Chapter 575: Advancement, Legendary Sacred Flame Lord

Chapter 575: Ascension, Legendary Flame Lord

"Get ready, we're about to take off!"

Bur heard Levi's words and looked utterly bewildered, completely failing to grasp their meaning.

He shouted after him, "What do you mean?"

"It means we're about to get blown sky-high!"

No sooner had Levi spoken than the spatial rift before them, radiating a prismatic glow, violently expanded.

The terrifying force erupting from within the rift burst outward with such intensity that it tore open a gash in the space enclosed by the Void Grasp.

All the energy of the elemental nuclear blast trapped inside the rift poured out through the tear.

A brilliant, multicolored jet erupted into the void.

Bur’s vision was instantly overwhelmed by the dazzling kaleidoscope of light.

He felt as though he were no more than a ball kicked fiercely into the air.

His body hurtled uncontrollably toward the distance.

He feared his magical shield wouldn’t hold.

Yet to his surprise, he found himself enveloped in a transparent hexagonal barrier.

This shield firmly resisted the force of the jet, carrying him along as he soared into the distance.

Levi had already cast an invisibility armor spell on Bur earlier.

Without it, Bur might have been torn apart by the shockwave of the elemental detonation.

Levi and Bur were like two balls caught in the elemental jet, blown far into the void.

The Void Grasp clenched shut, compressing the surrounding space.

The source of the elemental jet was severed.

Soon, the radiant, iridescent light in the void faded away.

The Demon God’s retainer, witnessing Levi’s unconventional escape, showed a flicker of astonishment.

It was the first time he had ever seen a human use magic in such a bizarre way.

How to describe it? Simply... eccentric.

Levi didn’t care whether others thought him odd—as long as it worked.

If conventional methods couldn’t break through space, then unconventional ones must be used.

As Levi was hurled backward, he locked onto the Demon God’s retainer hovering above the void beast.

Under his mental command, the telekinesis spell formed a super-long ballistic trajectory stretching ten thousand meters.

The accelerated object was a magical crystal-based elemental warhead.

In the Astral Plane, there was no air—hence no sonic booms or atmospheric resistance.

The propulsion generated by telekinesis incurred minimal loss, allowing near-limitless acceleration.

Propelled by the spell over the ten-thousand-meter track, once the crystal left Levi’s control range, its speed had reached an unimaginable level.

Ten kilometers vanished in the blink of an eye.

The crystal hurtled toward the distant retainer of the Demon God.

Accuracy wasn’t even necessary.

Even if the retainer dodged the crystal,

the explosion radius would still engulf him.

An elemental warhead was not just talk—

its blast radius exceeded dozens of kilometers.

Even the colossal form of the void beast could be fully encompassed.

All Levi needed to do was calculate the timing of the detonation.

To deliver the warhead at precisely the right moment beside the target.

There was no whooshing sound.

Levi launched over ten elemental warheads made from magical crystals in rapid succession.

Each one carried enough power to grievously wound a demigod-level opponent.

While flying, the warheads remained virtually undetectable.

Only when nearing the target, as the internal fusion reaction approached critical instability, did they emit intense fluctuations in magical energy, drawing attention.

But by then, it was too late.

From the moment the fusion reaction spiraled out of control to the release of violent magical waves and finally to detonation—

less than 0.1 seconds passed.

Almost instantaneously upon destabilizing, the explosion occurred.

A blazing red orb of light erupted in the void, transforming into the most spectacular firework.

The first detonation triggered a chain reaction among the following dozen warheads, which exploded before reaching their critical point.

Though diminished in strength, the blasts created over a dozen enormous, multicolored suns blooming across the void.

Levi gazed at the distant flames and smiled.

He owed this all to the Jade Prince—if not for him, Levi wouldn’t have had so many magical crystals at his disposal.

The prince’s treasury held over a thousand top-grade crystals.

Now, every single one had become Levi’s ammunition.

Using such premium crystals as expendable combat supplies—

this went beyond mere extravagance.

It was practically throwing money at enemies until they dropped dead.

A single top-grade crystal was worth ten thousand gold coins.

Depending on their attributes, some rare variants were valued even higher.

And being struck by ten thousand gold coins would certainly raise a welt.

After a while, the blinding light in the void dimmed and gradually vanished.

With the fading of the glow, the world returned to darkness and silence.

Flames erupted from Levi’s back, propelling him forward as he decelerated.

Lest he drift too far, into a void from which return would be impossible.

He turned his head to survey the expanse, but Bahr’s silhouette had already vanished from sight.

When the blast had sent them careening, Bahr and Levi had been hurled along slightly divergent trajectories, separated from the start.

