Chapter 730: Spire Ascension (I)
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"Dear finalists, before you is the Ascension Spire!"
Paul’s voice rang in the ears of the finalists. He gestured grandly at the gigantic spire before them, floating in the void.
The spire looked even more intimidating and out of this world in person. Cedric himself was impressed by the sheer scale of this thing.
He had been inspecting this strange piece of architecture since they arrived, and he’s been stumped, much to his surprise.
His eyes, the very eyes that could stare upon the complex patterns of concept laws without causing any backlash whatsoever, couldn’t even see through this thing.
Cedric had no idea what kind of materials were used to create this thing, yet at the same time, he could also confirm that this thing was neither man-made nor something born from a natural phenomenon. Something else entirely created this thing, and nobody knows what.
He could also confirm that this spire was indeed the very thing that’s causing every other mutation happening in this solar system. The fact that this realm doesn’t stay still is because the spire itself doesn’t stay still. Somehow, the spire bound this entire solar system to itself.
How it achieved that is a mystery that Cedric’s eyes can’t see through. It didn’t matter how hard he strained his eyes; nothing was showing up.
"This is where the final round of the tournament will take place." Lisa’s voice returned his consciousness to the present.
"It has already been explained to you how the final round works, so we won’t bother repeating ourselves. I’m sure that all of you, including our dear audience, have been waiting long enough for this to begin."
"So! Without any further ado, we hereby announce that the final round of Heavenly Star Chaos Realm’s Millennial Tournament begins now!"
As soon as Paul and Lisa made the announcement, a change occurred on the spire behind them.
A vertical line of golden light appeared at the side facing them. This line then expanded to a mass of swirling portal that sucked in air as it existed. Threads of golden light also flowed through the body of the spire, lighting it up just a smidge to emphasize this change.
"Finalists, you may now enter. Best of luck to all of you."
Paul and Lisa made way for the finalists.
As soon as they did, a few of the finalists started walking forward to enter the spire. Cedric was amongst them.
As he approached the entrance, he could feel the heated stares of his fellow finalists, causing a small grin to form at the corners of his lips.
He could almost hear their thoughts:
’Dawnbringer, you won’t be dominating this round anymore.’
’Filthy commoner, this is where your lucky streak ends.’
’The difficulty is customized. Dawnbringer’s strength should be his downfall in this stage. Finally, we have a chance to outrank him! ’
’I need to perform better than this commoner. I can’t afford to shame my sect anymore than I’ve already done.’
’I hope to make it out of this alive.’
’Do your best, and don’t die. That’s the plan, plain and simple.’
’I wonder what’s on the other side? ’
Cedric can’t really deny that he seems to be at a disadvantage here. With the difficulty customized to his strength, his foes are bound to be more difficult than what others would face.
However, it’s still too early to say that he’d fail. One wouldn’t know unless they personally entered. And that’s precisely why Cedric was going in now.
As he got close enough to the spire, a strong attraction pulled him in. If he really didn’t want to go in, he could’ve resisted it, but that wasn’t his intention, so he let it claim him.
Fwoosh!
Light engulfed his consciousness for a few moments.
When he finally came to, he realized that he had been transported inside the spire.
He stood on a large and strange-looking platform. He’s completely by himself. The platform he’s on seemed to be formed from haphazardly fused cubes that floated in the middle of nowhere.
Looking around, he could see smaller platforms like these scattered everywhere too. Interestingly enough, the platforms seemed to be covered with grains that had a magnetic look in them. It’s like someone folded a combination of two or three unknown types of metals to create these cubes, forming these strange grainy patterns on their surface.
Aside from these strange grainy patterns and cubic platforms, the surroundings were dark and gloomy.
He seems to be inside a dead space. It wasn’t so dark that he couldn’t see anything, but there are also no traces of life here except himself. The atmosphere was depressing and maybe hostile to living creatures too.
Zwoon!
A sharp and piercing whistle startled him out of his thoughts. The sound was emitted not too far from him. It was caused by one of the cubes on the platform rising up.
After this lone cube rose, it spun. First slowly, then faster and faster until it turned into a blur of motion. Then, it burst into smaller cubes that formed a unique shape.
The cube turned into a smaller platform and an altar. Then, it emitted a light, which formed words of a language Cedric had never seen before.
This is where his unique talent, Allspeak, showed its brilliance again, because he was able to understand and read this language that he had never seen before.
However, something else happened. On top of this strange language, letters and words of human language were imposed. It seems that there was a built-in translator in the system of this thing.
Cedric didn’t really need it, but it’s nice to have.
The message simply said, ’Please stand on this platform and altar to begin the scan.’
It turns out to be a set of instructions. Cedric had no complaints, so he did what it said.
He approached and stood on the platform and the altar. Moments later, golden light blossomed from beneath. It formed a disc that passed through his body.
Cedric felt this scan going deeply into his body and instinctively resisted. It couldn’t be helped; he’s not used to such intrusive scans. Everybody in his realm and age would take offense to this and would probably react the same.
However, that didn’t stop the scene from probing deeply. Cedric doubted that he could’ve done any better resistance against this thing because before he knew it, the scan was over.
The words on the side flashed and changed. It now said:
’Scan complete. You may now step down from the platform and the altar and wait for the beginning of your ascent.’
Had it not been for Paul and Lisa explaining how this thing works, he would’ve been so confused at this point.
The system of this spire offered no explanation, no reason, nothing. It just assumed that everybody who came in here was supposed to ascend the spire as far as they could. It might even be forcing them to do so.
He could easily understand the confusion this caused for those who just discovered this place and were accidentally sucked in here. Anybody would think that this spire will kill them because it didn’t even offer a way out.
Fortunately, Cedric has been given context of what to expect in here.
He did as he was told. He got off the platform and waited for the indication of his ascent.
And that occurred in the form of the main platform shaking out of nowhere. It was followed by golden lights flashing in the surroundings, then converging into a single node, which then turned into a portal.
Above that portal, the words written in the same alien language, with a translation applied on top, say:
’1st Floor’
There was no additional information given. It’s like this thing was expecting the climbers to use their common sense for the rest.
"Well, let’s see how this goes," Cedric mused loudly to himself.
Then, he walked into the portal.
Once again, bright light engulfed his consciousness for a brief moment. When he regained his consciousness, he found himself standing in the middle of a ruined battlefield.
Surrounding him were numerous wreckages of burnt and destroyed buildings that seemed to have been in this state for a long period of time.
Roar!
A deep and aggressive roar caused him to become alert. Turning his head, he saw a massive beast prowling at a distance.
It was a mutated saber-tooth. Its eyes were scarlet red, and its skin was a combination of mud brown and black flame stripes. Its body was huge, larger than the ruined buildings around him, and the beast’s killing intent seems to be manifesting in reality due to how potent it was.
"Ah, you smelled me already. Clever cat," Cedric mused to himself.
All points led him to believe that he was supposed to either defeat or kill this thing to clear this stage. If this trial was asking him for something else, then it’s doing a poor job of doing so because there’s literally no further information provided anywhere.
At least nowhere he could see.
But forget about that; he’s got a big cat deal to do. And by the looks of it, this kitty didn’t like him at all.