Chapter 386: Battle of the Sandbox (6)

Knowing it was unwise, she had no other choice at this moment; she could only take one step at a time. Her energy was currently only enough to launch a few more High-level Magic attacks. If she continued to adopt a defensive posture and wasted energy on a Shield, the result of being continuously attacked by that massive monster would only be her own depletion, waiting for Du Zhengyi to come and harvest her.

Once she shook off this monster, she should find a way to leave this place quickly, and incidentally, shake off that monster named Du Zhengyi. She had begun to be wary of him; defeating him on his own turf might not be easy.

She refocused her attention and began to use another High-level Magic, drawing upon the energy existing within the Sandbox; even a monster as massive as a train could be easily torn apart. However, although she called it easy, it was, after all, extremely energy-intensive—something she herself could not actually afford. No matter what kind of Great Mage it was, or what kind of heaven-shaking power they could produce, this power did not come from the Mage themselves, but the Mage themselves possessed the power necessary to invoke that strength.

Possessing the power required to invoke it, and knowing the magic spells and Secret Language—these were the two necessary factors that constituted a Mage.

Now, the power contained within her body was ready; she knew all the magic spells, and in this particular magic, she did not need the Secret Language. Yi Wa had prepared everything, then opened the Magic Shield protecting herself; this power was too strong, and the Shield would interfere with the casting.

The moment the Shield opened wide, a bone-chilling cold wind poured in violently; the blizzard seemed to fill this world. This Sandbox must have been manufactured based on the form of the apocalypse. She cursed the weirdos who made these Sandboxes back then, cursed their twisted sense of humor. She also cursed Du Zhengyi; she whispered a trace of a vicious Curse into her Attack Magic. Du Zhengyi was a Mage capable of channeling; if he were currently connected to that deformed monster, then the intent of this Curse would flow along the monster's consciousness into his own, drilling into his Consciousness Barrier to reach the depths of his spirit. She was thirty percent sure of this.

The magic attacking the monster was merely a grand facade, covering the Old Mage's ancient Curse. This reminded her of the wars of the past, and her spirit became excited; before the Great Extinction, war was like a grand game that exhausted one's wits. Today's humans spent all this passion on reality shows, on entertainment unto death. In her era, under the ancient Triumphal Arch, they played another, more glorious game. They once blew up stars just to transmit a faint Curse; their ancient warships once sailed in the sky; they did not hesitate to destroy their own fleets to win a strategic advantage on the chessboard of war.

Yi Wa missed those years; she missed the feeling of blood boiling, and she missed the pleasure of utilizing wisdom to the extreme.

She stared at the storm-ravaged sky; the monster driving the train dove toward her once again. She could clearly see its tasteless face. She waited—one second, two seconds... The gale became silent in her ears, and her heart sank; the magnificent magical scene she expected did not appear. Not to mention the Curse meant to ambush Du Zhengyi's consciousness, even the frontal attack she summoned had not materialized.

What was going on?

She still had one second to close her Shield, otherwise that brainless monster would dive and crash into her again. This time it would smash a huge pit into the ground, and she would be cushioned at the bottom of the pit, body and soul destroyed.

Yi Wa pondered during this approximate one-second interval, considering the characteristics of this place as a whole, and reconsidering why Du Zhengyi would use such a Sandbox.

The size of a Sandbox itself had no fixed limit, but most Sandboxes were not very large. For her, she might choose a Sandbox the size of a room; that was also the most common, most suitable for releasing poison gas. There were also Sandboxes containing a maze, a village, a street, or a small hillside, but usually, they were not larger than that.

But this place was clearly much larger than those; there were mountain peaks here, even a towering snow-capped mountain, and one could not see where the boundary was even from the top of the mountain.

The existence of this Sandbox was also for the purpose of raising monsters, and to serve as a battlefield when necessary. To hold a monster the size of a train, accommodate their tons of weight, and provide them with the ability to fly—they certainly couldn't just rely on wings to stir up the wind. Thinking of more dangerous possibilities, there might be more than one such monster here.

The size of the space here must be quite considerable, so this Sandbox had a problem—the energy to maintain its normal existence must be enormous. The amount of energy a Progenitor Mage could create had a fixed limit; from the time of their most prosperous period, the ability to create magical energy had been continuously weakening. The energy maintaining this place was not infinite; from a practical perspective, to distribute it evenly, there must inevitably be a weakening, or... a limitation.

The earliest Sandboxes were game boxes for weirdos; games all had their own rules, and the Sandbox was no exception. The rules of the game were always varied. The specific rule here must be an energy rule; in order to maintain the stability of the game field and uphold the order of the game, this place might have restricted a certain type of magic. It had canceled the response to a portion of high-energy-consumption magic from the Underlying Magic Spell of the Sandbox; the magic she summoned did not receive a response from this world, and thus she could not use the energy of this Sandbox to create a distorting, tearing attack.

Du Zhengyi had almost forced her into a dead end.

