire!
'Ice King' Sergei's pupils contracted sharply. He suddenly looked up and saw, in the night sky, beneath the blood-red moon, a human figure with outstretched wings!
A mysterious powerhouse!
Those wings were particularly striking under the blood-red moon.
They were wings composed of countless, dense cards, numbering in the hundreds of thousands! They were deeply imprinted in the mind of the Ice King Sergei!