Chapter 796 Arrays
In the next instant, Dyon"s body flashed forward once again. However, this time it was different. He no longer bothered to stay in the eyeline of his pursuers, he completely melded into the darkness of the forest!
The celestials froze. None of them had thought that after all this time that their "easy prey" was still hiding his abilities. The scouts were much more surprised because they hadn"t witnessed the battle between their King and Dyon. However, the other 9 celestials felt a wave of embarra.s.sment come over them. How had they made such a mistake?
It was only now they remembered just how much of a boost in power this little King got once he used his wings. It should have been obvious to them that he was holding back this entire time!
The only thing that made them sigh a faint breath of relief was the fact he should be easily spotted. With such bright golden wings that gave off their own light, even his transformation would be blatantly obvious to them.
What they didn"t know is that Dyon had prepared for such a contingency long ago. He had purposefully not used his wings until now. And, he purposefully dampened the effectiveness of his movement technique. Even further, if they were intelligent, they would be wondering why Dyon hadn"t used his movement technique against King Viserion!
Since Dyon woke up, King Viserion was the first to even remotely push him to his limits. Even then, he was toying with him. Dyon knew all he needed to win after King Viserion unlocked his third battle form was more speed. Yet, why had he decided to use his strongest form instead of using his movement technique?
Intuitively speaking, wouldn"t it have been smarter to use the weaker form and hide the stronger? Anyone who saw this might think Dyon was a fool.
However… How could Dyon not have his own designs?
Before he came to the Viserion clan, he had already prepared for the possibility of Luna betraying him. The problem was that his relationship with Veles was much too fragile, and was easily exploitable. As such, the scenario of a chase had always been on Dyon"s mind.
In his original plan, he had prepared to be chased by dao formation experts. So, how could a mere group of celestials faze him? That was nothing more than a joke.
Dyon was aware of the forested landscape of the Viserion clan. He was also aware that his wings had changed their color. And, even if they hadn"t, before his break through, Dyon had had one white wing. That wing was just as bad for stealth as his golden wings. So, Dyon long knew that relying on his wings would be a detriment and not a helper in this situation. Knowing that, why not make his potential pursuers think that his wings were his true final trump card?!
The celestials had organized themselves, thinking they understood Dyon. They remained relatively close to each other after their encirclement plan missed. And while they would have loved to attack, if they alerted any of the more powerful Earth or Heaven beasts in the area, it would be problem.
In the end, the spread themselves out a mere two or three meters away from each other. Their thinking was simple. Even though Dyon was powerful in his winged form, in this dark environment, he would be hard pressed to sneak up on them. Then, since they were so close, they"d be able to react in a short amount of time, immediately surrounding him.
However, what they never expected was the fact that Dyon had hid such a profound movement technique! After seeing him use it, and seeing how he became drenched in sweat, they began to relax, thinking that this was his true limit. All the while, they never knew that using the movement technique to such a small extent was never that difficult for him to begin with! While it might cause minor fractures in his legs, those injuries were quickly healed by his overwhelming blood essence in addition to the perfect fusion of him and his humanoid manifestation!
All this time, Dyon had only used his movement technique to the first stage of the first act. Limiting its profoundness and therefore his injuries. But now? He pushed it to his highest level of understanding, climbing to the peak of the second stage of the first act. In an instant, the efficacy of the technique almost tripled, causing Dyon to vanish from sight!
Just as the elders were feeling vigilant, a flash of blinding gold came from their left flank, immediately followed but a scream of agony. But when the elders followed through with their plan, converging on the blinding light, it suddenly disappeared! However, unlike what they a.s.sumed, Dyon was already gone, leaving behind an elder with broken ribs, and an oddly angled arm from a vain attempt at blocking.
The elders sucked in a breath. Was this really a saint? Although this elder hadn"t even completely the first cycle of the first celestial stage, only having filled 2 or so meridians with celestial energy, he was still a celestial! It wasn"t normal for a saint be able to even fight with him, let alone hurt him so severely, so quickly!
A cold sweat began to permeate down their backs. They were all of quite lowly status, often attending to small matters. Even the strongest of them, a patrol with second stage celestial cultivation, couldn"t claim to be capable of hurting this comrade of his so quickly…
What had they gotten themselves into?!
