Li Yao hid the real reason because he did not want the Fire Ant King to think that he was too crazy.
The reason real he carried the cannonball for the main gun of a heavy crystal warship, which had been added with even more gunpowder by him, was that he could take it out and die with his enemy when there was no other choice.
It was a good habit that Li Yao had developed when he was still in the Refinement Stage. At that time, he had become fond of walking around on the battlefield with a box of powerful bombs named Hellfire-Lightnings. It was exactly with an entire box of Hellfire-Lightnings that he had slain an enemy beyond his level for the first in his life, which was a ‘Six-Armed Naga’ in the demon general level.
Right now, his Cultivation had soared. The level of his ‘suicidal bomb’ naturally increased, too.
As it happened, the penetrating bomb was perfect to open the iron can that was buried deep under the ground.
However, the normal usage of a cannonball was to be fired by a main gun. Without enough acceleration, it could not deal much damage.
If Li Yao were to place the thick, black bomb there and detonate it with simple triggering rune arrays, the best result he could expect was that the floor he was on would be blown into smithereens. It was impossible for the minus nineteenth floor, which was protected by multiple layers of defense rune arrays, to be affected.
It was the critical reason Li Yao needed the ‘Venomous Scorpion Bone Biting Shackle’!
The ‘Venomous Scorpion Bone Biting Shackle’ boasted the most immaculate restriction rune arrays of the Heaven’s Origin Sector, which had perhaps been polished by Jiang Shaoyang for an entire year.
Demon emperors and the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators were all monsters with unbelievable vitality. Even if a crystal bomb was detonated right near their chest, they might not necessarily be killed.
It was because the damage of the bomb would spread out, and only one tiny proportion of it was really aimed at their body.
With the boundary of the restriction rune arrays, however, all the damage of the bomb would be focused on one point and would, therefore, significantly wreck the demon emperor or the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator when it was detonated.
To put it simply, the restriction rune array could be compared to an invisible membrane made of a magnetic field. After an explosion took place, all the energy would surge and shatter the items within the range of the membrane. As for the bystanders out of the membrane, no matter how close they were to it, they would not be harmed at all.
Through such a method, it could be ensured that the target inside the restriction rune array was executed precisely, and there would be no damage to the surroundings.
Such a usage was exactly what Li Yao needed.
Li Yao prepared to slightly change the form of Jiang Shaoyang’s restriction rune array through a series of modification. He was going to rip apart a hole that led downward inside the restriction rune array, which would envelop the entire cannon ball like an invisible and yet firm bell. After that, he would use his other crystal bombs as a source of power.
After the crystal bombs were detonated, because of the boundary of the restriction rune array, most of the energy would have nowhere to run but downward.
When they pushed the cannonball through all the floors in the middle, the cannonball would be detonated and blow out all the spiritual energy so that the ‘turtle shell’ outside of the control center would be wrecked!
In short, Li Yao was going to craft a special turret and barrel for the cannonball!
Crack! Crack! Crack!
Li Yao’s expression became serious again. Sounds of gears biting each other were echoing from his joints. With a flash of a Cosmos Ring on his little finger, a pair of gloves that were weaved with soft crystal tubes appeared in his hands. A deep green liquid was flowing vaguely inside the tubes, which extended and wreathed his arms, as if it were a futuristic fluorescent arm suit.
They were Ice Spirit Gloves. The liquid inside the tubes was Ice Spirit Jade Marrow, a marvelous material that could release coldness stably no matter how high a temperature it was put into. Li Yao was trying to cool down his hands with them.
Li Yao was not fond of the Ice Spirit Gloves because it would reduce the keenness of his hands. However, when his hand speed was accelerated to the highest, the heat resulting from the friction with the air could easily turn into interference for the magical equipment being assembled. Having no better choice, he could only deal with the slight hinderance.
Shua!
More than a hundred and fifty light beams were triggered by the mini crystal processor, which almost took up the entire interrogation chamber.
On the light beams, all the structural designs were jumping at a speed of one picture every three seconds.
The components floating around Li Yao split apart and danced crazily like blocks of ice that had been tossed into boiling oil!
Li Yao’s fascinated eyes turned blood red. In the end, he was gnashing his teeth as if he were a hungry tiger ready to lunge at a lamp, and he hurled the units into the heavy bomb one after another.
He was throwing the units so violently that the Fire Ant King felt that his blood was freezing. He could not help but wonder whether or not the cannonball would explode then and there!
Is—is he really a Cultivator, not faked by a certain demon emperor? the Fire Ant King asked himself again.
Three minutes later, everything around Li Yao was cleaned. The last component fitted into the joint of two units perfectly, like the last piece of a puzzle.
