Realizing that the scepter felt wrong, An Qingyu immediately wanted to pull it out of the dark quagmire, but at this moment, a flash of sword light slashed towards his head!
An Qingyu dodged to the side immediately, but the hand that was holding the scepter was still a step too slow and was cut off by the sword. He frowned, and swept the [Sword of the King] in his other hand behind him. A touch of cold air instantly froze half of the sky into blocks!
Amidst the extremely cold ice and snow, a dark human silhouette flew out and instantly transformed into Lin Qiye's figure, grabbing the [King's Scepter] with one hand!
The ability of [Scepter of the King] is very tricky. Whoever can use it to extract the opponent's divine power first is equivalent to locking in victory in advance.
An Qingyu also knew this. A ball of blood suddenly burst out from under his ribs, and a hideous bloody hand crawled out of his body and also reached towards the end of the scepter.
Grasp both sides of the scepter with both hands at the same time!
As An Qingyu activated the power of the [King's Scepter], a faint golden light bloomed from the bottom of the scepter. At the same time, a magical light flashed on Lin Qiye's body, and he turned into his original form again. Threads of cause and effect followed closely and entangled around him!
For a moment, the light on the surface of the [King's Scepter] quickly alternated between bright and dark, like a broken light bulb.
Lin Qiye narrowed his eyes, and the thread of cause and effect directly passed over the [King's Scepter] and extended towards An Qingyu's body. The latter's gray eyes condensed, and a ball of deep purple lightning suddenly burst out from his other palm and smashed into the surface of the scepter!
boom--!!
A huge ball of lightning exploded in mid-air, and the [Scepter of the King] was blown away by the aftermath and directly plunged into the broken earth.
Lin Qiye's figure emerged from the darkness and landed steadily on the ground. An Qingyu had one arm broken, and was barely supported by only one arm and a bloody hand. He landed on the other side of the battlefield in a somewhat embarrassed manner.
"I was wondering before, this maze is so big, even if thousands of people come in, they will be separated directly... I didn't meet any of the dozen people from [Divine Realm Paradise], how come No. 22 happened to run into Vishnu by chance?" Lin Qiye said slowly, "Now it seems that this is all your arrangement?"
"Yes." An Qingyu nodded.
"You planned for No. 22 to meet Vishnu. In this way, Vishnu would definitely try to hold me back. Then you could steal the Scepter of the King and turn Vishnu against you. You could use his power and the power of Nyx who was locked behind the door for your own use... But there is one thing I don't understand."
Lin Qiye stared into his eyes.
"When did you start following him? Or have you been hiding in this maze all along?"
"The remains of the Gate of Truth are of vital importance to me. Of course I have to keep some means to prevent it from being taken away by others first." An Qingyu said lightly.
"What do you want to do with His remains?"
An Qingyu paused for a moment, "Awaken the [Key to the Gate] and descend upon the true gate of truth."
Hearing this, the coldness in Lin Qiye's eyes resurfaced. He stretched out his palm and pressed towards the darkness in mid-air.
The next moment, An Qingyu felt a series of severe pains coming from various parts of his body, as if thick rivets were suddenly drilling into his body!
He looked down and saw that his shoulders, knees, ankles and palms had been pierced by darkness. He looked like he was nailed to a cross. The bone-chilling cold seeped into his body from the wounds, and an unprecedented feeling of weakness surged into his heart.
Lin Qiye held the Kusanagi sword in his hand, and a deep and hot aura emanated from his two pupils, one black and one gold respectively, and divine power that was infinitely close to the highest level surged out!
An Qingyu's face was extremely solemn. He tried to mobilize the divine power in his body, but found that most of the divine power was constantly being devoured by the dark rivets that were drilled into his body. In the end, only a pitiful amount of divine power could be gathered together.
Snow-white frost spread over An Qingyu's body. He twisted his body hard, and pulled his frozen left shoulder out of the rivet.
Just as he was about to continue, the pair of gold and black eyes were already in front of him.
"The Key to the Gate cannot be resurrected. I accept your body."
A flash of sword light flashed before An Qingyu's eyes. In the endless darkness, golden light fell from the sky. The light and shadow seemed to be cut by an extremely thin boundary, passing through An Qingyu's nailed body.
The light and shadow were projected onto the black cross. An Qingyu's struggling figure paused, and a line of blood emerged from the intersection of light and shadow. The whole person was silently split into two.
Dark flames ignited from within the bloodline, ruthlessly devouring the surrounding flesh and blood.
An Qingyu's eyes gradually blurred, the grayness disappeared without a trace, and turned back into the bright red "一" pupil. The black robe turned gray, and the soul in it had already moved elsewhere.
The darkness retreated to Lin Qiye's feet like a tide, and the golden light was like wings, gathering back between the six white wings.
Lin Qiye looked at the body in front of him that was swallowed by the darkness, his expression did not fluctuate much. He had known for a long time that An Qingyu would not die with this body. If he wanted to really kill him, he had to kill all these artificial god clones first.
Lin Qiye put away the sword of Ame-no-Murakumo and walked towards Nyx who was standing aside.
When Nyx saw the long-lost face, her eyes suddenly lit up. She lifted her skirt and walked forward quickly, hugged Lin Qiye's shoulders with both hands, and asked with concern:
"How is it? Are you hurt?"
“It’s okay, mother.” Lin Qiye smiled, “I’m no longer the same person I was back then… Even if the Supreme God takes action now, he may not be able to do anything to me.”
After Nyx confirmed that Lin Qiye was indeed fine, he sighed and said, "It's a pity that I couldn't stop Vishnu and let him run away."
"Your divine power has been drained away. There's no need to take risks. Just kill him head-on next time."
Lin Qiye seemed to remember something and picked up the [Scepter of the King] and [Sword of the King] from the ground beside him. Yu Yi was killed by him, so he naturally could not take these artifacts away, and finally they all returned to his hands.
Athena and Artemis came from a distance, both of them were injured and their divine power was also exhausted. They were relieved to see Nyx return unharmed.
While the three of them were talking, Lin Qiye's eyes fell on the tentacles' corpses, and his eyes narrowed slightly...
He stepped forward and saw No. 22, whose stomach had been ripped open, trapped in thick ice and struggling hard.
Seeing Lin Qiye approaching, a hint of fear appeared in his eyes.
"It seems that your good foster father doesn't care about you that much." Lin Qiye said slowly, "He took advantage of the chaos and ran away, but left you here... It's really disheartening."