Chapter 165: The Calamity-Class Threat! The Power to Vanquish All Evil

The aura the boss oozed was not simple at all.

It completely surpassed the power of Brenda.

"Kid," Brenda said, turning to Caelus. "Hide behind me."

"That thing’s combat score. I cannot sense it at all..." Brenda added grimly.

Caelus shivered when he heard this.

A combat score that even Brenda, a Gold III powerhouse, couldn’t measure?

He looked around. He noticed Sylvia and the others were standing completely still with their eyes closed.

Next to them, the assassin from the Torres family Caelus had just eliminated was standing there. Completely alive.

Caelus became severely spooked.

The fact that this guy didn’t die, yet Caelus was still able to extract his ability... how was that even possible?

He activated his Chaos Perception eyes.

Bzzzt.

The instant he tried to use it, his vision violently glitched. The big-headed being slowly turned to face him.

It looked at him with cold eyes.

"H... Humans... deserve no place in the domain."

Then, it opened its mouth.

The following instant, everyone around them snapped wide awake.

"Huh? What’s happening here?" Phillip Patek shouted in a stunned tone, having just snapped out of his shock.

Sylvia, who had broken out of her own illusion, swiftly searched for Caelus and rushed to his side.

"Are you fine?" Caelus asked, glancing at her and holding onto her hands.

Brenda didn’t say anything but focused entirely on the monster. She turned to her Perez family elites.

"Attention. Members of the Perez. Prepare the defensive formation."

"This is an Calamity-Class threat," Brenda ordered rapidly.

Hearing her, the Torres family and the Johnsons also turned completely serious.

The assassin that Caelus had supposedly eliminated eyed him warily before retreating to group up with the Torres family.

Within seconds, everyone had taken a strict battle stance.

The being calmly looked at the gathered forces. It seemed to be patiently waiting for them to attack.

Finally, Kevin Johnson charged forward. Ralph Torres, Phillip Patek, and Brenda all unleashed their powers simultaneously.

"Do not engage that thing. Stay put," Brenda warned, giving Caelus a long look.

Her hair burned fiercely as she shot toward the boss without another word.

’Hm?’ Caelus looked at Brenda in confusion.

Why was Brenda telling him to stay back? It wasn’t like he couldn’t fight. He was vastly better than all the Silver ranks present here.

But Brenda thought differently.

She favored pure talent. The fact that Caelus managed to achieve a Gold combat score while being less than twenty years old meant he had a limitless future.

That was exactly why she told him not to engage.

However, just a few minutes later, Caelus’s expression turned deadly pale.

The charging experts suddenly flew backward into the air, thick blood oozing out from every corner of their bodies.

"What is this..." Sylvia gasped in shock.

The scene playing out was way too bizarre.

As everyone began unleashing their ultimate attacks, a massive dome barrier suddenly formed around them.

They froze in their tracks. A few moments later, the dome violently cracked, and blood burst from their bodies.

"NOOO!" A Silver-ranked elite from the Perez family shrieked.

"P... Please no more. I don’t want to suffer this anymore. Please don’t torture me!"

He frantically scratched at his own face in pain.

Everyone trapped was in a similar, horrific situation.

Caelus’s heartbeat spiked faster than ever seeing this.

This being... what the hell was it?

It had just taken down an entire army of experts in one single move.

The next moment, the boss monster finally shifted its gaze to Caelus and Sylvia.

"Die..." the being whispered as it took a step forward.

Fwoosh!

Wind erupted from its position. It instantly appeared right next to Sylvia and Caelus, raising its bizarre staff.

Green light burst outward. A ring of light shot from its staff, and a thick dome began forming rapidly around them.

"Sylvia, watch out!" Caelus warned.

However, it was too late. The green dome had already covered them completely.

The being grinned evilly at the sight.

"Ender... Aura... I sense." The being opened its mouth once more. "Die..."

Caelus’s vision instantly twisted.

The next moment, he realized he was standing in a massive open plaza.

He felt his feet moving entirely on their own. Looking down, he saw heavy iron cuffs bound tightly around his wrists.

He was being forcefully pushed by two armored guards straight toward a massive guillotine.

Caelus’s eyes widened in panic.

What was happening? Why was he in front of a guillotine?

His mind became incredibly hazy. He couldn’t remember anything from before this moment.

He only felt pain all over his body and his chest growing incredibly tight as the guards forced his head down onto the wooden block.

Deafening chants began roaring from the massive crowd.

"KILL THE HERETIC! KILL THE HERETIC!"

Everyone chanted the exact same phrase. Caelus opened his mouth to speak, but absolutely no words came out.

’Wait.’ Caelus suddenly froze.

’Was I not in a challenge domain?’

Caelus’s mind forcefully jump-started. The heavy haziness vanished entirely as his eyes turned razor-sharp.

"I am in an illusion!" Caelus shouted out loud.

The world around him wavered violently. The guillotine flickered and disappeared, leaving the entire world looking half-glitched.

"Is simply understanding that it’s an illusion not enough?"

Caelus frowned deeply. This had worked last time when him and Brenda broke out of the previous illusion.

"Think..." Caelus muttered rapidly.

What could fully rip him out of this illusion? This boss was terrifyingly powerful, taking down Gold III powerhouses like they were nothing with its illusion. What did he have in his arsenal to deal with the boss’s illusion?

Then, a bright thought lit up in his mind.

"The Golden Palm!" Caelus remembered.

The blessing of the Buddha. The boundless light of the Bodhisattva that existed solely to vanquish evil was resting right in his hands.

It could crush any malice and shatter any illusion!

Boundless golden light erupted from Caelus’s body. He shot straight into the glitched sky and thrust his palm forcefully downward.

"Golden Light Palm."

BOOM!

A terrifying, mountain-sized imprint of a glowing golden hand manifested in the sky.

It descended directly onto the half-glitched illusory world.

The following instant, the entire space completely shattered like fragile glass.

[Debuff: Dreamwalking cleared.]

"???"

In the outside world, the world boss frowned. The next moment, a massive golden palm violently thrust toward it from inside the dome.

Seeing this, the creature immediately backed away, putting heavy distance between itself and Caelus.

As the smoke dispersed, the boss saw Caelus standing tall. His hand was lightly touching the green dome surrounding Sylvia.

Golden light flared from his palm, and the dome instantly shattered to dust.

The boss’s large eyes widened slightly.

"The boundless power.... of Buddha." The boss spoke, its voice laced with disbelief.

Caelus didn’t care about its words at all.

"Sylvia, buff me."

Realizing the extreme gravity of the situation, Sylvia didn’t hesitate.

She immediately utilized Origin Blood Blessing on Caelus. It amplified his Critical Hit by +8 and his overall Damage by +8.

His combat score jumped from the initial 87 straight to 95.

Immediately, Caelus summoned the Ruyi Jingu Bang.

"Sylvia, stay in the rear."

Caelus grunted as he blasted off the ground and shot into the air.

There was no escaping this fight. The only way out was to force the other experts to wake up.

All of them were trapped under the debuff called Dreamwalking. Even Temporal Reset didn’t work on it, because temporal reset required the knowledge of the debuff to work. It won’t activate without knowing you are under a debuff.

But, If he used Holy Cleanse on the experts, they should be freed and could fight once more.