19 WRATH OF THE CAGED BEAS (1/2)

The Qi strands had been gathered, the Pseudo Core had been condensed, the Inferior Stage had been achieved! But how could Cheng Hao already be done with the Immortal Ascension Tower? He was far from being finished…

As a matter of fact, he had barely even started.

The only reason it had seemed to have taken so long was mainly due to the info dump. He, during this whole time, had barely done anything.

As soon as the child finished condensing the Pseudo-Core, the projection of his consciousness had become a lot more definite: although his face and features weren't fully visible, his limbs were. While he had previously only resembled a gaseous mass, at least now his figure finally resembled that of a human. Cheng Hao smiled blissfully as he felt the flow of Spiritual Energy and Qi in his meridians: when they had completed a full cycle through his body, Cheng Hao's appearance could finally be discerned.

With the retrieval of his cultivation base, the boy also felt two familiar powers move about in their slumber…

This sensation had come from both his hands. With a slight push on his part, his left palm finally released a faint chill, and the right began to emit slightly perceptible warmth. Smiling in reminiscence, the hazy Cheng Hao clenched his fists and felt the opposite attributes of cold and hot spread to his fingertips.

Cheng Hao inhaled: the Qi and Spiritual Energy had once again completed a cycle through his body! His right pupil darkened as the faint outline of a fanged mouth stood out from within the blackness; accompanying the arrival of those body-less fauces, the illusion within Cheng Hao's left eye had also grown exceptionally clear.

Feeling confident from all these abilities being startled awake from their lethargy, the child raised his head, a slightly conflicted gaze landing onto the first of the fifteen entrances.

The gate itself was pretty impressive, being ten thousand or so feet tall; from that alone it could be guessed how many hundreds of thousands of feet tall the tower really was... and just how much energy must have been used to create an object of such incredible proportions.

Dozens of locks, hundreds of chains, thousands of seals… everything that could be thought of as even barely useful to keep something slammed shut: all of it was there, all to prevent this massive door from being opened... And Cheng Hao alone knew why that was.

He looked at the restriction on top of the gates and he let out a relieved smile: many of those restrictions were presenting cracks, but had yet to completely shatter. At least he was still on time.

”You did well. Rest in peace.” With a wave of Cheng Hao's hands, one of the seals grew opaque and shattered into countless light motes. Following it were one more, and another one, and another one, and another one, until every single seal had shattered! They then turned into Spiritual Energy, floating towards Cheng Hao, whom used it to feed the Pseudo-Core more and more energy, making his cultivation advance by leap and bounds. Yes, other than Qi, he also had some extra Spiritual Energy piled up, but the amount was still too small to call it heaven-defying. Most high-end Clans would probably be able to bring out elixirs and pills of even higher potency if they wished to, but this much energy was enough for the child to fully stabilize his cultivation base. With his methods plus the Pseudo-Core, were he to fight an Advanced stage cultivator right there and then, he would be able to win without too much of an effort. Then again, the one he was about to face was much, much stronger than the mere Advanced stage, seeing how its cultivation Realm was far higher than the Mortal Realm, even above the Ageless Realm!

The 'thing' trapped on the first floor of Cheng Hao's Immortal Ascension Tower... was a powerhouse at the Immortal Realm!

Following the shattering of the glowing symbols and talismans was that of the chains and the locks. One by one, the rings of the chains were dismantled, the locks shattered, until all turned into Spiritual Energy.

By that point, the first floor's gate was held together solely by a single golden blade.

It was embedded where the two doors' frames met and it seemed to be quite fragile when compared to the massive frames. The blade of this sword was completely made out of condensed golden energy, while the hilt was made of bronze. With enough imagination, it somewhat resembled a key.

Now, the fragmentation of the seals, chains, etc., had not happened in silence. Instead, each individual restriction had emitted a noise similar to that of glass shattering; when put together, a deafening 'harmony' had rang out for a full minute before the racket finally died down.

By that time, if the being had not been aware of Cheng Hao's presence there, then it surely would be now! And just as expected… BANG! BANG! BANG: something had began hammering the gates from the inside! Judging from the sound, it seemed to be a being with an incredibly massive body, so much so that the whole first floor appeared to tremble from the beast's roars alone! Slowly but surely, the colossal frames began to move…

The beautiful bronze blade embedded between them bent dangerously. However, just as it was on the verge of snapping, the gates suddenly stopped their advance and swung backwards, slamming shut! The sword also suddenly flung back into its original position and repaired itself until there wasn't even a scratch left on its surface.

The Thing behind the door kept hammering constantly, each blow more powerful than the others. The sword's edge cracked a few times, but it would repair itself right away whenever the frames had resisted the blow and it had flung back into its original state.

Yes. No matter how much the doors moved and all the effort that that 'something' would put into breaking free, those two doors would always hold on by a hair's breadth, and that breadth would more than enough to prevent the thing sealed inside from breaking free. Clearly, the bronze sword was no simple object. Cheng Hao smiled at the situation unfolding in front of him and then slowly approached the gate.

Step by step, walking on thin air, he slowly got closer and closer to the titanic golden gate...

Feeling someone approaching, the Thing inside stopped its attempts of escaping. The silence had a tinge of wonder, almost as if a big question mark had appeared in midair. Cheng Hao took the hilt of the sword in his hands and slowly... took it out from where it was embedded. The blade was shockingly long. The child spent more than five breaths before he could extract it fully. He grasped the astonishingly lengthy golden sword in his hands and its blade, as if liberated, turned back into the final bit of Spiritual Energy, which the youth gladly absorbed and then proceeded to feed to his newly formed Pseudo-Core. After he had done this, all that remained in his hands was the handle of the sword: a bronze key.