Chapter 263: The Disappearing Aberrations

Over the next ten days, Jiang Jiang Qinge and Li Luo's two squads went all out, directly conquering three Level Two Purification Towers in succession; during this period, they also traveled back and forth to the Purification Outpost twice to restock supplies.

The difficulty of a Level Two Purification Tower far surpasses that of a Level One.

During the fierce battles of this period, Li Luo and his two companions never had a moment of relaxation, because White Erosion-class Aberrations roamed everywhere around these Level Two Purification Towers.

Moreover, the Aberrations devour each other, so the White Erosion-class Aberrations that remain around a Level Two Purification Tower are the elite among them, with strength generally not inferior to the Third Mark.

If the Justice Squad had not achieved a massive breakthrough in the Dark Spirit Pool, Li Luo felt that, given their strength, they would have been unable to take a single step around these Level Two Purification Towers.

Furthermore, upon entering the range of the Level Two Purification Towers, even the "Black Swan Squad" began to take things seriously, no longer able to be as casual as they were when facing Level One Purification Towers before.

Therefore, many times, Li Luo and his three companions could only rely on their own strength to deal with the Aberrations they encountered, after all, they did not want to truly become a burden to Jiang Jiang Qinge and the others.

During the activation of these three Level Two Purification Towers, the most dangerous moment for Li Luo's squad was encountering a White Erosion-class Aberration with strength reaching the Fifth Mark of the Life Mark stage.

This Aberration already showed signs of evolving into the Red Erosion class, even stronger by several degrees than the Eight-Armed Aberration evolved from the Human-Skin Aberration they had met before.

At that time, to eliminate this Fifth Mark-strength White Erosion-class Aberration, all three of Li Luo's squad suffered injuries, and only through exquisite cooperation were they finally able to successfully slay it.

This counts as the strongest Aberration the Justice Squad has eliminated alone since entering the Dark Cave.

Worth mentioning is that in this battle, Student Xin Fu finally completed the breakthrough he had not achieved in the Dark Spirit Pool, successfully breaking through to the Second Mark of the Life Mark stage, raising the squad's strength once again.

The three of them had previously thought about whether they could slay a Red Erosion-class Aberration, but after experiencing this Fifth Mark-strength White Erosion-class Aberration, their somewhat inflated hearts began to settle down a bit.

The Dark Cave is too dangerous; better to play it safe if possible.

Before a cliff.

Jiang Jiang Qinge stood with her sword planted, her slender figure graceful, a short azure cape fluttering lightly in the wind, her long legs beneath the battle skirt slender and straight, the subtle lines between them flexible and agile, yet her aura at this moment was excessively cold, caused by the massive slaughter over this period.

In these ten days, the number of Aberrations she personally beheaded was several times more than Li Luo and his three companions combined.

Slaying so many Aberrations makes one easily infected by the power of evil thoughts; normally, a disciple who has killed so many Aberrations would probably need to meditate in seclusion at the Purification Outpost for a long time to cleanse this infection before continuing to go out on missions.

But relying on the dominance of the Ninth Grade Brightness Phase, Jiang Jiang Qinge was completely unafraid of infection by the power of evil thoughts, sweeping through everything, with only her temperament becoming slightly more murderous for a short time.

Li Luo, Senior Qiu Bai, Tian Tian, and others all stood behind Jiang Jiang Qinge.

The aura of Li Luo and his three companions had also changed compared to before, becoming somewhat deep and sharp, after all, they had entered the Dark Cave for over half a month, and the dangers they experienced during this period were probably far greater than those of the previous dozen years.

At some moments, there was even danger to their lives.

After all, Aberrations are not kind; once they catch a flaw, they will make you pay an extremely heavy price.

At this moment, the group was all gazing at the front of the cliff; it was a plain, and in the center of that plain, a ruined ruin could be seen, where thick black fog that made people feel uncomfortable permeated everything, occasionally emitting mournful sounds from within, making one's hair stand on end.

This was a Level Two Purification Tower, and the evil thought pollution within its range was even more intense than the several Level Two Purification Towers Li Luo and the others had seen before.

"This Level Two Purification Tower is already considered to be in the outer perimeter area of the Purification Outpost; as long as we clear this Purification Tower, we will not be far from the Level Three Purification Tower that is our final goal."

Jiang Jiang Qinge's clear, cold voice came through, causing the hearts of the people, which had been suppressed by the permeating evil thought pollution, to relax slightly.

"However, entering the outer perimeter area means the Aberrations here will also become stronger," Tian Tian solemnly warned.

Jiang Jiang Qinge nodded, pondered slightly for a moment, and said, "For this Level Two Purification Tower, we might change our plan this time."

"This time, we will not clear step by step first and then activate the Purification Tower..."

