Inside The Black Mist

With its attacks being futile, the Propagator retracted its tentacles.

Tianyang bent his body, lowered his center of gravity, and bent into a running posture.

As his body leaned forward, the scene in his vision became blurred. The tunnel, the walls, the Pillar of Star—everything turned into a colorful stream of light in the eyes of the young man.

When he stopped, what appeared in front was the Propagator's back!

The expression on the face of the ”woman” was dull. Just moments ago, the young man on the other side had disappeared. It was about to search for Tianyang’s body but suddenly its entire body shook.

A jet of blood sprayed out from under the cloak, forming a blade-like shape from the coagulating blood, seemingly due to some rule of force.

After a momentary pause, the power that bound the blood dissipated, and the black, petroleum-like blood spilled onto the ground.

A hand pierced through the Propagator's chest in the form of a palm blade.

It was Tianyang’s hand.

The young man appeared behind it and broke the Propagator's body with a single blow.

However, this severe injury didn’t bother it at all. It probed out its tentacles and pierced them into the wall of the tunnel.

With a shake, its tentacles dragged themselves away from Tianyang’s hand. The tentacles stretched infinitely like rubber, allowing the Propagator to sway to the dome of the tunnel.

The mysterious creature suddenly contracted its body to a point, and its flesh and organs folded, increasing in density. In an instant, the Propagator appeared in a perfectly spherical posture.

The Propagator, with its cloak sliding off, leaped like a bullet toward Tianyang, using its two tentacles for support. The ball-shaped object sprayed out dense black mist halfway through, covering its surface, fluttering like a flame.

The ball of dark flame rushed towards Tianyang at high speed, but Tianyang had already dodged it. The tunnel trembled violently as it fell to the ground like a cannonball.

The ground split into fragments, and a ball of black flame swept through the sand that erupted like a geyser, turning it into chunks of black crystal that eventually dropped to the ground.

The young man reappeared next to the Pillar of Star. Tianyang placed his hand on the trunk and pressed his five fingers into the hard crystals.

When he lifted his hand again, he pulled out a large piece of star marrow crystals. These crystals were quickly assembled under the influence of certain rules, forming a crystalline long sword that joined Tianyang’s palm.

The young man lightly pressed his palm on the sword and wiped it. Inside the crystal, hair-thin threads gradually lit up.

By the time the dark, fiery sphere appeared again, extending its tentacles to lift itself higher, the crystalline long sword in Tianyang’s palm was already glowing brightly.

From a distance, the young man appeared to be holding the starry sky!

Dark flames roared, full of power, as they sprang forward!

Tianyang lifted the sword, and the starry sky spread out.

A silver light appeared in the tunnel. This beam of light splits the tunnel in two.

It passed through the dark mist ball, and where it passed was the center of the dark ball, accurate to the millimeter!

Time seemed to pause at that moment.

The black mist on the surface of the dark ball opened up as soon as it touched the silver-white light, revealing the sphere wrapped in black mist.

The silver wire slid over the sphere and entered the other side of the tunnel wall.

The sphere's surface, as well as an organ hidden within the sphere, split up smoothly like a cheese.

The surface of the sphere immediately spewed out a ring of blood.

The organ at the center, which had been emitting orange light, suddenly flickered like a candle in the wind and quickly went out.

The organ was the Propagator's will cage.

With the will cage shattered, the life of the Propagator came to an end.

The shattered sphere fell to the ground and slipped out for more than ten meters, leaving a trail of thick, ink-like black stains on the tunnel floor.

At this moment, the rumbling made by the silver wire entering the wall was still pushing forward. If one looked through the cracks in the wall, one could see the silver light line pushing forward like a tide.

No one knew how far away it went before the energy finally disappeared. If someone ever dug up the city's foundations in the future, they would discover a kilometer-long ground fault near the tunnel!

The Propagator's flesh was rotting and decomposing. After just a few seconds, the ground was left with only a patch of black matter, like mold.

The starlight in Tianyang’s eyes dimmed. The energy flowing in his body slowly subsided. What also subsided was the external signal that had just returned to its main body, lightly touching the young man's nerves.

It was sending a signal.

So Tianyang opened his lips and released the information carried by that signal in human language, "Transcend...evolve...grow...my apostle..."

The last syllable had just passed through his lips when the young man fell to the ground like a puppet.

It was unclear how much time had passed before Tianyang slowly woke up.

He sat up and shook his head to clear his mind.

Glancing around, remnants of the destruction remained. The young man was stunned and had no idea what had just happened.

But it was fortunate that the Propagator had disappeared. That was third-degree danger from the dark creatures. It was amazing that he had survived something like this; he must have had a lot of luck!

Wait!

Tianyang suddenly remembered that before he lost consciousness, he seemed to have been injected with something by the Propagator.

He quickly took off his protective suit and carefully checked himself, but found nothing unusual except for a pattern on the back of his right hand.

A sickle in the shape of a crescent was held by a hazy hand made of black flames. On the blade of the sickle was a symbol, 1.

What is this?

As soon as this thought rose in his heart, a cold voice sounded in the young man’s ear, “This is the level emblem of Avenger!”

Tianyang was startled and looked around. "Who? Who is talking?"

No one answered.

Avenger? Level?

While pondering these two keywords, some information appeared in his mind.

[Avenger level

Rank 1: Assassin

Rank ability: Weakness induction, Instantaneous killing

Sublimation progress: 14%

Next rank: Obliterator]

The tunnel was silent.

Tianyang stood still like a sculpture next to the Pillar of Star.

The young man's heart was filled with waves of shock!

I…

I became an Ascender?

Avenger level? It seemed that there was no such type among the current levels announced by the fortress.

Could it be a new level?

Ascender…

Ascender!

"Haha..."

The young man couldn't help but burst into laughter, but quickly covered his mouth. Tianyang didn't want to attract any more mysterious things because of laughter.

But he still couldn't help being overjoyed. After all, the identity of an Ascender represented too many things.

One of them was that it would let Tianyang experience a completely new life. He could give his mother a better life and demand justice from Qin Wu, who held the status of a higher citizen.

The problems that troubled him in the past were all solved in front of the word "Ascender!"