Apotheosis – Ascension to Godhood

Chapter 460: He Was Cheating

The archers pulled their bowstrings as three giant turtles reached Zen's small tower attack range. Shots were fired as twelve sharp arrows were let go by the archers. Towards the sky the arrows went, aiming for the three giant turtles.

The archers were very alike, from their looks to their behavior, to the color of their eyes, to the sizes of their hands and feet. There were no questions as to how they all looked alike for they evolved from the same magic array.

“Woosh, woosh, woosh…”

The arrows had different colors wrapped around them. The twelve arrows looked like the rainbow as they traveled the sky and were about to land on the turtles. A very loud sound was heard as a turtle got hit.

“Crack…”

The shot was so strong that Zen could feel the sharpness of the arrows. He looked as if he could feel the pain gush through his system.

The power of the twelve arrows could be compared to that of the masters in the first level of Virtual Tribulation Realm. They were as fatal and destructive as they could get.

As the arrows hit the giant turtle, it screamed in pain and fell to the ground. A loud thud was heard. It became a big helpless creature that lay on the ground, hurt and fractured. The intensity was so massive that it even shook the tower where Zen stood.

'Wow. I never thought that only one round of arrows can take down the giant turtle, ' Zen thought to himself. He was in disbelief with what he saw. No words came out of his mouth. The level 12 tower was definitely stronger than the level 11. To his advantage, he found the loophole that had existed since the day the array was designed and took advantage of it. And that made it easier for him to conquer the beasts.

Zen was lucky enough to have that advantage over other cultivators who had to endure more difficulties in defeating the giant turtles.

The giant turtles put up a fight. Even the icy arrows shot from the level 9 tower only slowed them down. They were not effective. The warriors had to deal with relying on their own skills.

Each round of beasts' attacks was more difficult to conquer than the last, and since the test came to the sixth round, more and more cultivators were taken down. From the 400 cultivators who stood at the beginning, only 50 remained at the last round.

Exhausting every ounce of strength that these cultivators had, they spared no effort to deal with the giant turtles. They were all in, nothing held back as they were one step closer to victory and passing the first test. But, it was just the beginning. To prove that they were worthy of being warriors, they must make it to the second test, which could give them a high chance of getting into the main draw match.

After taking advantage of the loophole he found, defeating the turtles was a breeze for him. He was relaxed. He was starting to feel pity towards the other cultivators who had a hard time. To Zen, it only took three rounds of arrows for all the turtles to drop dead, lifeless, and turn into light that scattered into the air.

Zen was relaxed. He was not bothered by the time it took for him and Lily to finish the test. To his surprise, he found out that most of the cultivators did not make it to the next test. They were eliminated.

Seeing Zen was bored, Letitia in the palace couldn't help but burst into laughter.

Cole, the designer of the turtles, had put his time and effort into perfecting the giant turtles to become challenging for the cultivators. After seeing the outcome of the battle, Michael and Xiao were speechless, leaving Cole also rather disappointed. The fight was just going to the good part! The tenth round was supposed to be the big challenge for them all. Level 9 tower would have slowed down the turtles leaving the cultivators constantly attracting their attention and then killing them. What happened?

There was an unforeseen twist to the event -- the arrow tower of level 12 instantly killed the giant turtles. Cole was rather confused on how to grade and evaluate the cultivators.

Seeing the miscalculation of the supposed outcome of the fight, Cole decided to add one rule for tomorrow's evaluation, which was that anyone who had trespassed and conquered others' fields would be taken off the test, and be eliminated immediately.

Actually, Cole had nothing to worry about. The fight turned out to be different from what he expected, but it showed a fact that Zen could take advantage of anything on his path, making him resourceful. For other cultivators in the exam, they could just transform their life vitality into something as strong and powerful as Zen's sword spirit. They could perform the same miracles as Zen did, if only they were equally courageous and powerful.

But in reality, what they had transformed their life vitality into wasn't strong enough to defeat the beasts. As a result, those cultivators dared not to leave their fields and just get others' points.

Ever since the establishment of the magic array, Zen was the first one to do such thing. But the most important question of all that boggled Cole's mind was whether Zen would be the one and only person to do such thing. Would he be the last to do it?

Round after round, cultivators were eliminated. Arrows were shot, and landed on the beasts. In the tenth round of the attack, only 22 cultivators remained, but only 3 would proceed to the main draw match.

Seeing the changes in the magic array, Cole announced, “On to next level!” He raised his hands, and started to operate the magic array.

All eyes were on Zen. Would he make it? Letitia was nervous. She fixed her eyes on the Picture Slab, which showed the most important part of the qualifying test. Zen's performance in this test would determine Zen's passing or failing. Zen had upgraded his tower to level 12 far beyond what the other cultivators could do. As for other cultivators who also defeated the giant turtles and won some points, the best they could do was to upgrade their towers to level 10. Letitia looked up to and admired the archers in level 12 tower. Those archers were comparable to the masters in the first level of Virtual Tribulation Realm. They were the best in their level.

