In the end, the female cultivator didn't find any more trouble to them.
Just to make sure, Lugh already checked her panel thrice. Without any fail, it only showed that she was a projection.
'Am I mistaken? No, something's going on with her..'
Lugh suppressed the uncomfortable feeling as they continued on their way to the ascension point. Fortunately, they didn't encounter anything else until they arrived.
Making use of the space tunnel in this ascension point, the group successfully descended to the lower planes. If this plane is normal, there would've been a suppression against them, but the distortion plane is just an aggregate of destroyed worlds. Naturally, there's no suppression as well.
"The Qi here is not suitable for recovery. Prepare your Panacea, everyone."
In her words, everyone readied the Panacea that they stored in their spacial artifacts. After placing it in a module of their Armor, it would immediately be injected onto them once they sustain an injury.
'How many did I make again?'
Lugh checked the module responsible for panacea consumption.
[Med Kit]
-Stores more than 1,000 servings of Panacea in the Armor. There could be 10 types of Panacea stored in this module.
Long ago, he stocked up on things like this. Though, some of it was obsolete already due to him ranking up to the Demigod Realm. After removing Law-Realm panaceas, he was left with more than 64 servings of panacea, of which 30 of those are healing while the rest are the type that can help a combatant erupt with greater power for a short time.
The only reason why he didn't use these things much back then is that his fights are always one-sided; either he is overwhelmingly strong or his enemy is overwhelmingly strong.
"Mortal planes, this is my first time seeing one."
"Right. Our world didn't have any ever since the fusion."
While talking with Maen, he thought about their status in these Mortal planes. The strongest that it could nurture is a Tribulation Transcendence cultivator. Once it surpasses the realm cap, he or she will get kicked out of here.
"Hm? What is that?"
Maen noticed something, thus Lugh looked in the direction he pointed to.
"What the.."
A black plane. It's very similar to the black spots that they saw in the forest, though the scale of it here is much larger.
"Everyone, don't come closer."
Vera reminded them timely.
"It should be a piece of confidential information, but there's no harm telling you all now."
'Something that even her subordinates doesn't know?'
"This thing here is an apocalyptic phenomenon. To be precise, it's an insect apocalypse."
It was told that the Heavenly Sovereign is the one who decided on calling them "Apocalypses" due to their terrific nature. Each apocalypse varies, but there are some distinctions in them, too. There are some with high levels of growth, such as the insect and undead apocalypse.
These apocalypses are present only in the distortion plane, giving relief to the Alliance. Still, they didn't relax and developed some apocalypse-specialized weapons. Some are already tested, which is why the Alliance has a lead in exploring this plane compared to the zergs.
Hearing all of this, they immediately got away from that black plane.
'Such danger exists in this world? If the apocalypses come out, it's going to be a true hell on earth.' Lugh thought.
The group proceeded cautiously to the transit point. After some time, they finally arrived on their destination.
This plane looks like a very normal one, with a fully functional ecosystem and millions of cultivators. It was on this plane that did they hide the transit point.
They passed through its atmosphere, but that didn't affect them. They only stopped flying once they arrived in a dilapidated mansion.
"Gate Array!"
""Ha!""
They didn't waste time and started to cast the group array. Meanwhile, Lugh and the others are in the middle of them, waiting until they're done casting.
"Something's wrong.."
"Lugh?"
"Something's-SHIT!"
Lugh jolted as if he received a great shock. He already activated [Decisiveness], accelerating his thoughts even more. In his perception, the world slowed down. He processed the set of actions before he shouted.
"RUN!"
He used his mental power to push everyone here. The Deities weren't affected that much, but their concentration was broken.
"What is it?!"
Vera angrily shouted at Lugh.
"Apocalypse, it's coming!"
Her instincts kicked at the moment she heard his extremely serious voice. Trusting it, she followed Lugh's instructions.
"Spread out!"
Confused, they stood still for a moment. This didn't last long as they followed Vera's words immediately.
In the sky, an entity is falling down in their direction. Surprisingly, it's the female cultivator from before!
This time, she didn't look like a beautiful woman. Her face is split into two: a man's and a woman's, inducing creepiness in whoever sees it.
"Tsk. Danger perception trait?"
The entity spoke in a strange way. The voices of a child, adult, and old overlapped, making it harder for others to guess what exactly is it.
"Nevermind, I'll just eat them all."
It turned into a black fluid-like substance before falling into one of the Low-Rank Deities on the group.
"AHHHHH!"
"MERGEL! FUCK!"
The Low-Rank Deity screamed in great pain. It felt as if his entirety is being decomposed bit by bit. even his Armor couldn't protect him from melting as he soon assimilated into the black fluid.
To others' surprise, the black fluid transformed into its former appearance, though its man face is now the Low-Rank Deity that he assimilated before.
"He didn't satiate me much."
"Battle array!"
Vera instructed them to enter the battle array. As they positioned themselves, their energies got connected to each other as well as their recovery speeds.
Meanwhile, Lugh checked the monster with his panel.
[Life Assimilator (True)]
@#$c%^p2e Index: ???
???
???
???
....
A translucent red box appeared in front of him.
'What's this?! Even the panel couldn't-!'
Soon after, red prompts appeared, as if telling a great danger.
[Beep! Detected an @#$c%^p2e that surpassed the standard index.]
[Checking stored energy...]
[Beep! Stored energy reached below the warning level. Determining the situation to be a 5th-Level Alert!]
[Beep! Detected that the main console is undergoing self-repair...]
[Detected stored energy on the self-repair channel...]
'What?'
Deaths, deaths, and even more deaths. As the clock ticks, another Low-Rank Deity got assimilated to it.
The Demigods felt very helpless; they couldn't even help, or else they'll just turn into that monster's nutrients.
In the midst of explosions, Lugh fell silent. He tried to comprehend the prompts in front of him, but he couldn't do so.
[Determined that the host is on a 5th-Level Alert! Proceeding with the emergency measures...]
[The Origin Power was transferred to the Elimination channel.]
[@#$c%^p2e Index is at ???. Proceeding to Complete Elimination Mode.]
Lugh saw that more than a fifth of his comrades fell to the weird monster. With his [Decisiveness], he could still control himself. Still, this is the first time that he fell into this situation since the beginning of his journey.
As if responding to his non-existent frustration, blue light came from within him, coating the <
[Detected that the current weapon of the host is: Myriad Forms Armament.]
[Establishing Link.. Link Established.]
'I don't know what this is, but..'
He's sure that it can prevent any more casualties. He charged into the monster whilst <