She could consider trying magic with lower energy consumption, but the monster's size was truly too large; she suspected that ordinary attacks would cause very limited damage to it. This was an ice and snow world; it was possible that the game rules restricted the use of fire-type magic. She could try one after another, but for an Old Mage like her who was also battle-hardened, she could deduce the results of the tests according to war logic. The magic that could actually be used must be very strange and not easily thought of; she would only be exhausted in this war, becoming increasingly desperate, and finally, her mental power would become weaker and weaker.

Du Zhengyi would eventually come to harvest his enemy; at best, he truly never underestimated his enemies. He did not fear the Progenitor Mage, and he indeed had the confidence to back it up.

However, she did not like this process. She never liked being passive; in the war modes she was familiar with, she seized the initiative every single time.

It was the same now; she stood quietly, not attempting any more attacks, nor closing her Shield.

All wars were built on the understanding of the enemy. Through Luo Qi's memories, she understood Du Zhengyi. He was different from those War Machines first created by the Progenitor Mages; true War Machines never fought for themselves; they only obeyed orders, playing their due roles on the battlefield and at key points in strategy. They had to control themselves well, executing the necessary tasks only according to orders. This self-control was not just as simple as controlling oneself not to feel the pain of war.

But now Du Zhengyi was fighting for himself, so he would change his war behavior, make irrational choices, and deviate from the excellent performance a War Machine should have.

Just like now, she, using Luo Qi's body, faced the monster's attack without any defenses at all. This was a bet with a high winning rate because she had the biggest chip, enough to turn the situation around and put herself in the active position. But this was still a gamble; her adrenaline surged with excitement, and she inadvertently revealed a vicious smile to welcome the monster that destroyed everything.

This one second could be longer from a Mage's perspective; she noted every movement. The storm was pushed aside by the monster's momentum; the gale and blizzard separated into a bloody path, and the monster's strange head kept enlarging in her perspective.

She excitedly calculated the monster's speed, the increasing wind resistance, the impact force brought by the monster's charge... At the exact moment she calculated, the last point in time when Du Zhengyi could still manage to save Luo Qi, a slight disturbance appeared in the force field around her.

Du Zhengyi appeared abruptly from the void, his face like frost; he grabbed her and took her with him into the Subspace of Teleportation.

She knew it; she would eventually win.

They flashed into a mountain cave, where the Crystal embedded in the cave walls flickered with cold light. The moment they returned to the real space, a sharp blade appeared in her hand, stabbing straight into Du Zhengyi's soft abdomen.

Du Zhengyi let out a muffled groan, his hand gripping hers not letting go; he freed his other hand, a hand-blade wanting to chop toward her neck. Her Consciousness Attack was a level faster; as early as when she followed him out of the Subspace, she had agilely launched a Consciousness Attack on Du Zhengyi; this wave of attack was even much faster than her blade.

Du Zhengyi's hand went limp; her consciousness drilled into the gaps of Du Zhengyi's Consciousness Barrier. The will of a Progenitor Mage was not to be underestimated, and the Mage species they created were inherently at a disadvantage against them. But she was also cautious not to create extra trouble; she directly attacked the part of Du Zhengyi's brain that controlled physiology, slowing down his reaction speed and his ability to control his muscles; his strength softened.

"Does it feel fresh to be at the mercy of others?" she whispered.

He looked at her silently, not even reacting at this moment. She could not distinguish whether Du Zhengyi had cut off his ability to feel pain at this time. Perhaps there was also a feeling of heartbreak? His failure might also mean losing the last chance to save his friend. In her own consciousness, she had long ago excised empathy, but by using the partial consciousness of Luo Qi she had chosen to supplement herself, she enjoyed a bit of sympathetic heartache. This feeling was quite good; she had forgotten it for ten thousand years. Now she was like a human sitting in a movie theater watching a tear-jerker, and obtaining a very good emotional experience made her unable to help but reveal a smile.

At this very moment, Du Zhengyi, who was already paralyzed and unable to move, had a flash of surprise in his eyes, but then he returned a smile to her.

She was stunned for a moment, then immediately understood that it was a smile for Luo Qi. Even though he had failed and hadn't been able to truly say goodbye to Luo Qi, he counted the smile on Luo Qi's face as Luo Qi's, and this could also count as a farewell.

She was almost a little fascinated; oh my, what could be better to watch than this? Humans were particularly good at enjoying this; for a ticket price of thirty yuan, one could experience someone else's emotional journey. Hers was even better than a 3D movie; it was an immersive, augmented reality version.

She raised the blade and cut toward Du Zhengyi's throat; she needed to let Du Zhengyi die thoroughly, thoroughly enough that no one could save him.

But just then, she suddenly felt a tightness in her chest; she was even more anxious to finish the matter here quickly, fearing further complications. She raised the blade again, thinking this would be a one-second affair, but her hand suddenly threw away the blade and involuntarily went to grab her own collar.

She frantically tore at the collar of this body, beating her chest; she suddenly could not breathe, as if she had completely forgotten how to breathe, as if she hadn't remembered how to breathe since she was born.

She opened her mouth, unable to make any sound, unable to exhale air or inhale air. Her consciousness panicked, running about in the body's brain, but could not find control over her own body. She also lost control over Du Zhengyi; Du Zhengyi raised his hand and finally knocked her unconscious.