However, those with powerful spiritual energy are in no way inferior to those with superpowers. Unless the arbitrators of the European Arbitration Council possess holy light that can absolutely suppress them, ordinary superpowered individuals do not have an absolute advantage over vampires. Because they have blood as their energy source, vampires can live indefinitely as long as they have a constant supply of blood. Some ancient vampires have even lived for hundreds of years and possess unfathomable power, enough to rival the world's strongest superpowered individuals.
Although these four vampires looked very young, in terms of their actual age, each of them was probably an old monster spanning at least fifty years. Just thinking about their two hollow fangs that sucked human blood made Xia Lan shudder involuntarily.
The shorter vampire glared at Francis with displeasure, then scrutinized Xia Lan with a critical look: "This chick is quite nice, but Francis, we're the ones who brought her here, so why should she be your mistress all to yourself? Do you want me, Durmville, to go back to that damned underground castle in Europe empty-handed? I've finally come out here, and without the Duke's control, I want to enjoy myself in a Hong Kong underground bar."
At this point, his emerald green pupils suddenly flashed with a green light, and he couldn't help but stick out a long, bright red tongue and lick his lips, which looked as if they were smeared with blood: "I haven't tasted the flavor of an Asian girl yet. If this can change my taste, it will be the most wonderful thing about this trip. Damn Francis, I'm going to have this chick. If you don't agree, let's duel."
Francis glared angrily at Demville, a powerful aura of spiritual energy forming a chilling silver light around his body. His fists clenched, ready to strike without a word. Demville met his gaze without flinching. The two vampires seemed to disregard the two burly men before them, already arguing over who would possess Xia Lan before even eliminating their enemy.
The oldest vampire coldly looked at the two excited young men who seemed somewhat unaware of their surroundings: "My lords, although one of you is Duke William's most favored son and the other is Duke Ulysses's nephew, you are currently carrying out a mission for our Remore family. I am the highest-ranking officer. If either of you dares to disobey my orders, I will immediately send you back to Europe to face the family's punishment."
Francis and Demville were both startled and quickly stood up straight, their posture now impeccably aristocratic and their words gentle: "Your Excellency Marquis Banier, we obey your orders as if they were your children."
A deep smile appeared on the Marquis's face. His eyes suddenly intensified, as if they had become multiple overlapping pupils. He slowly shifted his gaze from Frances and Gaia to the two berserkers, and said leisurely, "My dearest brother Gaia, we now have two opponents. The girl can be ignored. There's another girl hiding in the corner, but she's seriously injured and can also be ignored. The Heavenly Eye is probably on them, but they might not be willing to hand it over to us. Moreover, our berserker friends seem to want the Heavenly Eye as well, and their attitude is quite unfriendly. I think we need to trample on their corpses to make our demand for the Heavenly Eye more forceful. Which one do you want to choose?"
The man with long, light gray hair kept his eyes locked on Leonid's without ever looking away. Both powerful figures sensed the fervent fighting spirit and hostile atmosphere in each other's gazes. Without needing to be spoken, they had chosen their opponent from the very beginning.
Ivanov glared at Banier: "So it's you bunch of bastards who can only walk in the dark. What else can you do besides hiding in filthy and deserted corners and sucking disgusting blood? You bats who only deserve to live with rats, go back to your old home in Europe and accept the holy judgment of the Arbitration Court. Only by roasting you one by one on a hot iron in the sunlight will you bastards have a true destiny!"
Everyone was stunned, including Leonid, who knew Ivanov well. Their astonished eyes kept sweeping over that fanatical face. When did the raging, violent berserker, who only knew rage and irritability, start uttering such insidious and vicious words, and almost every word hit the vampire's sore spot?
Leonid could even clearly see the four vampires displaying obvious anger. Each of them clenched their fists, and a tangible spiritual energy field surged from their bodies, emitting a powerful and terrifying aura. If it weren't for the lack of capillaries, the four of them might have already turned red with anger.
Ivanov looked at Leonid, who was staring at him, somewhat bewildered, seemingly unaware that he had just done something quite cultured, greatly enhancing the low-level taste of berserkers as barbarians.
"What did I just say? Was I cursing these vampires?" Ivanov asked in confusion. For some reason, he was about to scream violently, but a series of neat and clear words suddenly surfaced in his mind. Without even thinking about why, the Sunshine Berserker recited the words one by one. Although his brain, which was only made up of well-developed muscles, could not fully understand the meaning when he recited them, Ivanov still felt very satisfied to see the vampires suffer.
Xia Lan silently took another step back. The chill of the moonlight had lowered the basement temperature to normal. She reached into her isolation barrier, grasped Xiao Rou's hand, and transferred a warm and stable mental energy field to her to increase her recovery time. A faint, cold smile appeared on Xia Lan's exquisite face.
