Chapter 391: Desolate Bone Trap
Song Ziyue had already said that the Five Elemental Bone Array was designed by him. Logically, the person setting up an array holds the advantage, while the person trying to crack it has the disadvantage.
In a typical showdown, one side would set up an array while the other would try to crack it. If one could completely crack it, it meant that the person cracking it exceeded the person who set it up.
Song Ziyue did not take advantage of Lin Yuan in this aspect. He was proud and thought lowly of Lin Yuan. He had proclaimed that if Lin Yuan could extract more than 30% of the Power of Desolates from the array, then Lin Yuan would win.
30% of the Power of Desolates was considered very low.
Being looked down upon by Song Ziyue, Lin Yuan suppressed the raging flame in his heart, “Such shameless boasting. See how I break down your bone array!”
If a layman were to look at Song Ziyue’s bone array, that person would not be able to see anything special about it. It was just like a child taking a bunch of beast bones and casually stacking them together.
However, when Lin Yuan entered the bone array, his expression turned serious. He could see that the desolate bones had been processed through some special techniques.
Desolate bones with the five elements, Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth corresponded to five elemental desolate beasts, and not any ordinary desolate beasts.
For example, the desolate bone in front of Lin Yuan was a general-ranked desolate beast’s bone.
Lin Yuan could not tell what sort of desolate beast it came from. The bone looked very special as it was entirely smooth and round, like a glass bead.
“Song Ziyue may be arrogant, but he indeed has the ability. The array he set up is made from the combination of the bones from elite-ranked desolate beasts and general-ranked desolate beasts. The inner circle, where the array’s core is, there are even bones from king-ranked desolate beasts. To crack this array, the first thing needed is to find the array’s cores.”
In the surrounding pavilions, people began to discuss. They never expected that this was how the Desolate Heaven technique showdown would be for the matches from Song Ziyue onwards.
However, this method required more technical skills than the clashing of runic seals. Also, it allowed one to keep on battling.
There might be consecutive failures of people trying to crack Song Ziyue’s array. This was what he relied on to challenge all of the young heroes of the Lin family in a tag-team battle.
“This bone should be the central point of the ten plus desolate bones nearby. It is also one of the cores of this array.”
Lin Yuan had previously counted that this desolate bone array counted a total of 108 bones. There were 9 bones for the array core, and every 12 bones formed a group. Each group had a central bone and this central bone was where one of the array’s core was.
If he could break apart this core bone, then this small array group would be broken.
Previously, Song Ziyue said that as long he broke 30% of the array, then Lin Yuan would win.
Although Lin Yuan was indignant with Song Ziyue’s contemptuous words, he slowly held back his pride as he began examining the Five Elemental Bone Array. This array was not simple!
Regardless, winning was most important. If he could not even break 30% of the bone array, it would be too embarrassing.
“I only need to extract the Power of Desolates of 4 desolate bones and break apart 4 small group arrays to win.”
With this thought in mind, Lin Yuan injected all of his mental energy into the smooth glass bead-like bone. This bone emitted a searing feeling and was probably a fire-elemental desolate beast’s bone.
When Lin Yuan sank his perception into it, for some unknown reason, he suddenly felt faint. It was as if his perception had been absorbed into the desolate bone, entering a world that was filled with fire.
“Oh? This is!?”
Lin Yuan was alarmed. He immediately pulled back his perception and exited his consciousness, but at this moment, the round fiery glass-like desolate bone cracked!
“Boom!”
With a fiery explosion, a fire python, which was entirely red in color, appeared from the desolate bone. This fire python opened its jaws and bit at Lin Yuan.
“Ah!”
Lin Yuan let out a scream. Although it happened suddenly, and his soul had suffered a backlash, making his head hurt, Lin Yuan was still able to use all of his strength to send out a punch when the fire python threatened his life.
“Peng!”
With an energy explosion, the fire python was destroyed by Lin Yuan, but at the same time, the arm Lin Yuan had used to send out the punch dislocated due to the forceful clash with the fire python. His entire fist was now covered in blood!
Lin Yuan’s body was also sent flying by the energy surge as he landed heavily on the square.
His face was pale while his body suffered from some spasms. Clearly, he was injured.
Actually, the injury on his arm was nothing. The most important thing was the damage to his soul. When he had used his mental energy to probe the desolate bone, he had suffered a backlash from the desolate bone, causing his soul to be injured.
Such an injury needed to be treated by an extremely good Soul Nurturing pill. He could not use his mental energy for at least half a month.
“What happened? What happened back there?”
Some of the Lin family’s juniors were puzzled. A glass-like desolate bone suddenly shattered, popping out a fire python that injured Lin Yuan.
“It is an Essence Qi shadow left behind when a desolate beast dies!”
An old man from the Lin family said. He was extremely surprised that the junior named Song Ziyue had managed to master such a technique.
“That glass-like desolate bone is actually from a general-ranked desolate beast, it’s the Flaming Fire Python’s ‘brain stone’ in its head. Song Ziyue managed to seal the Flaming Fire Python’s Essence Qi into the brain stone when it was killed. Following that, he used the brain stone as one of the group array cores of the Five Elemental Bone Array!”
