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**
The brothers felt their minds shudder as the tyrannical aura of the Profound Sky Axe struck them.
The pressure on them multiplied instantly, leaving them with the daunting impression that even if all seven of them unleashed their defensive soul skills simultaneously, it would still be difficult to withstand.
Meanwhile, sensing the immense power of this Profound Sky Shatter and realizing that Ling Xiao was truly getting serious and fighting with his full strength, Huyan Li felt his blood boil alongside his shock.
In the span of a single spark, a thunderous roar erupted from his mouth: "Form the formation!"
This single command acted both as a warning to the Huyan brothers and a military signal.
Upon hearing it, Huyan Ba, Huyan Shan, and the others stood side-by-side with Huyan Li in perfect, highly trained coordination. Among them, Huyan Li, Huyan Ba, and Huyan Shan instantly leaped into the air, landing firmly on the shoulders of the other four.
The seven individuals thrust out their Diamond Great Shields simultaneously, slamming them together edge-to-edge. They perfectly timed the circulation of their soul power to stimulate the Diamond Great Shields, causing a magnificent brilliance to flare up.
An aura vastly more intense than before exploded in front of the seven brothers.
To the onlooker's eyes, the seven Diamond Great Shields in their hands fused together in a single instant. The edges blended like milk into water, leaving not a single gap, as if created by nature itself.
The seven individual shields had completely transformed into a single, colossal shield—or more accurately, a fortress wall of shields. Its defensive area and stopping power were far superior to merely lining up seven shields together to block an attack.
The process of fusing the shields involved numerous profound secrets and intricate techniques that no outsider to the Huyan clan could ever hope to know. This was precisely the foundational form of the Elephant Armor Formation: Impregnable Fortress.
Witnessing this scene, a hint of astonishment surfaced in Ling Xiao's eyes. At this moment, he finally understood why Huyan Li's first soul skill was named "Impregnable Fortress" when it clearly only manifested a single Diamond Great Shield.
As it turned out, the Diamond Great Shield conjured by channeling the Diamond Forces was the very foundation of deploying the Elephant Armor Formation.
Furthermore, the soul skill of the Diamond Great Shield involved an incredibly advanced application of the Diamond Forces, making it exceptionally difficult to master.
Over the past millennium, the Huyan clan had experimented with countless soul beasts as soul rings before finally discovering a specific type of soul beast that could stably produce this exact Diamond Great Shield soul skill.
The Huyan clan had truly spared no pains in this endeavor.
Boom!
The moment the Elephant Armor Formation was completed, Ling Xiao's Profound Sky Shatter finally slammed into the exceedingly broad wall of diamond shields. The tyrannical soul power, bearing the source attributes of the Profound Sky Axe, erupted instantaneously.
A deafening blast echoed through the square as terrifying energy fluctuations burst forth and horrifying streaks of soul power soared wildly.
Upon that giant shield wall of copper and iron, a mass of blackish-red energy flames, carrying an unimaginable physical force, slammed forward relentlessly. Yet, it was completely unable to breach the defense of that shield wall.
It truly deserved the name Impregnable Fortress.
It was easy to imagine that if high-ranking powerhouses of the Elephant Armored Sect were to deploy this formation, its might would be world-shaking.
According to the records of Spirit Hall, many years ago, several elders and numerous core disciples of the Huyan clan—led by the Heavenly Elephant Huyan Zhen—had answered the invitation of Emperor Xue Ye of the Heaven Dou Empire to aid Heaven Dou in resisting the Star Luo army.
On that day, when the Elephant Armor Formation was unleashed, it directly transformed into a Great Wall stretching for ten thousand miles and standing over a hundred meters tall.
It halted the fierce assault of Star Luo's hundreds of thousands of troops, locking them outside the Fasinuo Province and preventing them from advancing even a single inch.
At this moment, although the seven Huyan brothers had limited cultivation and the Elephant Armor Formation they deployed fell far short of that divine majesty, it nonetheless revealed a fraction of the defensive formation's true essence.
Its defensive prowess was truly astonishing.
The Profound Sky Shatter created by Ling Xiao pursued the absolute pinnacle of explosive and destructive force, fully unleashing the overbearing characteristics of the Profound Sky Axe.
Back in the Mystic Trace Canyon, Ling Xiao had used this exact Profound Sky Shatter to slaughter countless evil beasts and heavily injure numerous beast herds.
Yet, in this battle, it was forcibly blocked head-on.
This alone proved that its defensive power was virtually unbreakable by anyone below the Soul Ancestor realm. Even so, this Impregnable Fortress seemed to have been pushed close to its limit.
In the process of resisting the onslaught of the Profound Sky Shatter, although it gradually ground down and depleted the attack's power, the shield wall itself shook continuously. It appeared to be maintaining its form under immense strain, looking as though it might collapse at any moment.
Ultimately, however, it successfully withstood the Profound Sky Shatter.
In the blink of an eye, the energy of the Profound Sky Shatter exhausted itself, failing to breach the Diamond Shield Wall. However, Huyan Li and the others did not relax in the slightest.
