Chapter 118: Clearing the Field

Artificial Divine Realm 2055, Future, 2088.

The moment Lan Yi arrived in the future, almost within a thousandth of a second, he—standing high above the ruins of the Magic Metropolis—was immediately subjected to the scrutiny and pursuit of thirteen powerful, global-scale obsessions. These terrifying, obsessive entities were like vast, unspeakable monstrosities. Wherever their influence passed, the sky and earth tore open like festering, suppurating sores, from which hideous ghosts poured out in a torrential flood.

From a distance, the world, which had originally appeared in normal colors, was suddenly smothered and painted over by chaotic hues that defied linguistic description. These colors spread at an alarming speed, bringing with them spectral entities and ghostly domains that lunged directly at Lan Yi.

Also within that same thousandth of a second, Lan Yi, who had still possessed a human aura, was instantly enveloped by the Electromagnetic Stalker armor. His human scent vanished, replaced by a psionic spectrum field similar to that of a spectral entity. Electromagnetic avatars were inherently like this; in certain artificial divine realms, runaway electromagnetic avatars were essentially identical to supernatural manifestations. In essence, there was little difference—in fact, the electromagnetic avatar was even more potent. A Bose-Einstein condensate was far tougher and more robust than a ghost born of obsession.

Having transformed, would the Demon King-level ghosts, now baring their fangs, mistake Lan Yi for one of their own?

The answer was, of course!

Yet, this could not deter the greedy maws of the Demon King-level ghosts. A ghost that had just awakened from an emotional field, and one that appeared to be of their own caliber, was a feast for them. Focused solely on their obsessions, they chose to continue their assault, hoping to devour him.

"Presumptuous!"

Following Lan Yi’s roar, which shook the heavens, three thousand strands of hair from his "Canghua" instantly scattered. Circles upon circles of high-energy crystals, structured with complex lightning-soldier spatial cavities, erupted from the Taoist space beneath his skin. Like the ceremonial regalia of a patrolling deity, they wove together a powerful magnetic field with a structure akin to a Faraday cage. The terrifying accumulation of energy reached a level capable of shattering armies and leveling cities in an instant!

The ghosts and spectral domains that had been spreading like a contagion suddenly stalled!

The Demon King-level ghosts, bombarding him from thousands of miles away, realized that this newly awakened peer was no soft persimmon, but a ferocious Tyrannosaurus. Lightning possessed an inherent, overwhelming efficacy against ghosts, capable of directly annihilating their very essence—and this was a Taoist technique fueled to its maximum potential by Lan Yi.

Divine Heaven Peak Taoist Art: Overturning Thunder Pool!

At that moment, above the ruins of the Magic Metropolis, the Thunder Pool capsized. Bolts of lightning, each as thick as a barrel and weaving into a net, biting at each other like electric serpents, descended like orbital bombardment!

BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!!!!!

Fifteen minutes later, the world was cleansed.

The ghosts in the ruins of the Magic Metropolis were eradicated. The Demon King-level ghosts across the globe, who had reached out their greedy tentacles, suffered varying degrees of damage; their manifestations were blasted into nothingness. The rampant Geng Metal sword qi, bolstered by the power of the thunder, severed the connections of their obsessions at the molecular level.

When facing ghosts, even among their own kind, showing weakness only leads to being skinned, dismantled, and eaten. Only by being strong—unreasonably, terrifyingly strong to the point where they dared not provoke him—could he maintain this spectral facade and force them to swallow their pride and accept the fact of his sudden emergence.

In short, by exploiting the nature of spectral obsession, he had hurt them enough in one wave that they would forget everything else and choose to believe.

And that is exactly what happened.

Lan Yi’s entrance as a thunderous tyrant, showing no fear in the face of the Demon King-level ghosts and countering them with Taoist arts, had stunned the restless entities. They acknowledged his existence, not only withdrawing their power but, in the case of nearby Demon Kings, actively retracting their spectral domains—the liberated fields.

Perhaps, in time, these ghosts—who became demons through obsession, could not survive without it, and were prone to fixating on dead ends—might feel something was amiss. But for the short term, they would certainly not come to trouble Lan Yi again.

The entire chaotic, filthy world seemed to clear slightly because of Lan Yi’s arrival.

Yet it was only a slight clarity. The world remained filled with despair and madness. The ghosts, turned demonic by obsession, engaged in cruel predation and slaughter every moment. As long as they persisted, this world, where biological life was nearly extinct, had no hope of recovery. And within the oscillation of the time crystal, all of this would repeat like a hellish, endless cycle.

This was an environment that psionic cultivators despised.

Although psionic energy was overflowing, the cost was the violent, repeated exploitation of the human soul and the destruction of the future. This was the prototype of the subspace demonic plagues that ravaged realms within certain artificial divine clusters of the interstellar era. Though the scale differed, the origin was identical.

Without a "Golden Giant" to turn the tide, the ending of such a hopeless world was inevitable annihilation.

Artificial Divine Realm 2055 was fortunate. Before its total destruction, it had waited for the psionic cultivators dispatched by the Conquest Space. These top-tier experts from the main world were indeed capable of offering salvation.

But at the same time, it was unfortunate.

Because it was not the Golden Giant who arrived, but the Silver Giant—the Old Demon Lan.

With the ghosts deterred and the battlefield cleared, Lan Yi maintained the fine-tuned operation of the electromagnetic avatar covering every inch of his body. Having confirmed that no ghost dared to bare its fangs at him, his eyes, filled with cold, somber emotion toward non-human species, shot directly toward the ground—toward the ruins of the Magic Metropolis that had just been impacted by his Taoist bombardment.

At this moment, the ghosts in these ruins had been essentially purged.

The lesser demons, facing the violent, capsizing bombardment of the Thunder Pool, had their pathetic obsessions blown away by the mere aftermath. As for the true demon-level ghosts—those spectral entities capable of leveling buildings and streets—even if they weren't dead, their obsessions were violently shaken, forcing them into a dormant state. Even if some uniquely gifted specimens remained conscious, they would not dare to come forward and seek death before Lan Yi showed a sign of weakness.

The thunderous tyrant, as if descending from the heavens, slowly touched down from the high altitude.

Lan Yi saw the Magic Metropolis Tower on the surface.

This tall tower, having endured numerous cruel upheavals, was scarred by the mad colors of the apocalypse, yet it had not collapsed. Before Lan Yi’s arrival, this tower had been the territory of several moth-like ghosts. Due to the ionization effect generated by the tip of the iron tower, these moth-men were the first to perish.

As the ghosts were violently purged, all that remained were the obsessive entities hiding deep underground.

"Come now. Let me see who among you is the one reversing cause and effect behind the scenes."