59: Chapter 59 The Fragments Arrive

The figure of Ince Zangwill dissolved into the dark red halo behind Chanis Gate.

At this moment, Lu Li was standing beside the old Sealed Artifact pedestal on the second underground level of the Iron Cross Street Pumping Station.

He lightly pressed his right hand against the remaining seal runes on the surface of the pedestal, and his unique spatial perception as an Apprentice Pathway Beyonder spread along the crisscrossing drainage pipe network to every abandoned anchor point on the outskirts of Chanis Gate.

As the spiritual fluctuations unique to Dunn completely faded from his perception, a barely audible cracking sound echoed from deep within the heavy pedestal.

This was the final lament of the ancient sealing structure, played for the fall of a Nighthawks captain.

Lu Li closed his eyes, remained silent in the deathly Darkness for a few moments, and then slowly opened them.

Previously, he had firmly confined the second wave of spiritual impact leaking from the rupture in Chanis Gate within the core area of Tingen City.

It was also at that moment that he keenly sensed a strange presence rapidly approaching from the edge of the Spirit World.

That was not the fetal fragment in Megose's womb.

That scourge had long been completely annihilated by the seal forged by Dunn with his life, combined with Klein's final Sun Flame charm.

The fragment attacking this time was guided in by the backup runes that Ince had repeatedly engraved on the Spirit World barrier of Tingen before his defection, using a Grade 0-08 Sealed Artifact.

During the Battle of the Full Moon, Lu Li had personally stripped away most of the runes.

However, several patterns were hidden deep within the abandoned anchor points on the outskirts of Chanis Gate.

Their engraving time predated the setup of the mold positioning circles, and they were so ancient that not even Old Neil's distribution map of sealing nodes had recorded them.

Lu Li did not linger any longer and quickly sprinted along the drainage branch pipe towards Chanis Gate.

Between the cracks in the stone bricks, the embers of the burned mold hyphae floated with a faint dark green fluorescence.

On the stone walls, the remaining blocking rune patterns flickered in the dim light.

This passage, which he had traversed countless times, was completely different tonight.

With every step he took, the surrounding air vibrated slightly; a suffocating sense of crisis was everywhere.

In the corridor on the outskirts of Chanis Gate, Old Neil pressed his left hand against the cold stone wall, struggling to maintain the last reverse rune.

His staff had long been shattered in the impact of the seal's rupture, half of the seal maintenance log on his chest had been torn away by the air blast, and his clothes were torn and tattered, yet he still stood tall and steady.

Lu Li stepped forward quickly and, speaking very fast, gave a concise report on the current situation at Iron Cross Street.

The mold root system had completely dehydrated and withered, the backflow traces of the seventh sensor node on the outer ring had faded, the Pumping Station pedestal seal was operating normally, and the entire spatial reinforcement network had temporarily stabilized.

Old Neil nodded slightly, his voice raspy and dry, filled with heavy fatigue and solemnity.

"The fragment of the True Creator has completely locked onto Tingen. The ruptures in the Spirit World barrier are not limited to Chanis Gate."

"The four deeply buried anchor points hidden by Ince before his defection are all concealed deep within unrecorded abandoned nodes. Just now, all four anchor points were activated simultaneously, tearing fine cracks in the Spirit World barrier."

"The fragment is seeping through the gaps into the real world, converging towards Chanis Gate. Once it fully condenses into a complete projection, the shockwave sweeping through the entire city will be enough to raze all of Tingen to the ground."

Lu Li returned to the main entrance of Chanis Gate.

Daly was crouching beside Leonard.

The young man was still unconscious, but his breathing was already steady and calm.

The short staff was placed across his knees, and the seal runes on the staff handle flickered with specks of light.

Seeing Lu Li return, Daly raised her hand and pointed to the dark sky above.

Relying on her Spirit Medium perception, she had long ago locked onto the precise location of the threat.

The fragment of the True Creator was suspended in the Spirit World interlayer three hundred meters directly above Chanis Gate, and it was penetrating the barrier and seeping into the real world at an extremely fast speed.

Old Neil, leaning on the broken remains of his staff, walked slowly to the center of the main gate.

Blood was constantly seeping from his torn work robe on his chest, but he ignored it.

He looked up at the sky, which was stained with a dark red halo, pressed the end of his staff against the stone floor, slowly drew a regular circle, and then bent down to concentrate on carving runes inside the circle.

Every time a rune was completed, a layer of faint silvery-white spiritual light emerged from the stone bricks beneath his feet.

The runes spread layer by layer from the outer circle inward, becoming increasingly dense and exquisite.

By the time the last layer of runes was carved, his fingertips had long been scorched black by the intense spiritual backlash, yet he never paused from beginning to end.

"This is the reverse formation diagram of the Chanis Gate seal."

Old Neil spoke in a deep voice, his tone steady and powerful.

"When the first generation of Sealed Artifact masters built this place, they had already left a contingency plan. This reverse anchor point outside the gate is for dealing with the desperate situation of the seal rupturing from the inside."

He tapped the center of the circle with his broken staff.

"The eye of the formation requires a Nighthawks of Sequence 6 or higher to preside over it. Using this as the core, we will absorb and divert all the destructive impact of the fragment's descent to avoid affecting the entire city."

"All spiritual impact will converge at the eye of the formation and be dispersed to the uninhabited areas in the suburbs along the drainage pipe network and the Hoi River system. The cost is that the person presiding over the center of the formation must withstand the entire first wave of impact."

"I'll do it."

"You guard the perimeter and strictly prevent any pollutants from leaking out via the impact."

As his voice fell, Old Neil straightened his body, leaned on his broken staff, and stepped into the center of the formation diagram step by step.