Their formation had been thrown together in haste, meaning the Impregnable Fortress had yet to reach its maximum potential power. Furthermore, Ling Xiao's offensive was by no means limited to just that single strike of Profound Sky Shatter.
In the next instant, a cold gleam flashed. Ling Xiao had already closed the distance to the seven brothers. Soul power erupted beneath his feet, launching his entire body into the air. He swung the massive axe downward with a violent force, the Profound Sky Axe seeming to emit a low hum.
A sudden flash of brilliance revealed a malicious, dark-red axe-radiance blossoming across the blade—sharp and piercing, yet condensed and restrained, its cutting power focused entirely inward.
Ling Xiao channeled his strength into the swing, reinforcing the blade with this edge-radiance.
With a heavy thud, the Profound Sky Axe chopped directly onto the shield wall.
How could the Diamond Shield Wall, already at the end of its tether, possibly withstand a direct cleave from the Profound Sky Axe? Without question, a crisp, sharp cracking sound instantly rang out from the center, sounding exactly like shattering glass.
The shield wall manifested by the Elephant Armor Formation shattered into pieces. Yet, despite cleaving through the giant shield defense with a single blow, Ling Xiao showed no signs of joy.
Achieving only this much could not be considered breaking the formation. Huyan Li, Huyan Ba, and the others seemed to have long anticipated the shattering of the Diamond Shield Wall.
The seven of them rapidly retreated in different directions, blurring out of the way as they leaped several meters outward and slammed heavily back onto the ground. Through this maneuver, the seven perfectly positioned themselves to face Ling Xiao from all sides.
It was a classic example of using retreat as a means to advance.
At this very moment, they had locked Ling Xiao into a tight encirclement. Feeling the gazes of all seven locked onto him, alongside the constant warnings of danger flashing in his mind from behind, Ling Xiao let out a light laugh.
A pincer attack of this level was nothing to write home about. It wasn't as if he hadn't experienced worse before.
"Second Soul Skill, Mammoth Colossal Strength!"
Suddenly, the seven brothers surrounding Ling Xiao unleashed their second soul skills simultaneously.
Seven yellow, hundred-year soul rings emerged from their bodies.
Relying on the amplification of this second soul skill, their physical strength instantly swelled by a significant margin.
"Go!"
Before the shout even faded, the seven launched an attack from all directions at once.
Each fully stimulated their Martial Souls as their vital energy surged, exploding with the absolute peak of their physical strength.
At the same time, massive elephant roars suddenly rang out, merging into a single, soul-shaking bellow designed to suppress Ling Xiao's momentum on a mental level, chipping away at his drive and weakening his power.
If it were an ordinary person, their mind might indeed fail them under such pressure, causing their morale to plummet and their combat effectiveness to drastically decline.
However, Ling Xiao had undergone early training and education at the Spirit Hall Academy, followed by life-and-death tempering within the Death Canyon. How could his mind be shaken or his momentum damaged by such tricks?
Faced with this coordinated pincer attack, Ling Xiao didn't even choose to focus fully on defense.
As the soul power within his body circulated rapidly, a fierce wave of soul power fluctuations diffused from his form. The energy was so dense it was nearly tangible, and his flames of soul power flared up aggressively, pushed almost to the absolute limit of the Soul Elder realm.
Channeling strength through his physical flesh, he slammed his foot violently against the ground. Leveraging the instantaneous explosion of soul power and his own terrifying explosive force, Ling Xiao charged head-on toward Huyan Li's position.
Striking second but arriving first, he unleashed a powerful counterattack. The injection of a massive amount of soul power caused the Profound Sky Axe in his hands to erupt with a brilliant light.
Wisps of dark-red energy flowed and wrapped nimbly around the axe head. Facing the fist flying toward him from Huyan Li's possessed form, Ling Xiao swung his axe in a heavy cleave.
Following a sound like a clap of muffled thunder, Ling Xiao's figure remained completely rooted to the spot, while Huyan Li was forcibly hacked backward by the weight carried by the Profound Sky Axe, a fairly deep wound appearing across his massive knuckles.
Although he had repelled Huyan Li with a single swing, the situation had not eased by much. In the blink of an eye, the offensives of the other brothers arrived one after another, a succession of powerful strikes closing in on Ling Xiao.
Seeing this, Ling Xiao didn't pause for a second.
The Profound Sky Axe sliced outward again in a diagonal sweep, delivering two rapid slashes to the left and right. He shattered the attacks of Huyan Shan and Huyan Ba as they closed in from his flanks, shaking both of them backward.
Suddenly, the sound of rushing wind echoed from behind, causing an intense warning to flare up in his heart. Ling Xiao cut his eyes slightly to the side.
Though he couldn't see the situation behind him, he could map out the general status through the soul power fluctuations rippling from the rear. In this split second, it was too late to turn around and seize the initiative with an attack; Ling Xiao had no choice but to adopt a defensive posture.
**
Enjoying the story? Support the translation and get early access to future chapters here: www.patr eon.com/c/FanficTranslator
Thanks for reading!
I have 100+ advanced chapter now on Patreon. I will post 5 advanced chapter on Patreon everyday except Sunday