Chapter 172: The Sky of the Illusionary Realm

“Strange, we’ve been chasing for so long, yet why haven’t we found that guy? Is he really that fast?”

With her snow-white wings flapping continuously, the girl flew over the desolate, boundless land, unable to suppress her bewildered mutterings.

In the illusionary realm, there are no sun, moon, or stars, and there’s no distinction between day and night. It seems to always maintain a scene that resembles a never-ending twilight—neither dark nor bright—reflecting a nature of earth and sky filled not with daylight but with an overwhelming ocean of magical energy.

As described in that notebook, the concentration of magic here is downright terrifying, far exceeding the madness of that night when Noviya awakened, a hundred times greater than anything imaginable in the real world, creating a scale where magic tides are visibly sweeping across the horizon.

Speaking of a perilous environment, the further up you go, the more terrifying the intensity of the magical storms becomes. Ordinary creatures might as well be walking on a tightrope over a pit of doom; thus, even those with the ability to fly can only move on the ground.

As such, encountering those local creatures of the illusionary realm is unavoidable, for instance…

“Whoa~”

While flying, the Priestess suddenly raised her hand, using a golden shield that had coalesced on her forearm to block a dark beam coming from afar, stopping and shaking her head with a hint of helplessness.

“How come they’re coming again…”

After leaving the protective range of Tiyelu’s Sacred Ground, Vilyric quickly encountered various local creatures from the illusionary realm. Unlike the real world, creatures here fall into two categories: the upper-dimensional spirits that are hard to detect with the naked eye and exist in a spiritual form, and the various elementals born from the concentration of elements.

Generally, the former is excessively cunning, knowing how to seek benefits and evade harm, posing little threat to individuals with resilient will or strong spiritual power. Although they can only be sensed through sp, with Vilyric often maintaining a small detection range, they can basically be ignored.

The elemental spirits, however, are slightly more troublesome.

As described in the intelligence she obtained earlier, the elements in the illusionary realm are not only thick but also extraordinarily violent. Naturally, this leads to elemental life forms, created from these elements, becoming downright aggressive, and they operate with only the most basic level of intelligence. Hence, upon seeing outsiders, they charge forward without fear to launch an attack.

Combat has always been one of the Priestess’s weak points; dealing with one or two waves is simple enough, but if endless enemies keep appearing, she will surely feel vexed.

Thus, after clearing away the constant stream of attacks a dozen times, Vilyric decided to tough it out and ascend into the sky, where the fierce turbulence could tear apart even ordinary elementals. As expected, the disturbances she faced decreased considerably.

As long as she didn’t raise her altitude too excessively at once, the passive defense offered by her “Feather Dress: Glareia” was enough to withstand the pressure.

That said, the creatures of the illusionary realm truly lived up to their reputation for being formidable. After a brief moment of peace, Vilyric soon discovered that even the elemental storms in the sky harbored enemies.

Compared to the tier three to five elemental spirits or elite elemental spirits below, the elemental beings spawned by the chaotic magical energy here are even more terrifying, standing at least ten meters tall and appearing in droves!

Hardly ever seen in the outside world, they typically belong to the upper echelon of overlevel 6 transcendent beings, yet here, they emerge like cabbages, continuously popping out, just like right now.

Emerging from the elemental turbulence, those were over a dozen towering figures made up of pitch-black cloud masses that vaguely resembled humans but only had upper bodies—their lower halves were a mass of chaos.

Their forms are hazy, their faces showing nothing but voids without eyeballs. Dark attribute magical energy surged from their bodies like floating fog, surrounding Vilyric from all sides.

Elemental beings above tier six, although still lacking communicative intelligence, have already grasped some tactics and combat techniques. The encirclement they displayed now is clearly something that those lower-level elemental spirits cannot achieve.

“Tch, what a hassle. I don’t have time to brawl passionately with a bunch of idiots… one, two, three, four, five… twelve Dark Large Elementals?!”

Although this would be a disaster scenario for an ordinary person, for the Priestess, it really isn’t that serious; if she puts her mind to it, she could end the battle in at most half a minute.

The issue lies in the sheer number of elemental beings; no matter how many she kills, they just keep coming. In just a little over half a day since entering the illusionary realm, Vilyric has already dealt with at least ten waves of attackers since ascending to the sky.

In fact, she had already spotted these guys with her sp scanning; it’s just that at the time, she was surrounded by similar large elemental beings, and this direction was the least crowded, yet over ten tier 6 enemies akin to transcendent beings still appeared.

And this is just after she had barely set foot into the illusionary realm. According to information from Tiyelu, there usually wouldn’t be too many strong beings in the outer areas… no wonder that initial team of explorers, despite having someone like Min Chen among them, ultimately faced defeat and ran away in disgrace.

The Dark Large Elementals lying in ambush did not hold back against her; as soon as they revealed their forms, they instantly unleashed an onslaught like a violent storm.

Destructive beams of light, dark flames, rotting decay, chains of despair… one by one, all familiar yet slightly different dark attribute skills were thrown towards the small-looking White Robed Girl at the center, as if they would completely engulf her in the next second.

Vilyric frowned slightly.

While these attacks hold little real power, to be honest, her greatest annoyance is dark element enemies—it’s a kind of instinctual aversion.

[I’m saying—let there be light!]

The golden maiden of the Holy Spirit appeared like a burst of radiance, her body swelling against the winds, instantly reaching over ten meters to match the size of the large elemental beings. A dazzling spear drew arcs through the air, blasting apart the dark elemental skills coming from all directions in bursts of black flames.

Then, the Holy Spirit’s spear extended explosively, lengthening to hundreds of meters, its razor-sharp edge almost shooting straight into the sky!

“Swish!”

A golden glow flashed, and all the surrounding Dark Large Elementals became rigid simultaneously. Then, as if sliced through by sharp blades, they were neatly divided into two at various angles.

“Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!!!!”

A dozen even larger black flames exploded mid-air, stirring up a tumultuous wave of dark elemental magic. Vilyric had already deployed Radiant Protection ahead of time to shield herself from the aftermath of their annihilation.

With one strike, she wiped out the enemies; the Priestess dramatically wiped the non-existent sweat from her forehead while the Radiant Spirit behind her animatedly mimicked the action, looking quite comical.

“Phew, phew, that was close! Thanks to my exceptional skills!”

   

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