438 Smelting Trial 1.1 (1/2)

[Devil Emperor's Pagoda - 1st Floor]

Advancement requirements:

1.) Search for a lucky chance.

2.) Search for clues about the irregularity of the first floor.

It is this information that suddenly appeared on Raven's mind without any warnings. Just like what Elder Abe informed them earlier, all participants will naturally know what are the methods to advance once they entered the pagoda.

”Search for a lucky chance and search for clues huh?” Raven muttered to himself, ”It sounds simple but I shouldn't drop my guard down. Who knows what kind of nasty surprises this pagoda has in store for me. Now then, where shall I start?”

He then started looking around him. As he's in the middle of the wilderness, there's too many things that are covering his view even with his ocular technique active. Due to this, Raven's first thought was to search for an elevated space where his vision could expand freely.

Raven's gaze automatically went towards the mountain peak. As soon as his gaze landed on it, Raven didn't hesitate to go over there as quickly as he can. Thankfully, there was a mountain nearby that satisfy his needs.

He arrived at the foot of the mountain in no time, due to his recent improvements, Raven's speed was nothing to scoff at even though he wasn't using his Spacetime Laws to travel.

As soon as he took his first step onto the mountain, Raven suddenly had a feeling that something changed just now. He can't put a finger on if but he knew that something felt off. Although it was a vague feeling, it gave him an impression that the mountain transformed the moment he entered its territory.

He decided to ignore this at fist as he took a couple of steps forward, but as soon he reached quarter of the way through the mountain, he suddenly felt a rumbling beneath his feet.

This caused him to stop on his tracks and frown. He had his ocular technique active which allowed him to inspect his surroundings in a much closer and detailed manner. The fluctuations on his surroundings were visible to him as well.

All of a sudden, sharp shards of earth started flying towards him from below. The projectile were swift and also came in all directions. Silently taking out the Archaic Thousand Armed Deity Wheel, he controlled two hands to encase his whole body to defend against the sudden attack.

While others might think that this took a lot of time, in reality, everything happened within the blink of an eye. Thankfully the shards weren't strong enough to break his defenses, allowing him to be unharmed by volume of sharp projectiles coming his way.

Raven raised his vigilance and surveyed his surroundings even closer, trying to find out whether the attack was orchestrated by someone or from the mountain itself.

This situation was quite strange, he amounted it to the so called 'irregularity' of the first floor itself, unfortunately this doesn't really give him much information at all.

'Its either that mountain itself has consciousness or there's something else going on here that I cannot see or aware of. Anyway, I'll try to see what's going on with this mountain. Maybe I'll get more information at the peak.' Raven thought inwardly as he hastened his steps.

Raven continued climbing the mountain but as soon as he reached the halfway mark, he was attacked once again but this time it was stronger. From shards of rocks, it turned into deadly spikes. The projectiles were faster and carried more penetrative force, causing the arms surrounding him to visibly crack.

This caused his pace to slow down which made him frown, Raven then added another pair of arms to surround himself with, superseding the with ones he had set up earlier. Doing this caused his defense to be bolstered enough to ignore the unending spikes of earth coming his way, allowing him to resume his quick pace.

This trick is something that Raven unintentionally learned during the ceaseless massacre on the third trial. So far, Raven could only control 150 arms on the Archaic Thousand Armed Deity Wheel. Each arm carried a terrifying force which he could use to ceaseless bombard his enemies with, and so long as he wants to, the wheel would be hidden.

That being said, controlling all 150 arms are still too much even for the current him. It would his whole concentration to do so, so much so that he won't be able to move once he get to that point. Additionally, each arm is closely connected to him. Which means that if an arm was destroyed, then he'll be injured as well. To top this all off, it would need him time and a good chunk of his Cosmic Force to condense the destroyed arm/s once more.