Hearing Dyon"s words, the clone directly spit up mouthfuls of blood in complete anger. He lost because his opponent was too weak? If those he grew up with knew this, would he be laughed at to his grave? By the time Dyon said up to this point, there was no more point in him saying any more. Although he found this clone to be quite stupid to let himself be played with like this, he should have still been a powerful enough in his prime to be able to figure out the rest.
Even when his cloning technique was used to its fullest extent, there would still be a small delay when changes occurred. Those changes are what accounted for the transitions your opponent underwent.
For example, when Dyon exploded with new strength at the very beginning of the battle by using Demon Emperor"s Will, his angel wings, and the residual energy from the third trial, he had been able to force the clone a half a step back.
Although the clone then brushed this off as him laying his guard down, Dyon"s perception was too sharp to have missed that. The reason he forced him a half a step back wasn"t because his guard was down, it was because he had yet to readjust himself to match Dyon"s new height of power.
Because Dyon"s energy cultivation talent was poor, and the clone was forced to match that, this delay was even greater for Dyon, allowing him to take advantage of the gap even better than another person could.
Dyon never thought that his poor energy cultivation talent would ever come in handy, but it did here.
After three weeks of becoming familiar with the flaws of the clone, he then gradually increased the output of his power. The reason he was able to do this was because while he was familiarizing himself with the clone"s flaws, he was also slowly integrating more of the Demon Sage"s blood essence. In the end, he only managed to add an addition 0.2%, but that was enough to catch the clone off guard with a burst of power.
However, Dyon felt no joy in this victory. He could tell that this clone had robbed him.
With Dyon"s intelligence, he knew that the geniuses of other quadrants weren"t anything to turn his nose up at. As such, he also knew that had the clone not broken the rules, it would have only taken him a few days to beat him at most. For another genius, it would have taken a week or two at most. The fact it took Dyon so long meant that he most definitely didn"t rank well, and it p.i.s.sed him off.
Stretching out his pulsing broad sword, and laying its heavy body on the slowly fading clone, he looked it in the eye with endless murderous intent.
"There"ll come a day when I own this Tower." Dyon"s killing intent seeped into the bones of the clone, binding him from talking as an overwhelming Presence loomed. "Since you wanted to cheat and even didn"t mind killing me in the process, I"ll make sure your life is a living h.e.l.l. Count the days."
Blood overflowed from the clone"s mouth as Dyon"s broad sword vaporized his rib cage. And then, Dyon disappeared.
**
Outside the fourth trial, Dyon"s prediction was neither wrong nor was it right. It could only be said that it fell somewhere in the middle.
When Dyon"s name appeared, it rested at the 11th spot, finally destroying his fabled number one streak. However, this didn"t dampen his legend by much despite finally giving the top ten geniuses the ability to breathe normally again. Only a r.e.t.a.r.d would think that just because Dyon ranked 11th this time that he was somehow less of a threat now.
However, because of the parameters of the fourth trial, many began to think that although Dyon could compete with the top ten geniuses, they had more talent than he did. The reason for this was simple. According to common knowledge, the more talented you were, the harder it was for the clone of the fourth trial to perfectly replicate your abilities, thus making him easier to defeat. By relying on this, the top ten geniuses had defeated the clone within two to three weeks, while Dyon needed five days over the upper limit to win.
This lit a fire under the geniuses even more so than before. Although they were fired up already, they hadn"t had a true target to aim for. Now that they knew it was likely that their futures were brighter, they pushed themselves to their limit, looking forward to the day they would finally meet this Dyon.
It was too bad that none of them knew exactly what happened. Although they were right that Dyon"s energy cultivation talent was poorer than theirs, if they were to compare body and soul cultivation, Dyon would lap them by hundreds of times easily. To say it wasn"t close would be an understatement.
That aside, many were eager for the future. Despite Dyon taking three weeks and five days to finish, and the tenth place genius taking exactly three weeks, there was still a large gap between Dyon and twelfth place. Because of this, instead of being grouped with the lesser geniuses, Dyon was still grouped with the top ten, making him an honorary eleventh member.
All that was left to do was wait for Dyon"s result in the fifth trial. If he was able to rank within the top 11 once again, his place amongst them would be solidified and his name would resound throughout the cosmos.
What no one would know until much later was that Dyon"s results in the fifth trial would be his most shocking yet…