Paragon of Sin

"...No. No, no, no! Wh-what have you done? WHAT DID YOU DO?!" A crazed, hectic, emotional voice exploded outwards in the form of a spiritual burst. A mixture of vigorated rage, distressed confusion, and unnerving disbelief encapsulated it all. It was torn, heavy-hearted and fueled by shock.

It belonged to San Luoyang.

Shortly before, the Ever-Knight tasked with guarding the Voidship of the Everlore Association shot towards Wu Yu with tremendous murderous intent that could freeze hardened soldiers. The explosion generated by the sheer force of his spontaneous movement sent the Voidship spiraling backwards, calculated or not, the Voidship traversed thousands of miles in moments before slowing to a difficult halt.

"...!" Wu Yu was caught off guard by the display of hostility, unsure of its origins, and only allowed to give a brief glance towards San Luoyang who's expression was still in the process of changing. The senses of an Earthly Saint were phenomenal, allowing him to grasp minute changes in the briefest of moments.

Wu Yu's thoughts were extremely fast, even faster than his body's response time. He could see the violent trail the Ever-Knight left behind, an eruption of thousands of mystic runes cycloned around them as it empowered their every action. He thought about how he could grasp all these details, how strange it was that one Earthly Saint was aggressively moving and the other wasn't, and reminded himself of the difference of their foundations.

He was a newly ascended Earthly Saint. Besides his Mystic Intent at the Awakened-level, he hadn't refined his physique or energies to the next phase, consolidating his cultivation base and familiarizing himself with the usage or properties of an Earthly Saint. There were all sorts of new things within his body, such as a strange internal space that resembled the insides of a Spatial Ring, and the usage of these external mystic runes that flowed all around and through him.

Unlike before, he felt an active control of these runes as if they were a part of him. Seeing how the Ever-Knight's runes swirled around him in a vicious and hyper manner only reinforced his own ignorance. However, when the Mystic Aura of the other party cascaded towards him, his tens of thousands of Mystic Runes acted instinctively, forming a connected network that defended against it.

They felt alive.

His Mystic Soul rumbled slightly within his dantian, feeling far different than before. Immersed in these changes, he felt a wave of euphoria.

The brown-eyed Ever-Knight clenched their fist, causing a condensation of Mystic Runes, and an outburst of mystic energy that gathered at his knuckles, converted to extreme mystic power. A hot, earthen, and free-flowing aura emanated from its fist. The mystic power gained essence, form, and identity—a will of its own.

The Ever-Knight's emerald fist became a small inferno, blazing with incredible heat, and seemed to embody the heaviness of earth and the pervasiveness of liquid. The immediate fixed space was burned, scorched a tint of black, and fiery, dark-red light emitted without pause. It flooded the world without hesitation.

Blazing Inferno Magma Intent!

It was perfectly infused with the Ever-Knight's mystic energy, producing Blazing Inferno Magma Power that threatened to smother the world.

Wu Yu's reaction was abnormally swift for him. The Ever-Knight was a 3rd Runic Ascension, and despite being a newly ascended Earthly Saint, he was fully confident in the Imperial Heaven Qi Method and its various spells and arts. With his seemingly constant usage of Demi-Mystic State at the Earthly Saint Phase, he felt an itching urge to unleash the 3rd Grand Transformation.

However, he held himself back as he decided to take it slow. This was an opportunity, and while he was caught off-guard initially, confused by the abrupt hostile action, it didn't stop that the situation unfolding was an unavoidable one at this point. He could only adapt or die.

And he had no intention of dying today.

Wu Yu interacted with his Mystic Soul, its mystic energies flowing through his body and causing the internalized mystic runes of eight different sets to grow abnormally active. Suddenly, he felt a burst of tremendous physical power flood through his body in a vigorous and unstoppable fashion.

"Oooh!" He released a low-roar of shock, invigorated as the mystic runes empowered every iota of his physical energy, every cell of his body, and missing not a single location. Within just a single pinky, he felt far more strength than he had ever felt before. The thought of crushing his previous self with simply a pinky swing popped into his mind, causing a faint arc of intrigue to form.

However, the wave of heat that singed fixed space and faintly affected him refocused him instantly. The Ever-Knight used one hand as a pulled back fist, and the other as an outreached hand that grasped towards him with a heavy, vicious clench.

Wu Yu saw the mystic runes surrounding the Ever-Knight vanished abruptly, reappearing around him and releasing faint silver light of spatial power. His eyes contracted slightly as his newly empowered senses couldn't process its speed, finding himself instantly surrounded as the mystic runes took upon a mixture of indistinct mystic and spatial colors.

A spherical spatial cage formed that sealed his movement, kept at bay by his own mystic runes, but only passively. He was still trapped in a single moment. Wu Yu felt isolated from the entire world, as if he was drawn into a sealed spatial ring intermixed with a Worldly Domain. This was clearly the evolved version of the

Spatial Resonance Phase's Spatial Prison ability!

World Prison!

Wu Yu's heart thumped fiercely as his spiritual senses expanded outwards to analyze the prison. Despite its simple nature, this World Prison was terrifying. Just this ability alone used by an Earthly Saint would've prevented even his Demi-Mystic State 3rd Grand Transformation Form at the Soul of Mysticism Phase to be utterly helpless, like a fly caught in a jar.

To think the gap between these two stages of cultivation was so abnormally massive. A wisp of despair flitted through his heart for a brief moment, until his senses caught a fluctuation of weakness originating from a specific location. He once again was reminded of his new cultivation level, far beyond his previous power limits.

This was one of the main reasons cultivators had to consolidate their cultivation and practice their abilities, to ensure they were fully aware of their powers. Otherwise, if a grown powerlifter thought he had the strength of a baby, he might helplessly stand there as he was beaten by a scrawny child.