The elders couldn"t help but shiver. Their greed had blinded them, causing them to dive head first into this mission, never once signaling for help. But, if they signaled now, even if their dao formation experts had somehow magically come back from their war with the barbarians so quickly, it would take at least a few minutes for them to reach here. With the battle prowess this young King had displayed. Would they last that long?!
What they didn"t know was that this was all a fa?ade Dyon had purposefully put up. However, that was how he liked it.
He had just spent hours slowly laying down formations, how could he not use them? Right now, he was panting heavily, waiting for his limp and bloodied arm to heal. However, his face was completely expressionless, as though the heavy breathing and broken arm weren"t even his own.
Dyon flashed outwards again, seemingly disappearing in an instant before appearing behind one of the weaker elders that were rushing to the position of the still roaring elder. As a sainthood body cultivator, Dyon"s vision was already far better than most cultivators even above his station. After all, blood essence cultivation improves all aspects of the body, including the eyes. Because of this, he had sharp and clear sight, even in this dense darkness.
Unfortunately, Dyon also understood that this wasn"t much of an advantage. Although these elders were relatively weak, they still practiced the Dragon Refining Art. Even if they hadn"t made it to the 4th stage, they would have still had the first level of Dragon Eyes at the very least because one only needed to reach the 2nd stage for this ability. Since they Dragon body-type abilities scaled with cultivation, their vision was tens of times better than a normal lower celestial.
As such, Dyon still remained cautious, understanding that not only would they likely be able to see him if he was in their line of sight, they could also see his body heat!
Another agonizing scream erupted as Dyon"s fist completely shattered the spine of the elder he aimed for, cutting their numbers from 12 to 10 with a mere two attacks. Although he purposefully didn"t kill them, he had definitely crippled their abilities to partic.i.p.ate further!
The elders spun around, hoping to catch sight of Dyon, however, he had once again disappeared. They were incredulous, how could it be possible for someone to be so fast?! And why couldn"t they sense him?!
At the celestial stage, a soul would gain more properties. As Dyon also had explained to him when he nearly died at Zabia"s hand, it was only when the soul reached the Celestial stage that it would be capable of leaving the body and operating independently. With this, came many other abilities, including a sort of divine sense or bird"s eye view.
However, how could these lower celestials have such an ability? In the cultivation world, finding someone whose soul kept up with their energy cultivation was rare beyond belief. Usually only alchemy or formation experts would invest in such a thing, and even they would usually lag behind substantially. Therefore, these celestials didn"t have this divine sense. They could only rely on their instincts and eye sight! Unfortunately, Dyon always attacked from their blind spot, and their Perceptions were weak!
Remarkably, Dyon had had a pseudo divine sense for a long time now. But, he couldn"t use it now since his soul was locked away. That said… When his soul did finally break away from its current stage, the world would witness the birth of a divine sense the likes of which had never been seen before!
With their second elder taken down, the cold sweat on the backs of the elders increased.
"BACK TO BACK!" The calm elder that first noticed they had gone in a large circle barked.
However, how could Dyon allow that? With an expressionless face, ten motes of light accelerated forward with a blinding speed. They seemingly appeared out of nowhere, rushing toward the elders. These were none other than a portion of the arrays Dyon had laid!
The reason why even celestials didn"t notice that Dyon had led them in a circle previously was because the path he had taken was much too devious. The truth was that the circle he led them in wasn"t even all that large, it was at most a few hundred meters in radius. The path Dyon took was long and winding, but the only places he set down arrays was within this specific circle he mapped out in his mind.
In an instant, the lights were upon the elders. They all simultaneously punched outward. Although they all disdained this weak attack, they didn"t dare to underestimate it. After losing two of their elders to injury, how could they have the heart to be arrogant anymore?!
However, that was when something they didn"t expect happened. The moment their punches connected, it felt as though they had hit nothing but air… As though they were really trying to punch light. Many of them lost balance, falling head-first in the mote of light. In an instant, all ten figures disappeared, unable to resist the pull of teleportation.
Under normal circ.u.mstances, it would be easy for a celestial to resist the pull of an array. Dyon had witnessed this first hand when he tried to teleport away from the Niveus Sect Matriarch. However, these were no normal arrays, they were comet level arrays!