“The remaining Flaming Fire Python’s Essence Qi inside the brain stone contained the resentment of being killed, so once it was initiated, it would break the brain stone and change into a Fire Python shadow that could kill. If the reaction of the person who probed it was any slower, he would have died on the spot.”
Although many Desolate Heaven Masters were not good at fighting, they were proficient at certain killing techniques, such as setting traps in desolate bone relics.
This was how one could use the Desolate Heaven technique to kill.
With a trap set inside a desolate bone, even if the person trying to break the array knew that there was a trap, it would not be easily cracked. This was because to crack the array, one had to sink one’s mental energy into the desolate bone, and once that happened, it would trigger the trap, causing the desolate beast’s essence Qi to form a backlash to one’s mental energy. The result after that was quite obvious.
This could only be avoided if one’s Desolate Heaven technique was superb, to the point where one could undo the trap Song Ziyue had laid at the moment one’s mental energy sank into the desolate bone. And Lin Yuan clearly did not have this ability.
Lin Yuan retreated back to the Evening Breeze Pavilion with his face pale. After consuming a Soul Nurturing pill, and readjusting his dislocated arm, he barely managed to regain some Yuan Qi.
“I was careless. Too careless. I accidentally fell into this fellow’s trap. If I knew that there was a trap in the desolate bone, I would definitely not have turned out this way.”
Lin Yuan, who returned to the Evening Breeze Pavilion, felt embarrassed facing his juniors. He had directed the battle previously and arranged the order in which people went up, making him seem like the leader of the Evening Breeze Pavilion.
However, the moment he went up he fell into a trap just as he attempted to extract the first desolate bone’s energy. Thus he lost, even though Song Ziyue had said that just extracting 30% would give him victory.
He had not even managed to extract a single bit of energy. Having completely failed, it was too embarrassing!
“This kid first mentioned the 30% of energy to divert my attention, making me miss the possibility of there being a trap in the desolate bone. He is too cunning!”
As Lin Yuan gave some thought to it, he began to spout some unconvincing excuses. Not far away, Yi Yun shook his head gently when he heard him. In a showdown between Desolate Heaven Masters, it was all about using one’s ability to create all sorts of obstacles for one’s opponents. Setting a trap within a desolate bone was a very common practice.
Back when he first came into contact with the Desolate Heaven technique, and was extracting the Lin Bone Gall, Luo Huo’er, who was unhappy with him, had set a trap in the Lin Bone Gall. She had hoped that he would cause it to explode when he injected his mental energy into it, drenching him in bile.
However, Yi Yun had seen through it, causing Luo Huo’er to succumb to the trap herself.
Of course, compared to Luo Huo’er’s trap, that was just a mischievous prank, Song Ziyue’s method of using a desolate beast’s essence Qi was more lethal. It could kill.
“Anyone else?” Song Ziyue said on stage. He took out another piece of bone from his interspatial ring, placing it down in the spot where the Flaming Fire Python’s desolate bone had been. This bone was not a fire-elemental desolate bone, but a water-elemental one.
This surprised people. Every time Song Ziyue set up the Five Elemental Bone Array, the arrangement of the desolate bones were different.
Such an ever-changing array was most troublesome as it would be much more difficult to figure out the rules.
“As long as you a Desolate Heaven technique apprentice below the age of 18, feel free to challenge my Five Elemental Bone Array! If you can break 30% of it, you win!”
Song Ziyue was extremely confident. His provocation made many disciples of the Lin family angry. Song Ziyue was only 16 years old, yet he proclaimed that any Desolate Heaven technique apprentice below the age of 18 could challenge him.
However, though people were indignant about it, they knew that it was certain that the array set up by Song Ziyue was extremely hard to deal with. Lin Yuan, who was the personal disciple of the middle-aged man surnamed Sun, was quite outstanding in terms of his Desolate Heaven technique in the Lin family. Unfortunately, he did not manage to extract even a single bit of energy from the Five Elemental Bone Array. He lost instantly.
Lin Yuan said that he had been careless and fell for the trap, but everyone knew that Song Ziyue had set up an extremely profound, hidden trap. This caused Lin Yuan to be unable to discover it, if not, he wouldn’t have lost so miserably.
Under these circumstances, even if someone had told Lin Yuan that there was a trap in the bone, he would probably still have been unable to do anything about it.
Yi Yun looked at Song Ziyue and furrowed his eyebrows. His goal in participating in the Desolate Heaven technique tea session was very clear. He was here to mess things up!
Previously, when Lin Yuan attempted to send Yi Yun up to participate in the 64 people group match, Yi Yun lacked interest. Those who participated in the group match were a bunch of nobodies. Yi Yun would only waste his mental energy by going up, it would be meaningless.
He would only go on stage at such a moment when a top Desolate Heaven Master apprentice from the opposite side appeared. Only then was it time for Yi Yun to make a move.
Yi Yun stood up and, without a word, walked along the Evening Breeze Pavilion’s edge.
The youths in the Evening Breeze Pavilion were curious about Yi Yun’s action, but at this moment, Yi Yun silently leaped up and, like a feather, moved towards the center of the square…
And at the same moment Yi Yun leaped, a young girl flew up into the air from another small pavilion in the central regions of the lake, towards the square at the lake’s center.