Ultragene Warlord

Chapter 564: The Clam's True Form

"This should be the base form of the disaster-grade clam—no, I suppose it's the disaster-grade clamshell dragon now."

The dragon sprayed out multicolored mist all around its body. As it tapped on the air with its golden claw, a ray of golden light shot toward Zhang Lie, which he deftly avoided.

The golden light shot out of the sea of mists into the high heavens.

"[Blades, Extinguish]!" Spiritual energy condensed into shining waves. Like a tsunami, the waves rushed toward the clamshell dragon.

The clamshell dragon evaded the attack and teleported to Zhang Lie's back in the blink of an eye, then swiped down with a golden claw.

Zhang Lie turned. He blocked with a blade in one hand and struck with the blade in the other.

The clamshell dragon's tail whipped toward that hand and curled around the blade, trying to wrest it from Zhang Lie, but its tail began to decay with the irrepressible aura of time.

"[Time's Passing]!"

Unfortunately, disaster-grade lifeforms were halfway out of time themselves.

"[Shadow and Light]!" Zhang Lie made use of his understanding of the sword to depict the movement of time through space. Time was a fixed quantity, but it flowed through different spaces and different places at different rates.

As Zhang Lie shot forward, he increased his own flow of time to an exceptional degree, sending a flurry of attacks toward the clamshell dragon in what seemed like no time at all to the outside world.

Zhang Lie's application of the technique was similar to that used by the monarch of stars, but Zhang Lie's version was less utilitarian. The monarch of stars' technique could be used even outside of combat: the reason the monarch of stars had been able to carry out so many research projects simultaneously while maintaining his combat power was precisely because of his time-manipulation technique.

Everyone else only had twenty-four hours in a day, but the monarch of stars was able to stretch twelve hours of work a day into sixty. As a result, he was able to maintain both his research output and cultivation.

Zhang Lie's sword technique was only usable in battle, though it did give him incredible strength for a short period of time.

The clamshell dragon was beaten to such an extent that it couldn't retaliate. Its body was full of wounds, and it was hard-pressed to even back away, let alone morph into mist and fly away.

Gusts of rainbow-colored mist sprayed from the clamshell dragon's wounds. Zhang Lie, rather worried about the mist, immediately stepped back. He attempted to attack from another angle, but a massive shadow appeared behind him right then and there, so large it was taller than a mountain, so large it covered up the sun and all else.

An ancient and aged hum, one that had experienced all the ups and downs of countless eras, rang out through the air. It sounded like the baying of a whale, the keening of a dragon.

The shadow opened its maw wide, sucking in the air with such force that a tornado formed in the sky. Zhang Lie turned back and beheld the whirlpool tyrant in all its majesty.

He was astounded that the clamshell dragon had been able to replicate a disaster-grade lifeform. The whirlpool tyrant shone with gleaming red light, like a luminous, glowing sun whose rays shone red as they pierced through the clouds. The sky looked as though it were burning up. Beneath the sun was an idyllic patch of crystal-clear sea, one which seemed to turn red from the evening sunlight.

"Scram!" Zhang Lie slashed at the whirlpool tyrant with his sword, cutting it in half.

Ever since absorbing the whirlpool tyrant's disaster gene fragments, Zhang Lie's combat prowess had risen sharply. He had expended great effort to take down the whirlpool tyrant initially, but at this point it was hardly a threat to him.

As Zhang Lie activated his golden qilin transformation, the red tint to the sky vanished and was replaced by great arcs of gold. Golden armor covered his body; antlers grew out of his head. Golden flames burned all around him, releasing a holy aura. The black sun to his back and bloody moon beneath his feet made him look like a god that had descended from the heavens.

The sea continued to surge and frothe, its surface gleaming gold. The golden sky and golden sea met at the horizon. The gray mists dissipated, leaving nothing behind to block the splendor of gold. The entire world seemed to revolve around the sun called Zhang Lie.

Sheng thought that he was an experienced traveler, having traveled to many places and surviving numerous encounters with unusual and varied lifeforms, but Zhang Lie shocked him once and again.

"What in the world...?"

Zhang Lie's gaze landed on the clamshell dragon. As he stared at the dragon with his own dragon's pupils, the clamshell dragon began to quiver, as though it were on the verge of running away. The next moment, however, it found Zhang Lie standing before itself, blocking its way. Zhang Lie was now so fast that it couldn't even see him move from place to place.

The clamshell dragon breathed out multicolored mist as a sword slash cut it in two—but the will of the world's voice didn't ring out. Zhang Lie's face turned cold. His gaze swept over the sea and sky, and he noticed that the clamshell had vanished from sight. In other words, that clamshell dragon hadn't been the clam's true form—it was only an illusion created by the clam itself!

The clam was far too naive to think that it could escape Zhang Lie's clutches. Zhang Lie didn't even need to see where it had gone; he simply swung his blade down.

"[Ninesoul Dragonblade—Third Form: Separating Earth and Sky]!" Zhang Lie's blade made a horizontal slash.

White light split the sea and the sky, cutting apart the horizon. The skies split; the black- and white-colored energy that went into the slash erupted like a volcano. White energy drifted toward the skies, and black energy caused the sea to quake.

The whole world quaked. A patch of void and chaos expanded where the horizon had been, tearing apart the sea of mists.

The spatial distortions all throughout the sea of mists were cut apart and smashed to pieces, and the clam fell out into the air.

Zhang Lie smiled. "Found you."

He had made use of his fearsome strength to shatter the sea of mists, dragging the clam out of its hiding spot by brute force.

A thick scar marred the clam's shell, deep and jarring amidst its jewel-studded exterior. Had Zhang Lie struck at the clam and the clam alone, the strike would surely have split the clam in two.

The clam quivered as multicolored mist erupted from the shell. With another horizontal slash, Zhang Lie prised the clam shell open...