A negligible deviation at the origin would swell into a yawning chasm over vast distances.

And so it was that Levi could no longer discern where Bahr had been thrown.

Levi gave his head a firm shake, deciding there was little use in such fretting.

Bahr was, after all, a legendary mage; even if he had inadvertently overshot his mark, he ought to find his way back.

Levi propelled himself forward through the emptiness.

Bahr had been tumbling backward through the dark, realizing his plight only when the last surrounding objects vanished.

Only then did he understand the urgent need to brake.

Merely halting his backward momentum took a considerable toll on his strength.

When he finally came to a standstill, gazing out into the pitch-black abyss of the Astral Plane, a wave of desolate sorrow washed over him.

Was he doomed to be lost forever in the Astral Plane?

Bahr fumbled for his teleportation crystal, but after a moment's hesitation, he stowed it away again.

He would only use it if driven to absolute desperation.

Invoking the crystal to return to the meteorite base was his final, ultimate life-line.

Suddenly, he noticed a flare of radiance blooming to his left, and squinting closer, he saw it was a colossal sphere of light.

It bore a striking resemblance to the glare of the previous explosion.

A surge of excitement gripped Bahr—could it be Levi?

He hurriedly flew toward the source of the light.

Yet anxiety gnawed at Bahr’s heart; was Levi still locked in combat?

The enemy was too formidable; Levi could not possibly defeat them.

Bahr worried, too, about the perils he might encounter upon his return.

He pressed on, weighed down by a heavy heart.

The brilliance Bahr beheld was the explosive aftermath of Levi detonating an elemental nuclear bomb against the fiendish thralls.

Levi waited until the blinding glare dissolved before flying toward the battlefield to inspect his handiwork.

The site had been swept utterly clean.

Both the void behemoths and the fiendish thralls had vanished without a trace.

Perhaps they had been reduced to mere stardust.

The light of the detonation had been too dazzling, the resulting magical fluctuations too violent, capable of shredding any sensory perception.

Thus, Levi could not tell whether the void behemoths and the thralls had been vaporized into dust or had fled.

Regardless, they were gone.

His objective had been achieved.

The next step was to await the sun's eruption of solar flares.

Levi paused for a moment in the void, sensing the spatial coordinates he had previously anchored.

Opening a spatial portal, he stepped through, returning to the site where they had deployed the magical capture net. As soon as he stepped through, someone hurried toward him.

Seeing him return alone, a middle-aged mage asked anxiously, "Where is Mage Bahr? Could he have..."

Levi replied, "He is unharmed, we were merely separated. He is likely on his way back."

The others exchanged looks upon hearing this, their countenances clouding with worry.

Losing one's bearings in the Astral Plane was a perilous affair indeed.

Soon, someone set up a return beacon nearby.

A return beacon was a magical device designed to provide orientation for companions lost in the Astral Plane.

Once deployed, the beacon would systematically pulse light in all directions at a rhythmic tempo to catch a companion's eye.

At the same time, it could convey messages through the color and frequency of its flashes.

The return beacon was primarily used to offer direction to teammates at immense distances.

Once they drew closer, both parties could use communication artifacts to establish a more precise meeting point.

If the distance was too vast, however, even communication magic would fail to function.

Several of them took turns invoking their magical devices to call out to Bahr, but no response came.

Perhaps Bahr was simply too far away.

Or perhaps he had failed to notice the messages, or lacked the time to reply.

Before long, the hour of the solar flare eruption was upon them.

The company had still not seen Mage Bahr return.

Helpless, they could only abandon their calls for him and focus their attention on the task at hand.

Levi looked toward the sun with profound curiosity, wondering precisely how they would harvest the matter from within it.

Suddenly, the sun grew perceptibly brighter.

He could feel the intensification of its light, which meant that deep within the star itself, a monumental upheaval was underway.

Levi observed that the volume of solar flares on the sun's surface was multiplying.

It seemed to be growing increasingly volatile.

Subsequently, more and more solar flares broke free from the sun's gravitational pull, streaking toward the deeper recesses of the Astral Plane.

The light and heat of the flares gradually dissipated, ultimately swallowed by the dark, vanishing into the gloom.

Yet, Levi knew that the extinguished flares had not truly vanished.

They were merely hidden from his sight.

The solid matter formed when those flares cooled and solidified would continue its flight through the Astral Plane.

Only when captured by other stars, or when colliding with some other mass, would their relentless journey come to a halt.

"It's coming! Unfurl the capture net, quickly!"

Hearing the voices of the others, Levi expanded his sensory perception to its absolute limit.

Suddenly, he sensed something streak through the range of his awareness.

The duration of his perception lasted less than a single second.

