Chapter Eighty-Five: A Brief Respite

“Understood!”

The man slowly withdrew.

Once he was gone, the blonde woman ignited her cosmos and, using telepathy, sent her voice to the other two pyramids within the divine realm.

Those two pyramids were almost identical to the one beneath her feet, matching it even in scale.

The three pyramids stood in a dense forest, evenly spaced apart. Centering their territory on the pyramids, the mighty deity had laid out a vast divine domain that formed an immense, roughly triangular realm.

“The Saints from the Sanctuary have arrived!” the blonde woman said.

“I know. So what? Aside from those three Gold Saints, the rest are nothing but trash!” came a disdainful reply from the pyramid to her right.

Their bodies had been chosen by the mighty deity, granted divine favor, and had already attained power at the limit of the sixth sense.

Apart from those Gold Saints who had awakened the seventh sense, they had no fear of any Bronze or Silver Saint.

At that moment, from the pyramid to the left, another woman with short brown hair snapped, “You’re being far too careless! From what I can tell, besides those three Gold Saints outside the divine realm, they also have three exceptionally powerful Silver Saints.”

“Two of them seem to have awakened the seventh sense as well, and the last one possesses power at the very limit of the sixth sense. They’re hardly any weaker than we are!”

With the blessing of the divine domain’s power, she could survey the situation across all of North America.

The disparity between enemy and ally was far too great to allow even the slightest negligence.

Hearing this, the man on the right stroked his chin in surprise. “So I really underestimated them!”

The blonde woman then said, “This place is protected by the mighty deity’s domain. Once the Saints enter it, their power will be suppressed.”

“So long as we hold our ground within the divine realm, they’ll find it very hard to defeat us.”

“As for those outside, let them be.”

“Defend the pyramids. Once the mighty deity descends, everything will be over!”

The man clearly sounded displeased. “I know that. No need to remind me.”

He did want to test himself against the Gold Saints reputed to be the strongest among mortals, but he was not foolish enough to leave the divine realm and challenge them alone.

“That’s all I needed to hear.”

The blonde woman withdrew her telepathy, and the three pyramids returned to silence.

Elsewhere, as Yin Seventeen and the others pressed deeper into the purge, the work grew steadily more difficult.

At first there had been no Silver Saints at all. Then two or three appeared. Now the evil-god warriors of Silver rank were becoming more numerous, and more formidable.

Three hours later, Yin Seventeen looked down at the pyramid below the mountain and said, “Senior Mayura, shall we rest for a moment?”

As he spoke, he turned back and gave the three exhausted Bronze Saints a meaningful look.

They had set out from the northwestern coast of North America and swept through the region, destroying nearly twenty small strongholds along the way.

After one battle after another, he and Mayura were still manageable, but the three Bronze Saints were already panting for breath.

Though she could not see them, Mayura could hear their labored breathing. After a moment’s thought, she nodded. “Very well. Everyone, rest here.”

The enemy was growing stronger and stronger. She and Crateris might still be able to hold on, but the three younger Bronze Saints were very likely to suffer casualties.

“Thank you, Lady Mayura! Thank you, Lord Yin Seventeen!”

The three thanked them repeatedly and collapsed in crooked heaps on the ground.

Feeling several abnormal and powerful cosmos signatures near the pyramids below, Yin Seventeen let out a helpless sigh.

“So this is how convenient it is to raise evil-god warriors.”

Each stronghold was guarded by about ten of them. They had destroyed nearly twenty pyramids, and in total they had eliminated almost two hundred evil-god warriors.

The Bronze-rank ones were one thing; they were not even worth his attention. But the Silver-rank warriors were different.

The entire Sanctuary did not even have two dozen Silver Saints, yet during their earlier purge, Yin Seventeen and the others had already dealt with nearly fifty Silver-rank evil-god warriors.

Among them, there had even been one at the very limit of Silver rank.

Mayura had needed to expend some effort to defeat that opponent.

It made Yin Seventeen feel as though the evil-god forces in North America treated Silver-rank warriors like cabbages—something common and cheap. The realization was deeply frustrating.

Beside him, Mayura said slowly, “Their power comes from the evil god. It is forcefully poured into them by that god, so of course it is more convenient than the power we earn through arduous training.”

“That is why the evil god can easily create endless numbers of such warriors.”

“However, because they are raised in this way, they cannot fully control their own power and lose any chance of advancing further.”

“You have no reason to envy them at all.”

The evil-god warrior she had faced earlier had reached the level of Silver limit in speed, strength, and other aspects, but because that power had not been cultivated step by step through his own efforts, he could not display the true combat strength of a Silver Saint at the limit.

She had defeated him with only a little trouble.

Had he been a genuine Silver Saint at that same level, even if she had still managed to win, she would have had to pay a far greater price.

“I suppose that’s true.”

Yin Seventeen nodded and said with a wry smile, “Rather than calling them fighters, it would be more accurate to call them a group of slaves captured by the power of the evil god.”

“They have no future.”

Mayura ‘looked’ toward the mountain below and said, “From my investigation, there is one enemy at the Silver limit and three more at upper Silver rank in the stronghold below.”

“I’ll handle the one at the Silver limit. You stall the three upper Silver ones. Can you do that?”

As for the remaining Bronze-rank evil-god warriors, she ignored them completely, assuming they would be left to Dolphin and the other two.

“Three upper Silver opponents?”

Yin Seventeen drew a deep breath and said with a bitter laugh, “Senior, you really think highly of me.”

Since he had taken possession of Crateris’ Cloth, his strength had grown again, but even now he had only just reached the level of around fifteen times the speed of sound.

As for those three upper Silver-rank evil-god warriors, although their actual combat ability was far below that of true upper Silver Saints, none of them was any weaker than he was.

To face three such opponents at once was indeed dangerous.

“Among the five of us, apart from me, you are the strongest. If you don’t go, who will?” Mayura turned her head toward the direction where Yin Seventeen stood.

Though he knew she could not see him, Yin Seventeen still felt as if a stern pair of eyes were fixed on him.

He turned away and looked down the mountain with a helpless sigh.

“I’ll do my best.”

Silver was still Silver. Even if the real combat strength of those evil-god warriors was somewhat inflated, they could still easily crush Mi and the other two younger Bronze Saints.

And since Mayura had to concentrate her power on the enemy at the Silver limit, if he failed to hold back the remaining three Silver-rank evil-god warriors, then the moment they were drawn into the battle with the three younger Bronze Saints, casualties would be inevitable.

Half an hour later, Mayura slowly rose to her feet.

The three Bronze Saints also got up at once, understanding the cue.

“Attack!”

At her command, Mayura ignited her cosmos and shot down the mountain like a streak of green light.