Chapter 1077: False Fourth Stage

In the ultimate light, an unsurpassable aura rose steadily.

Slowly clenching his fist, Lin An felt a strange awe at the nearly berserk spiritual energy surging within him.

For the first time, he discovered he could not precisely control his power.

On the system interface, the numbers for the four attributes spiked madly, only barely halting after leaping to the 99‑point mark.

Although he had thought absorbing emotional energy would surge his power, Lin An never imagined the enhancement speed would be so outrageous.

Without doubt, he even felt that a light punch alone—without using any spiritual energy—could smash half a plaza, releasing a destructive attack via pure physical strength.

What kind of power is this?

Third Stage peak or Fourth Stage!?!

No, it should be a False Fourth Stage! In the incomprehensible flood of information, his instinctive consciousness seemed to answer him.

In the same shock, Lin An suddenly realized he had vastly underestimated the terror of the Fourth Stage. In his past life he had never seen a Fourth Stage act. All information about the Fourth Stage was top secret, so he could only infer it from the battle scenes of the Six Kings.

But at this moment.

Feeling an almost invincible power, Lin An actually became somewhat obsessed.

It seemed that with a single thought he could crush the surrounding Third Stage, and if he wished he could instantly burst forth at over 7 Mach, the wind pressure alone enough to crush masses of Awakened Ones.

This was a transcendence of life's level.

Is it because... the absorbed emotional power came from a Third Stage?

Recalling his previous experiments, Lin An was certain that the earlier absorption effects had never been this good.

Before he could feel more, a thunderous crack of shattering brick and stone interrupted his thoughts.

Only seen beneath the double‑headed dragon, a large group of Soviet High Level who had originally prepared to greet him now seemed to bear immense pressure, struggling to hold on.

Everyone's face turned pallid; the weaker among them were even forced to hunch over, as if a ten‑thousand‑jin weight pressed on their bodies.

He gasped heavily, breathing with difficulty.

As the one closest to Lin An, Tel felt at this moment as if every pore of his body were trembling.

Under the superimposition of dual auras, every cell in his body wailed, his instincts urging him to flee immediately.

This is a monster! Run!

Like primitive humans facing an ancient beast, the instinctive fear hidden in their will was aroused.

Incomprehensible, unimaginable, unbelievable.

At this moment, "Raine" seemed to them to truly incarnate as an unsurpassable deity, bringing them immense shock.

How could this be, so terrifying!?

They had clearly seen Lin An once before he set out. Though fearsome then, his aura was like a concealed assassin's blade in a cloth bag.

But now they only felt as if they were facing the sun.

Their own spiritual energy before this sun was like a puddle compared to an ocean.

With such a huge gap, they could no longer discern "Raine"'s true strength.

Moreover, the double‑headed flame dragon reaching a height of a hundred meters filled them with overwhelming shock.

This mythic‑like creature actually appeared to be Lord Raine's summoned beast!?

With difficulty raising their heads, many Third Stage Awakened Ones gazed at the double‑headed dragon's body, momentarily doubting life itself.

They probably couldn't even defeat this terrifying creature.

Just how great is the power gap between them and Raine? Though both are Awakened Ones, why does it feel like they are two different species?

Instinctively, they felt as if they had returned to the trial tower, to that worldwide‑shocking slaughter.

When Lin An once crushed all Awakened Ones, they felt the same way. But they never expected that, when they again felt helpless, it would be against Awakened Ones from their own war zone. Moreover, now it is clearly even more disempowering than before.

"Raine.. Lord"

The voice squeezed out from his throat, Tel suppressing the urge to flee, his expression bitter:

"You.."

"Dismiss your summoned beast.."

He really didn't want to say it, but they could barely endure it! Especially the government‑side high level, whose strength was already lacking, now almost trembled at close range facing Raine.

It had nothing to do with courage; pure oppression was too great to bear.

Noticing that further increasing his strength might literally crush the few low‑rank individuals, Lin An silently halted the emotional absorption.

Of course, the time for emotional absorption was also nearly up, and it seemed to have hit a bottleneck.

As the light gradually faded, Lin An slowly suppressed his fully released aura back into his body, whereupon everyone present broke out in cold sweat and gasped heavily.

In their gazes at Raine, besides lingering shock there was also a hint of wild joy.

No matter how strong or terrifying Raine is, he is still one of ours!

Many Soviet High Level noticed Lin An standing on the opposite side, their hearts suddenly swelling with pride.

Under that recent might, the Lin An who once seemed powerful in their eyes now looked like an ant beside a giant, and thus not so frightening.

Did you see that!? Lin An!

This is the Soviet's strongest!

Thinking of how Lin An had been silent and reserved since arriving, everyone present instantly imagined how shocking he had been in the Red Tower disaster, and how, under "fear", he had assisted Lord Raine in completing the mission!

Overwhelmed with emotion, Tel, as the representative, gazed longingly at Lin An:

"Lord Raine! You.. have you already reached Fourth Stage!?"

Although theory says a Fourth Stage would have a global announcement, given what they just saw they really couldn't believe a Third Stage could display such terror.

"Third Stage peak, or rather.."

"False Fourth Stage."

He had no intention of pretending to be Fourth Stage; Lin An replied gently. Naturally, if you're going to pretend, you go all out.

It doesn't matter what rank one claims to be; in any case, the power one shows is already terrifying enough. The Soviet war zone, if not foolish, will surely raise his importance again.

Third stage... peak?!

False Fourth Stage!!

Muttering to oneself, lost in a daze.

Although they didn't get an answer about the Fourth Stage, upon hearing Lin An declare that False Fourth Stage, everyone still couldn't contain their excitement.

False Fourth Stage— that's just one step away, isn't it? Our Soviet war zone will soon have a Fourth Stage?!