The radius of his sensory perception had already reached ten thousand meters.

Which meant that the object which had just flashed through his awareness was traveling at a speed exceeding ten thousand meters per second.

A look of shock crossed Levi’s face.

Could something moving that fast truly be captured?

Soon enough, reality proved that Levi had been overthinking.

The capture net effortlessly snared some of the cooling matter shooting out from the flowing flames.

The vast majority of it appeared to be nothing more than clumps of black rock slag, completely unremarkable to the eye, making it hard to imagine that the blindingly brilliant Solar Brilliance was extracted from such material.

However, despite the vast distance separating them, Levi could still sense a scorching aura emanating from within.

The energy contained inside the black slag was by no means as mundane as its surface suggested.

After a period of violent eruption, the distant sun returned to tranquility once more, its energy fluctuations gradually stabilizing.

This also signified that the window for collecting Solar Brilliance had come to an end.

Everyone hastily began drawing in the capture nets.

Yet, the harvest within the vast nets was pitifully meager.

Once all the matter was gathered together, it formed a sphere less than half a meter in diameter.

Upon seeing this, Levi felt a deep wave of disappointment.

The others, however, were a picture of excitement.

Someone spoke up, visibly thrilled: "This harvest is the largest we've ever had in history."

"Next, we just need to wait for Mage Bull to return, and then we can head back."

"I hope Mage Bull returns safely."

Levi, on the other hand, remained unsatisfied.

This did not achieve the purpose of his journey to the Astral Realm at all.

He had originally thought he would be able to come into contact with the most primal Solar Brilliance and comprehend the laws of the sun.

Gazing at the distant sun, he pondered for a moment before speaking to the others: "Go back first, do not wait for me. I have matters to attend to and will be leaving for a while; there is no need to wait for my return."

With that, he rose and flew directly toward the sun.

The mages behind him hurriedly cried out in loud voices: "Mage Levi, where are you going?"

Levi had already flown far away, out of reach of their voices.

Once he was at a distance, he directly cast the Astral Roaming Spell, opening spatial portals to advance toward the sun.

It was too far.

Levi continuously opened portals, constantly adjusting his teleportation coordinates, steadily drawing closer to the sun.

After an unknown passage of time, the vision before Levi’s eyes was entirely consumed by the sun.

He had finally arrived in its proximity.

He could already feel the sun's immense gravitational pull.

Slowly, he began to plunge toward the sun.

Boundless and endless solar power surged into Levi’s body.

His blood grew as scalding as molten magma.

His mana coursed and roared like vast rivers and mighty oceans.

Involuntarily, he transformed into the Holy Flame Lord.

Under the illumination of the sun, his form continuously swelled and expanded.

In the blink of an eye, his height exceeded one hundred meters.

His increasingly massive body was capable of receiving an even greater volume of solar power, sustaining the growth of his Holy Flame Lord form.

In the state of the Holy Flame Lord, Levi felt the sun before him was exceptionally warm, leaving him eager to plunge into it and merge as one.

Drawn by the sun's gravity, Levi drew closer and closer to it.

He felt the warmth intensify.

Suddenly, the warmth turned into an all-consuming blaze that incinerated his body.

Levi sensed the destructive power hidden deep beneath the warm light.

The warm sun was merely an external illusion.

The true essence of the sun was an endless force of destruction.

It was only because of the vast distance that the destructive power could not be felt, falsely imparting a sensation of warmth.

Facing the source of destruction, Levi chose to throw himself willingly into its embrace.

He harbored not a shred of fear toward the destructive power contained within the sun.

Pulled by the sun's gravity, the Holy Flame Lord’s body was stretched out, turning into a streak of flowing flame as it plummeted into the sun.

Boom!

He plunged into the sun.

Levi felt himself merging into one with the sun.

Was this the sensation of death?

Far from it!

The destructive power on the sun's surface could not kill Levi.

It would only make him stronger.

Levi unfolded his Holy Flame Domain.

The Holy Flame Domain, spanning ten thousand meters in diameter, enveloped the surface of the sun, assimilating its power.

Levi slowly stood up.

Upon the sun, a ten-thousand-meter-tall Holy Flame Lord rose to its feet.

Gathering the immense energy of the external environment formed an unimaginably colossal body, yielding an incomprehensibly formidable power.

This was meant to be a fleeting moment of supreme strength.

However, the power of the sun was infinite and inexhaustible.

This allowed Levi’s originally transient state of absolute might to be maintained indefinitely.

Within the sun, Levi also began to adapt to his brand-new form.

New words manifested before his eyes.

[Holy Flame Lord (Legendary)] Inchoate Solar Divine Body (10,000 meters)

(End of Chapter)