Taking Letitia's stand and judgment of the level 12 archers, it shouldn't be hard for Zen to pass the test.

Zen was again, relaxed. He had this one covered. Suddenly, the lights that were shining on Zen faded. The light sky in the magic array was replaced by darkness. The sky and the meadow gradually disappeared in front of Zen. Even Zen could not see clearly everything around him! Ŗ𝐚𐌽ö฿Εš

“I've moved to the second level,” Zen told himself.

Everything was vanishing fast but one -- the tower. Zen stood petrified at the sight of the tower which floated in the sea of darkness.

Suddenly, other towers showed up one after another, leaving some distance between them.

Zen had faith in his victory. Nothing could make him fail the test. After all, he had a lot of potential. What was this all about? Was this the second part of the pre-qualifying test? He counted, one.. two... three... There were 21 towers in total, including his. What he saw were all survivors standing on their own towers.

“What is going on with that guy? His tower… why is his tower so huge?”

“How is that even possible? Did he cheat on the test? All of our towers are level 10. Why is his twice larger than mine?!”

“Unless his is level 11, or even level 12! But how could he gain extra points in this magic array? How was that possible? How did he upgrade his tower to level 12?”

Other cultivators stared at Zen and murmured, whispers flying everywhere.

When they saw Zen's gigantic tower, they found it was not something along their level. It was a fortress. The cultivators exchanged glances and repeatedly compared their towers to Zen's. These cultivators risked their lives for their upgrades.

What they saw made them feel unfair and cheated.

“What the heck?! How did he do that?” Standing on his level 10 tower, Owen was confused and he stared at Zen oddly. Anyone like Owen, as a cultivator at the consummation of Illuminating Soul Realm, would be very proud of themselves if they could pass many rounds of beast attacks. He worked hard to achieve this.

But Owen wasn't proud of himself at all. He came all the way to the magic array from Woollen Grassland to get into the main draw match. As for the pre-qualifying test, it was another obstacle that he had to get through. Owen was more determined to get into the main draw match than anyone could ever imagine.

According to the rules, anyone who got into the second part was supposed to have at least level 10 tower. Therefore, when Owen saw Zen's level 12 tower, he was disappointed at himself.

Owen recognized Zen. He remembered meeting Zen earlier, who was at the third grade of Illuminating Soul Realm. This annoyed Owen so much that it was almost consuming him. But Owen knew better. He stayed cool all throughout.

'Is it because of the World Commercial Alliance? Did they do something to help this guy? This is unfair!' Owen was suspicious of Zen. After all, Zen's tower was just so… cool. A thought kept on repeating on Owen's head. How was Zen able to do it?

And Owen wasn't the only one who noticed this suspicious scene.

“I thought that the World Commercial Alliance was fair. Turns out that I was wrong. That's low!”

“Shame on him! Even if he gets into the main draw match, I won't congratulate him. I bet even the pre-qualifying test is an excuse. They can choose anyone to get into the main draw match as they want! This is unfair!”

“I'm gonna teach that guy a lesson. I'm going to defeat him and get his tower!”

No one would attack Zen at this state. But since Zen was in level three of the Illuminating Soul Realm, they thought he was easy to deal with. Besides, anyone who could get Zen's tower could easily beat down other competitors! If they could defeat Zen, they could defeat anyone standing in their way.

But the battle hadn't started yet. Among the 22 towers, only 3 shall remain. Unbeknownst to the participants, there was an invisible power which limited all cultivators' movement. Despite this, their target was clear: defeat Zen and get his tower. Zen didn't want to be in this position. After all, he stayed out of trouble, at least, he tried to. But because of his tower, all eyes were now on him. Zen was the target.

Seeing how the other cultivators looked at him, Zen could not think of any other thing but regret. He saw the jealousy and rage on others' faces. Had he not upgraded his tower to level 12, he would not be in this position.

“Let the battle begin!”

Cole announced. Four cultivators who were closest to Zen jumped to him immediately.

Zen furrowed his brows, nervous. Cold sweat started to run down his skin as the Demon Night with a huge sword stood in front of him. Determined, Zen waved his hand and the twelve archers raised their bows and arrows. The archers did as they were told, like soldiers in the forefront of the battlefield. Zen wanted to win so bad. Now it was time to defend his fortress. Regret was down the drain. What remained was his fighting spirit.

A master in Virtual Tribulation Realm could easily defeat numerous cultivators in Internal Elixir Realm. This only meant one thing -- Zen's tower should be able to withstand the attacks and defeat them. The archers in level 10 tower were just mere cultivators in the middle phase of Internal Elixir Realm. Zen was much more powerful than them. He had a big chance of smelling victory in the air.

“Woosh, woosh, woosh…”

Off went the twelve powerful and swift arrows.

As soon as the arrows were launched, one by one the arrows landed on the other cultivators' towers, destroying them, reducing the towers into ash in a blink of an eye.

Other cultivators were scared. Silence roamed the atmosphere. Seeing the towers reduced to nothing but ashes made them feel threatened. It came to their senses that in this magic array, Zen was the king. Zen was undefeatable.