Chapter 248
Recovery!
The sunlight, the dazzling sunlight, suddenly pierced through the haze again and shone down!
The murky air quickly cleared, carrying the suffocating earthy smell unique to the aftermath of a major disaster.
The field of vision suddenly opened up.
Dead silence.
Absolute silence enveloped the entire Shrek Academy's fourth assessment arena, even reaching the onlookers who were slumped on the ground in the distance, having narrowly escaped being swallowed by the sandstorm.
Everyone, from the terrified farmers and stall owners to the teachers and students of Shrek Academy, had their eyes fixed on the center of the arena—
That flat, open space surrounded by farmhouses is long gone.
Instead, there is a terrifying giant crater with a diameter of over 100 meters and a depth of nearly 10 meters!
The edges look as if they have been gnawed by the most ferocious beast, showing an irregular, jagged tear pattern!
The soil and rocks on the pit walls have an eerie, vitrified luster, which is the trace of being instantly melted and solidified by unimaginable high temperature and force!
Wisps of smoke, carrying a burnt smell, were rising from the cracks in the pit walls.
At the very bottom center of the giant pit, a wretched human figure was deeply embedded in the vitrified mud.
It was Zhao Wuji!
His clothes had long since turned to ashes in the sandstorm and high temperature, revealing his strong, bronze-colored body covered with countless fine cuts and charred marks.
The muscles that were originally as tough as iron were now covered with grotesque, bloody gashes, and in some places, you could even see the white bone hidden beneath the dark red flesh!
His face was swollen like fermented dough, a mixture of blue and purple, completely unrecognizable from his original fierce appearance. Congealed blood foam hung from the corner of his mouth, and dark red liquid was slowly dripping from his nostrils.
His eyes were closed, and his breathing was weak and disordered. Each difficult breath caused his broken chest to heave violently, producing a hoarse "hoarse" sound like a broken bellows.
Only the upper body of the person was barely visible, while the lower half was deeply embedded in the hard, vitrified soil, like a withered tree that had been roughly broken and carelessly discarded in scorched earth.
The Immovable King? At this moment, he looks more like a piece of scorched mud embedded in a rock.
In the midst of this deathly silence, the hundred-meter-tall sandstorm lord, Bangiras, stirred.
Its massive, mountain-like body leaned slightly forward, its thick limbs, covered in heavy alloy steel armor, moved with each step, like the sound of a dull war drum, causing the entire crystal pit to tremble slightly and cracks to spread!
It slowly lowered its head, its head, like a battering ram, with a single, tower-like horn on its forehead gleaming with a cold light. Its dark golden lava eyes, filled with a pure, indifferent gaze, looked down at the dying golden figure at the bottom of the pit.
"Waaah..."
At the bottom of the pit, Zhao Wuji seemed to regain a faint consciousness under the enormous shadow and the cold, deathly gaze. His swollen eyelids twitched a few times with difficulty, trying to open.
When his blurry vision caught sight of those two enormous, dark gold pupils above his head, like the entrance to a hellish furnace, his battered body twitched violently!
"Ho..."
A short, terrified gasp, like the snapping of a rooster, escaped from deep within his throat. Immediately afterward, Zhao Wuji's eyes, swollen to slits, widened to their limit, his eyeballs almost bulging out of their sockets!
That was a fear that penetrated to the bone and was imprinted in the deepest part of the soul!
He seemed to see something more despairing than death itself, his body trembling violently, making incomprehensible gurgling sounds in his throat, trying to curl his body deeper into the scalding glazed earth, futilely avoiding the absolute oppressive gaze from the level of life.
Lin Xia calmly watched Zhao Wuji's death-defying, beast-like reaction at the bottom of the giant pit, his face expressionless. He simply raised his right hand casually.
"Okay, come back now." There was no earth-shattering noise, no blinding light.
The towering, mountain-like figure of the hundred-meter-tall behemoth, exuding an aura of savage destruction, began to collapse and dissipate silently, like a dream bubble.
The heavy armor etherealized, and the massive body transformed into a pure and condensed stream of earth-yellow energy, flowing like a hundred rivers into the sea, instantly disappearing into Lin Xia's palm.
One second it was a world-destroying behemoth, the next it was just a small beast, about the size of a palm, covered in dark gray steel armor, nuzzling Lin Xia's neck affectionately with its little head.
Bangilas let out a satisfied "Bang~" sound in its throat, its dark golden eyes sweeping over the "little bugs" at the bottom of the pit below, with a hint of lingering laziness.
Lin Xia's gaze once again fell upon the wrecked, scorched crater and the surrounding ground, which looked as if it had been repeatedly raked by a giant plow, covered with deep cracks and traces of melting.
He sighed softly, his voice not loud, but it reached everyone's ears clearly.
"The noise was indeed a bit too loud."
Under the gaze of countless still-dull, awe-inspiring, and fearful eyes, Lin Xia casually took a step forward.
His toes lightly touched the scorched, cracked ground covered with spiderwebs.
hum!
A soft, watery yet profound earthy yellow halo, centered on his toes, spread silently outwards!
The light, like a warm spring, instantly flowed across the entire testing ground, covering all the damaged areas.
A miracle unfolded before everyone's eyes.
That terrifying, ten-meter-deep crater was as if it had been gently smoothed out by an invisible hand!
The broken glazed clay layer seemed to come alive, emitting a faint "rustling" sound, and rapidly flowing, merging, and settling!
The cracked pit walls healed automatically, and the towering edges collapsed silently to fill the gaps!
In just a few breaths, the enormous, devastating crater vanished without a trace!
All that remains is a slightly raised, flat piece of land, a bit darker in color than the rest, exuding the scent of damp earth!
Immediately afterwards, the halo flowed across the hard ground around it, which had been melted and vitrified by the high temperature.
The dazzling, glassy luster receded like the tide, turning into the most rustic, dark brown soil.
The huge, bottomless cracks were quickly stitched together as if by invisible needles and threads, and the churning earth filled all the ravines!
A halo of light flowed over the edges of several farmhouses that had been affected by the sandstorm, were teetering on the brink of collapse, had no thatched roofs, and had walls covered with terrifying cracks.
Those shocking cracks healed and disappeared at lightning speed!
The peeling paint on the walls grew back, and even the scattered thatch seemed to have turned back time, rising up from the ground and covering the simple roof again!
As the last wisp of earthy yellow light receded like the tide and settled beneath Lin Xia's feet, the entire Shrek Academy's fourth assessment arena was completely transformed!
The land was flat, the farmhouses were intact, and even the few wild grasses that had been blown askew in the distant fields had straightened up again!
Aside from the lingering dust in the air and the dampness of the dark brown fresh soil, it was as if the devastating sandstorm, the suffocating pressure, and the dying Soul Saint embedded at the bottom of the pit... it was all just a terrifying nightmare! (End of Chapter)