What a wild and straightforward ‘puzzle’ it was!
It looked like a vertical launcher for a crystal warship that had been put upside down. The front end of the cannonball was aimed down, half a meter from the ground, and fixed by multiple messy frames.
The Venomous Scorpion Bone Biting Shackle, which had been utterly deformed, was now lying at the rear of the cannonball. The shell of the Venomous Scorpion Bone Biting Shackle had been completely plucked, and it was connected to the cannonball through hundreds of crystal threads.
In order to give the cannonball a sufficient initial velocity, Li Yao deployed a circle of crystal bombs on the ground right below the cannonball. When the entire penetrating system was triggered, the circle of crystal bombs would blow up the floor first so that the cannonball would have some ten meters to gain momentum.
“Nailed it!”
Li Yao took off the Ice Spirit Gloves, which were about to be burnt, and looked at his work with great satisfaction.
With the crystal cameras on his mini crystal processor, he took many pictures of the combinative magical equipment.
When I am back in the Star Glory Federation where there is the signal of the Spiritual Nexus, I am going to send the pictures to Jiang Shaoyang and let him know that the magical equipment he produced has such a special usage. He will certainly be very excited! Li Yao thought to himself.
The Fire Ant King opened his mouth, hesitating whether or not he should tell his new ally that the magical equipment he crafted just now really look like a huge pile of garbage.
However, when Li Yao tapped the light beam softly and activated the penetrating system, the dangerous mystic rays that were emitted from the overlapping frames and tubes decorated the ‘garbage’ with a certain coldness and made it exude a beauty of violence.
“Fire Ant King, how much have you recovered your capability?” Li Yao glanced and noticed that the wounds on the Fire Ant King’s body had all healed.
The Fire Ant King sniffed. Perhaps because he felt that he had been more or less eclipsed due to the series of shocks just now, right now, he bulged his eyes out and croaked like a frog deep inside his throat. His limbs and torso, which had withered, were expanding again. His mitochondria were burning crazily, and his demonic energy was surging out and twisting the air into colorful swirls!
“Ho!” the Fire Ant King bellowed. More than ten swirls crashed into him, enshrouding him in a hazy mist.
When the hazy mist was gone, the leader of the Blade of Chaos who showed up in front of Li Yao again already possessed a brand-new appearance!
He was shorter than the previous Fire Ant King. The eye-catching crimson shell had mostly disappeared from his body and turned into red armor covering his scapula, chest, arms, abdomen, groin, and other critical body parts after melding with his flesh and blood.
But the antennae on his forehead were longer and shaking slightly in the air.
He was even more handsome than before. Other than his red skin, there was no difference between him and an elegant human expert.
Hiu! Hiu! Hiu!
The Fire Ant King’s arms and legs seemed to be still, but a dazzling light appeared in front of him as he was shaking off the wet interstitial fluid secreted because of the crazy mutations of his cells. His smile was full of hatred, which made his face more hideous than usual.
“I’ve chosen to activate all my potential with the strengthening drugs. At the cost of a huge amount of my vitality, the poison, venom, and barriers that Elder Nether Spring left on me have finally been devoured. I have even stimulated my cells with his poison and thereby gained even greater strength!
“The price is that I am going to be fatigued for a long time after the battle, but there’s no time to worry about that now!
“I am back at the demon emperor stage for now and can maintain this at least until we march out of the place!
“Nether Spring, since everything began when we discovered a residence of Chaos together years ago, let’s just finish our grudge once and for all in another residence of Chaos!”
Li Yao sighed. “Before today, I never thought that I would be fighting side by side with a demon emperor. Let’s go!”
The Fire Ant King was dazed. “Where?”
“To a shelter, of course.” Li Yao blinked. “Do you wish to explode with the cannonball, Fire Ant King?”
The gate of the interrogation chamber was opened again.
Li Yao and the Fire Ant King strode out blatantly toward the other side of the floor, not even trying to disguise themselves.
Perhaps because they looked too bizarre and they were walking in a too unconcealed way, the guards of the Nether World Watch around them all thought that they were dreaming. They watched as the two of them passed by and did not know how to react for a long time.
“Is—is this the Fire Ant King?”
“Un—unlikely. Something must’ve gone wrong…”
Li Yao and the Fire Ant King talked to each other in a low voice while walking forward casually.
“Countdown, eight, seven, six…”
“It seems that my Fellow Cultivator is more focused in the arts of refining in your training,” the Fire Ant King observed. “You must be very careful when we’re down there. Just leave all the tricky enemies to me!”
“Four… Three… Crap!”
“What’s wrong?” the Fire Ant King asked.
“I seem to have miscalculated. The bomb might be slightly more powerful than I expected.”