Leonid sighed. "It's nothing, well said." He only sighed softly, but the sigh was extremely long, as if he was strongly regretting something, or as if he was hinting at some nameless meaning.
Suddenly, a raging fire shot out from Ivanov's chest, instantly transforming into a sun blazing with intense light and heat, swiftly descending upon Demville.
In the blazing firelight, the vampire's face appeared even paler. Demville was taken aback. In the instant the sun was directly overhead, he closed his eyes. Although the sun in Ivanov was not true sunlight, it contained rays that were more invasive than sunlight. As a vampire, he was wary of sunlight. If that blazing fire came into contact with his eyes, he would go blind immediately.
Unexpectedly, the berserker had also learned to launch sneak attacks. Obviously, Leonid's sigh was just a signal of teamwork among the companions. Ivanov immediately launched a sharp and deliberate attack based on his companion's hint. He saw that Francis and Demville were relatively weak, so the unexpected attack landed on one of the two young vampires.
Suddenly, a crystal-like shield, seemingly filled with azure liquid, appeared before Demville. With a flash of blue light, it transformed into a massive aquamarine sphere, covering most of his body. The aquamarine color possessed a deep, opaque quality, which could minimize the corrosive and harmful effects of fire and sunlight on vampires.
Vampires aren't incapable of walking in sunlight, but intense sunlight weakens their power. The ultraviolet rays in sunlight are the most potent weapon against the skin of vampires, which lack capillaries. This common sense and habit formed over thousands of years has deeply ingrained the fear of sunlight into the very marrow of vampires. Therefore, upon seeing the Sun Berserker's scorching sun attack, Demville instinctively thought of dodging.
Banir and Gaia snorted simultaneously, and two incredibly swift figures pounced forward, leaving faint afterimages in the narrow space of the basement. Powerful and terrifying spiritual energy emanated from their long, sharp claws, forming countless strong, azure light spots that shot towards Ivanov and Gaia.
Even in a berserk state, with extremely strong physical defense, the high-level berserker still dared not fearlessly use his body to withstand attacks like the low-level berserker. His massive body dodged with disproportionately powerful strength, then roared softly as he engaged the two vampire marquises in battle.
Despite his displeasure at Demville's blatant attempt to steal the girl he already considered his for the taking, Francis, as a fellow vampire, couldn't stand idly by and watch his companion fall into danger. He suddenly stepped forward, and thick black mist bloomed from his fingertips, instantly transforming into a jet-black ball of light that slanted into the fireball, blocking the massive, sun-like fireball alongside Demville's aquamarine ball of light.
With a deafening roar, the massive fireball exploded violently above Demville's head. Despite the azure light sphere shield and Francis's intervention, Demville still stumbled and nearly fell to the ground. A surge of blood welled up in his chest, and a trickle of blood flowed from his bright red lips. However, the vampire immediately swallowed the blood back. Every drop of blood represented the vampire's lifeblood, and wasting blood was tantamount to suicide.
Francis was also in a flurry of activity. He hadn't expected that at the moment the fireball exploded, a dazzling light would shoot out from the center of the fireball and strike him squarely above the corner of his eye. The extremely bright light instantly caused him to lose sight in his right eye. Francis was terrified and kept activating his mental energy field, trying to restore his poor eye as quickly as possible.
A unique and intoxicating fragrance suddenly wafted from behind him.
Chapter 253 I Like You
Countless dazzling golden rays shot out from every part of Ling Yun's body, as if a dazzling little sun had suddenly appeared inside him, disintegrating his body with intense light and heat. In the blink of an eye, Ling Yun had become a golden ball of light, with only a blurry shadow visible. But a moment later, even Ling Yun's figure disappeared. Countless pale golden fragments shot out from the golden ball of light, turning into golden dust that vanished into the void.
"No, you can't do this!" countless Lingyun roared in unison. But golden light also shot out from within their bodies, countless golden fragments drifting in the void, turning into specks of dust and rising upwards. An unnamed breeze blew by, and the void returned to its desert-like emptiness and desolation, as if the billions of Lingyun who had just existed were merely countless illusory bubbles.
The mirror, standing hundreds of meters tall, suddenly vanished, and an unseen, strange aura slowly flowed through the void.
Seemingly propelled by an invisible force, the void was slowly changing. The gray background gradually deepened, as if it had been smeared with a thick layer of black ink. The color of the background deepened, and the light refracted in the void gradually dimmed. Strange void ripples surged as if they had a life of their own, transforming into various bizarre and complex abstract symbols whose meanings were incomprehensible. After expressing complex meanings that no intelligent life could understand, they sank into an incomparably dark mass of chaos in just a fraction of a second.
Everything vanished, even the void was pulled into darkness.
After a long while, a soft question suddenly echoed in the empty darkness.