A cool night breeze blew, causing his graying short hair to stand on end.

Lu Li followed closely behind and stepped into the range of the reverse formation diagram.

He crouched at the edge of the circle's center and pressed the fragment of the worm of time he carried with him tightly against the stone bricks.

The fragment resonated, precisely locking onto the coordinates of the Spirit World fragment.

At the same time, the spiritual tentacles of the Marauder Pathway quietly extended, attempting to steal and divert a small portion of the descending impact force.

Even if it was only a small amount, it could share the heavy pressure for Old Neil at the center of the formation.

On the perimeter of the formation, Daly held her hands suspended in the air.

Fine spiritual tentacles extended through the cracks in the stone bricks deep into the underground pipe network, leaving subtle spiritual markers at every pipe junction, firmly locking onto the diversion trajectory of the shockwave to prevent any possibility of energy deviation or leakage.

The next moment, the fragment officially descended.

The sky of Tingen suddenly split open, revealing a huge rift that spanned the entire city.

Deep within the rift was a pure, deep dark red.

That color was as if the pupil of the giant eye deep inside Chanis Gate had been magnified ten million times, hanging heavily above the world, overlooking the earth.

A thick and majestic pillar of dark red light fell vertically from the center of the rift, carrying a terrifying spiritual impact capable of collapsing the foundations of the entire city, and slammed into the main gate of Chanis Gate.

Old Neil slammed the remains of his staff into the stone bricks at the center of the formation.

The thousands of runes of the reverse formation diagram lit up instantly, and a dazzling silvery-white light burst forth from the center of the circle, spreading in all directions and condensing into a huge rune shield above the main gate.

The moment the pillar of light collided with the shield, all of Tingen trembled violently.

The gas street lamps on Iron Cross Street were all snapped in half, the stone pavement of Zoutland Street split open with a long, narrow trench, and the surface of the Hoi River surged, raising a huge wall of water several meters high.

The rune shield shattered layer by layer under the pressure of the terrifying pillar of light.

With every shattering, Old Neil's body would tremble violently, and dark red blood foam would constantly overflow from the corners of his mouth.

But the shattered runes were reborn and re-formed in an instant.

He gripped the broken staff tightly, using all his strength to continuously channel the violently raging spiritual pressure into the drainage pipe network, diverting it to the Hoi River system and the uninhabited areas of the northern suburbs highlands.

"Hold on!"

Daly's shout came from the edge of the formation, carrying a strained hoarseness.

Her spiritual tentacles were tracking the flow of the impact within the pipe network in real-time, constantly confirming the status: "All diversion pipe pressures are controllable! Hold on for a few more minutes!"

Lu Li gritted his teeth and pressed the fragment of the worm of time with all his might.

The spiritual tentacles of the Marauder broke through the barrier, probed into the core area of the fragment's descent, and frantically stole the scattered impact force.

All the intercepted energy was poured along the anchor points beneath his feet into the old Sealed Artifact pedestal buried deep underground.

The long-dormant remnants of the seal were activated one by one, expanding layer by layer, constantly increasing the energy capacity limit.

Extreme spiritual burning swept through his entire body, and every spiritual circuit felt as if it were being stirred by red-hot iron, the pain piercing to the bone.

But he could clearly perceive that the terrifying force pressing on Old Neil's shield was steadily decreasing.

The shockwave raged crazily above the formation diagram, and he did not know how long it lasted.

The stone bricks beneath Old Neil's feet had long since completely shattered, with rubble piling up, and he was buried up to his knees.

Even so, he gripped the broken staff with both hands, never once relaxing, firmly supporting the rune shield that was on the verge of breaking.

When the momentum of the pillar of light finally slowly diminished, the three innermost core layers of the reverse formation diagram had been completely destroyed.

The remaining half of the seal log on Old Neil's chest fluttered in the night wind.

Eventually, the last wisp of the violent impact flowed along the pipe network and was completely discharged into the uninhabited area downstream of the Hoi River.

Daly's spiritual tentacles confirmed that the danger had completely dissipated, and she said hoarsely: "The shockwave has completely dissipated."

Confirming that all the impact had been diverted, Old Neil slowly released his hands from the broken staff and collapsed exhaustedly into the pile of rubble.

He looked up at the sky above Chanis Gate, where the hideous dark red rift was slowly healing and closing.

Then he lowered his head, looked at the broken staff fragments in his palm, and exhaled a long breath of stale air.

The earth-shattering turmoil came to an end, and Tingen City fell into a deathly silence.

The streets were a mess, with broken street lamps, cracked roads, and old apartments with collapsed walls, everywhere showing the aftermath of the impact.

Fortunately, none of the more than three thousand residents of the slum area who had been evacuated to the northern suburbs highlands in advance were injured or killed.

The northern suburbs highlands were high, perfectly isolating the aftermath of the impact from the water system and pipe network.

Old Neil's reverse formation diagram had firmly locked all danger within the core area of Chanis Gate, without affecting the civilian evacuation point in the slightest.

The crisis was completely resolved, and Daly retracted her spiritual tentacles that covered the whole city, leaned against the Pumping Station stone pillar, and slowly slid to the ground helplessly.

She closed her eyes lightly, the residual spiritual light on her body flickering slightly, sensing the state of the entire city.

The frightened people in the northern suburbs were huddled together, but no one was hurt.

Although a few wooden sheds in the East Borough slum had collapsed, the residents had long since evacuated in advance, leaving it empty.

The foul pollutants remaining in the pipe network on the outskirts of Chanis Gate were also completely eliminated under the aftermath of the reverse formation diagram and the purification of holy water.

A crisis that could have destroyed Tingen and wiped out the city was thus quelled.