Wu Yu was fortunate his thoughts were abnormally fast, fortunate that his senses were extremely powerful to find this fluctuation, and at ease that he possessed a stark difference in foundation. Wu Yu took a step to his left, his mystic runes pushed against the World Prison, and he didn't hesitate to punch in that direction.

BOOM!

A hole was punctured in the World Prison followed by a thunderous shaking of fixed space. Without hesitation, Wu Yu urged his mystic energies, forming reinforced mystic power infused with his Imperial Heaven Mystic Soul's innate energies.

An outburst of multicolored stars flooded the area of ten miles around Wu Yu as his punch hadn't just punctured a hole, but caused the World Prison to pop like a balloon!

"What?!" The brown-eyed Ever-Knight was shocked by this development. Shockingly, he hadn't reacted the same way when Wu Yu attacked the weak point of the World Prison or punctured a hole, but when his World Prison had popped outside of his control. The sound of his surprise was extremely genuine, but the murderous intent in his eyes only grew fiercer.

Wu Yu shot towards the location of the World Prison's hole, reaching it before even realizing that the World Prison had utterly collapsed. He escaped for a hundred miles out before he saw the unique silver-colored mystic runes swirl about chaotically, slowly returning to the Ever-Knight in a defeated manner. And while he thought of it as slow, to the casual observer, they wouldn't even be able to sense its return before inhaling a tenth of a normal breath.

Wu Yu immediately frowned. He looked at the Ever-Knight who was still charging at him, and at his blazing fist, and his mind felt abnormally alerted. He couldn't pinpoint why, however. The exchange might've taken a long time to describe, the actions simple, but they happened in far less time than a mortal's blink of an eye.

The Ever-Knight's brown-eyes glinted with a ferocity, a steeled resolve of unbreakable structure was reflected. Wu Yu's heart grew taut. This entire thing felt strange. So, so, so strange.

Why did he feel that it wasn't right? That something wasn't right?

「Worldly Magma Incineration Art: Fist of the Molten Inferno」

However, he had very little time to consider this feeling as the Ever-Knight's fist seemed to have reached a climax of its charge, spurting out fiery light without equal. He launched that fist with tremendous force. A gigantic molten fist that size of a small-sized moon formed, as large as one would imagine.

This startled Wu Yu instantly. This was a tremendous attack of a wide range, yet he immediately executed his First Step of the Ninth King Art, and while he hadn't actively drawn upon his internalized or externalized Mystic Runes, they grew active as they assisted his Movement Art. In a blink of an eye, he vanished from his location and re-emerged over ten thousand miles away, easily dodging the molten fist.

However, his heart clenched without warning. He didn't know why, but he felt extremely uncomfortable. Then, he saw a line of mystic power linking the molten fist to the Ever-Knight. The Ever-Knight was seemingly temporarily stunned by Wu Yu's ease of escape or its quickness, but that was brief.

It seemed he was about to redirect his attack when his body erupted in a fiery light intermixed with silver and mystic colors, causing Wu Yu's pupils to shrink as the Ever-Knight's application and usage of his mystic power was incredible! The Ever-Knight arrived before him in the blink of an eye, about to launch a swift fist strike towards his face.

Instinctively, Wu Yu parried the fist by heavily striking its wrist, shifting its power and causing a thunderous boom to erupt, and then he saw an opening revealed as the Ever-Knight seemed dazed. Wu Yu's discomfort grew, but his instincts as a fighter refused to allow him to take advantage of this situation, and he infused his right leg with mystic power and kicked out at the Ever-Knight's abdomen with all his strength.

Just as the kick was about to hit, the Ever-Knight's revealed eyes sparkled with a light of success and relief.

"..."

BOOOSH!

Wu Yu's kick crashed against the Ever-Knight's armor, and the Ever-Knight was about to retreat, but Wu Yu's discomfort caused him to instantly execute his 1st Grand Transformation, effectively doubling his Mystic Core's power, supplying him with tremendous strength. Then, he executed the 2nd Grand Transformation, galvanizing his Imperial Heaven Aura to further increase his strength!

His entire body glinted with multicolored stars that revolved throughout the surface of his skin, like a moving picture. It was extremely beautiful, yet his facial features remained visible and clear to see. The ferocity revealed was extraordinary, and the Ever-Knight's eyes widened for a moment as he could finally catch a glimpse of Wu Yu's sets of mystic runes!

Four…five…seven…oh my go-

BOOOOOOOOOOOOM !!!

If the previous thunderous booms could be described as heart-shaking, then this was loud enough to be heaven-shaking!

The Ever-Knight's emerald-colored armor brightened with Mystic Runes, revealing itself as an armament at the Mystic-Earth grade, one of the strongest defensive armaments in the Grand Cyclic Stellar Region! It had four sets of unique mystic runes, indicating its high-level.

But it wasn't enough.

Wu Yu's kick slammed against the Ever-Knight's armor, redoubled in power by two Grand Transformations, pushing him out for hundreds of thousands of miles. He hurtled through the Dark Void leaving behind a long trail of dark-red blood, and the lingering of a surprised, horrified, and distressed groan of tremendous pain.

But just as Wu Yu was about to follow-up, his spiritual senses caught something.

'Oh no!' His mind reeled, but it was too late. The tether of control that the Ever-Knight had towards the magma fist manifestation had somehow been severed, its direction and course no longer under anyone's explicit control. It became a rogue moon fueled by an Earthly Saint's power!

Then it happened.

"...!" Wu Yu.

"...!" San Luoyang and the others.

"...!" All the observers from afar.

Aghast at the sight. They all watched as the magma fist penetrated the atmosphere of Rainbow Sky, smashing into its surface at impossible speeds. There was nothing its protective formations could do.

They only saw a fiery light erupt…