As if in response to the question, the dark space suddenly began to collapse, like a television screen that had been turned off. In the blink of an eye, it formed a barely visible bright spot, which then flashed brilliantly before disappearing into a clear, bright black-and-white sphere.
The sphere spun around somewhat dazedly, as if it had just awakened from a deep sleep. Then, as if it were consciously expressing a silent yet richly emotional and meaningful brilliance, a thin golden light shot out from the sphere. After a moment, the sphere regained its clarity and awakened consciousness.
The microscopic world began to slowly expand, while the sphere shrank rapidly. A huge eyelid suddenly drooped down from the sphere and then immediately pulled back up. Long eyelashes trembled slightly. It turned out that this was just an eye.
Her eyes blinked again, and a fine layer of golden light suddenly appeared on the luminous surface of the crystal. However, the golden light was only fleeting, and her eyes immediately showed an unusual look as she looked at another pair of beautiful eyes not far away, which were filled with shock and disbelief. Those were Mochizuki Nami's wonderful eyes.
The owner of the eyes slowly straightened up, finally feeling solid ground beneath his feet—a truly wonderful feeling. The golden sun shone brightly overhead. Although the smoke and dust and ruins still presented a desolate scene, compared to the lifeless void of the Illusionary Realm, even standing amidst the ruins, Ling Yun still felt it was paradise. Life was so beautiful, and a touch of tenderness appeared in Ling Yun's eyes.
Mochizuki Nami gazed intently at him, her jade-like face displaying an indescribable expression—surprise, anger, jealousy, and a nameless, hidden emotion. Her hands remained outstretched, as if in the starting position before casting the Blood Sacrifice Technique, but upon seeing Ling Yun regain consciousness, she slowly lowered her two delicate white hands.
"You won, Ling Yun, you broke my Blood Sacrifice Technique!" After a long while, Mochizuki Nami finally spoke slowly, her tone filled with an indescribable sense of loneliness and heaviness, but also with an inexplicable and complex feeling.
Ling Yun had never been able to see through her true emotions and psychology. Mochizuki Nami was like a hazy pink mist, just like the unparalleled magic she possessed—always elusive, indistinguishable from reality, leaving you only with a delicate and alluring heart. Beneath that breathtakingly beautiful exterior lay a mirage that could never be truly seen. Extremely beautiful, alluring, and captivating, but she could only be seen, never touched.
Only at this moment did Ling Yun's gaze penetrate Mochizuki Nami's beautiful, dark eyes, reaching into her heart. He truly sensed the depths of this Japanese girl's exquisite and clear mind—the real Mochizuki Nami, who felt a sense of loss, but even more so, an inexplicable joy and excitement, as if she had encountered something that interested her most.
"I didn't break it, I was just lucky." After a long while, Ling Yun finally said slowly. He wasn't trying to comfort Mochizuki Nami. The Blood Sacrifice Delusion Technique was definitely the most profound delusion technique he had ever experienced in his life. If it weren't for the person he deeply loved, if it weren't for the invisible thread that had always connected the two of them, Ling Yun would have already lost himself and become a lost part of the delusion realm.
Even now, Ling Yun still finds it incredible. He seems to have done nothing at all; it was just a sudden flash of inspiration that inexplicably transported him out of the illusionary realm. Yet, the strange mirror, the incomparably powerful deity, and the countless selves within him are clearly etched into his mind as precious memories. These are not merely simple memories, but rather a vast amount of information, as if a tiny seed from another world's civilization had been planted in Ling Yun's heart. As Ling Yun continues to break through his own limitations, the seed will silently grow until it becomes a towering tree, its branches and leaves flourishing, ultimately forming a magnificent forest.
Even with Ling Yun's current perception and the ability of the Eye of Illusion, he can only vaguely sense something and can never clearly understand it.
The Eye of Illusion seemed to have undergone another wondrous change, but this change remained unknown. Ling Yun still only had a vague sense of it and didn't know exactly what he possessed. However, all the changes, including the increase in power, couldn't compare to the feeling Ling Yun experienced the instant he broke through the illusion and sensed the vibrant life force of reality.
It turns out that places where life exists are so beautiful; loneliness is always an unbearable burden for life! We exist, we feel lonely, it turns out, is just a feeling of being far from the crowd, because we are in life itself, Lingyun thought silently.
“Luck?” Mochizuki Nami gave a bitter smile. “I remember you also mentioned luck when you broke my illusion technique last time. Is your luck really that good, or is mine bad? You are my destined nemesis. Every time I meet you, it always ends in my defeat. Ling Yun, you are a grown man. How can you bully a small, weak woman like me like this?”
The first half of her speech sounded like she was complaining, but as she spoke, her tone changed, subtly revealing a girl's coquettish and playful side. Especially the last sentence, which sounded like the tone of a girl whose boyfriend had caught her little scheme—a mixture of delight and reproach. Moreover, her tone shifts were always natural and seamless, never feeling abrupt.