She turned her head to look at Li Luo and the others, saying, "This time we will do the opposite, directly concentrating our strength to push to the location of the Level Two Purification Tower, and then activate it."

Hearing this, Li Luo's eyes narrowed slightly, saying, "If we do this, we will then attract all the Aberrations in this area to launch an attack on us."

Jiang Jiang Qinge nodded, saying, "This is close to the outer perimeter area, and many nameless Aberrations wander in the outer perimeter, so if we are to fight, we need to end it as quickly as possible; otherwise, attracting some wandering powerful Aberrations will also increase our risks."

"And solving it all at once is the fastest method."

"Of course, this so-called 'all at once' does not mean we really rely on our two squads to withstand the siege of so many Aberrations."

Jiang Jiang Qinge took out a scroll from her bosom; the scroll's surface was rough, the material the same as the maps they held, presumably also forged from the bark of the Power Force Tree.

"This is an Isolation Scroll; previously when we returned to the outpost, I exchanged for it at the Exchange Point."

"As long as we reach the Level Two Purification Tower, we can unfold this object; it will form a ring of isolation light shield, and the light shield will block all Aberrations below the Red Erosion class from entering; at this time, as long as we eliminate the Aberrations that break into the isolation shield, we can delay the time until the Purification Tower is fully activated."

"And as soon as the Purification Tower is activated, the purification halo will erupt, and all Aberrations in this area will be erased."

Li Luo finally realized; so there was this thing, then this plan was indeed feasible, except for one point: the isolation shield can only block Aberrations below the Red Erosion class, which means that the Aberrations entering the isolation shield at that time will basically be of the Red Erosion class.

This made Li Luo's expression more serious; this indicated that this time, they would very likely have to face true Red Erosion-class Aberrations directly.

This is absolutely going to be a fierce battle.

Jiang Jiang Qinge's gaze looked at Li Luo and his three companions, saying, "As for the Aberrations entering the isolation shield at that time, we will try our best to eliminate them as quickly as possible; you three stand before the Purification Tower as the final barrier."

This obviously placed the three of them in the rear, also meaning letting them bear the least pressure.

Li Luo and his three companions nodded; this was not the time to show off.

Jiang Jiang Qinge acted with lightning speed; after a simple deployment, she said no more, slowly tightened her jade hand on the hilt of the heavy sword, leaped with her slender body, and directly swept down from the cliff.

Behind her, Tian Tian, Senior Qiu Bai, and Li Luo's three-person squad immediately followed.

The group rushed across the plain.

After a while, they approached the location of the ruins shrouded in thick black fog.

Both teams guarded their minds closely, their bodies' Power Force circulating, maintaining high alertness, and then directly charged into this heavily polluted area.

However, what made them somewhat shocked was that when they broke into this severely polluted area, the expected tidal wave of attacks did not appear.

In fact, not a single Aberration appeared before their eyes.

The black fog surged around them; it was clearly so cold and uncomfortable, yet there was an extremely eerie silence.

Facing this situation, even Jiang Jiang Qinge was stunned for a moment.

"What is going on? The evil thought pollution here is clearly so severe, how could there not be a single Aberration?" Tian Tian could not help but exclaim in surprise and doubt.

Li Luo and his three companions looked at each other, also feeling strange about this scene.

With this degree of evil thought pollution, normally Aberrations should be roaming everywhere; how could it be so empty and silent...

"Abnormality implies evil; be on guard."

Jiang Jiang Qinge pondered slightly, warned everyone, and then said, "Regardless, let's go to the Purification Tower first and see if we can activate it directly."

Hearing this, the others also nodded.

Thus, the group pressed onward with even greater caution, threading carefully through the thick black fog. The fog was viscous and chilling, saturated with countless malicious thoughts, and the moment it touched them, it stirred restlessness and gave rise to a swarm of evil intentions within their hearts.

The two squads trudged forward through the pitch-black mire, yet everywhere they passed, it was eerily quiet, still meeting with no obstruction of any kind.

But it was precisely this very smoothness that instead left them with an inexplicable unease.

In this bizarre dark cavern, the more things deviated from the norm, the more it filled one with dread.

In the end, the group passed through the black fog and arrived before that second-tier Purification Tower.

They stared at the Purification Tower before them, which emanated a faint, soft glow, and felt a touch of disorientation — they had actually reached here without encountering the slightest obstacle?

Moreover, where were the aberrations in these ruins?

How could they have vanished so cleanly?

If it were not for the fact that the Purification Tower before them had yet to be activated, they would have suspected that some other squad had reached here ahead of them and cleared out this entire area.

But with the Purification Tower still unactivated, that meant it wasn't another squad...

Then, where had the aberrations here gone?