After a thousand years of cultivation, he returns at the pinnacle!

The challenge begins in Chapter 79; it's an absolute crushing victory!

Astra's defeat dealt a significant blow to the Apostle realm.

For three hundred years, no human had ever reached the hundredth floor. In fact, these few people who were the first to reach the hundredth floor should have been easily defeated by Astra.

But the mysterious young man who suddenly appeared, named Jiang Chen, seemed to possess the power of another cultivator.

Therefore, the news that Jiang Chen intends to challenge the Twelfth Apostle Hall one-on-one is not only attracting the attention of people all over the world, but also of the current Apostle world.

Beneath the brilliant and dazzling light, the eleven high-ranking apostles sat calmly on their thrones.

Inside this palace, the crystal ball reflects the details of the Twelfth Apostle's Hall.

They will be following Jiang Chen's one-on-one challenge against the Twelfth Apostle Hall closely.

Kahn's gaze fell upon the scene of Jiang Chen smashing the gate of the Twelfth Apostle's Hall with a single punch, and a slight smile appeared on his lips.

"Hopefully this guy can bring me more surprises this time."

.....

The first floor of the Hall of the Twelfth Apostles.

Unlike the Temple of the Apostles in Astra, there are no magnificent domes, no flowing runes, and no oppressive feeling emanating from all directions. Here, there is only fog. Grayish-white fog, as thick as solidified milk, spreads from the ground to the horizon, enveloping everything in a damp, cold, and suffocating silence.

Jiang Chen stepped through the shattered doorway and onto the "ground" of the first level—if it could be called ground. With each step, mist surged from his feet to the sides, revealing a dark gray, constantly flowing light beneath, as if he were stepping on the surface of an underground river formed from resentment.

In the live stream, seven cameras simultaneously tracked his figure. But the fog was too thick, so thick that the cameras could only capture a blurry outline—the boy in the dark blue school uniform, walking unhurriedly through the grayish-white fog.

"What is this fog...?"

"The camera lens is blurry; I can only see a silhouette."

"Brother Chen, be careful. Astra's Apostle Hall is a direct confrontation, but this one looks completely different."

"It feels like the opening of a horror movie, like something is about to jump out at any moment."

The scrolling of comments slowed down. Billions of viewers in front of their screens held their breath, watching the figure in a school uniform walk alone through the gray-white fog.

Jiang Chen stopped in his tracks.

He sensed it.

Something is surging forth from the depths of this gray-white fog.

As the grayish-white mist approached him, it continuously deformed, condensed, and materialized. Humanoid silhouettes emerged from the mist, their features blurred, their limbs twisted, and mist still emanating from their edges, like a group of fragments torn from a nightmare.

The dead.

Countless souls perished.

Their numbers were unbelievable. They surged out of the fog faster and faster, filling the entire first layer in the blink of an eye—in front, behind, to the left, to the right, above, and underfoot, overwhelming and densely packed into the entire space.

In the live broadcast, Jiang Chen's figure simultaneously disappeared from the cameras of all seven positions. The screen was filled only with the gray-white tide of ghosts and their silent screams—there was no sound, but every viewer in front of the screen could feel the bone-chilling cold, as if something was scraping their souls with fingernails.

"Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap!!! What are these things???"

"A ghost??? Is it the ghost of someone the apostle killed???"

"Where's Chen-ge??? I can't see him!!!"

"So many souls, at least a million, right? And this is only the first level???"

"What exactly is the law of this Twelfth Apostle? It's completely different from Astra's head-on confrontation!"

"I knew something was wrong! This Apostle's trial isn't combat, it's a mental attack!"

At the same time as the barrage exploded, beneath the dark golden sky of the Apostle Realm, the enormous light screen continued to swirl.

First Apostle Kahn sat enthroned on the highest throne, his amber pupils reflecting the overwhelming tide of souls in the light screen. His expression remained unchanged, except that his right index finger tapped lightly on the armrest.

"The first level of Morgana." His voice was soft, as if he were talking to himself. "She has collected the souls of three hundred years of human dead. Every awakened one who attempts to challenge the Twelfth Apostle's Hall will have their spirit torn apart by her shrill screech after death, and their soul will be imprisoned in the first level of the Apostle's Hall, becoming an obstacle for the next batch of challengers."

"Three hundred years." He repeated the number, his lips twitching almost imperceptibly.

Jiang Chen stood in the very center of the tide of dead souls.

He was surrounded by an overwhelming horde of dead souls, their faces twisted, blurred, and incomplete, yet each one bore the lingering pain and fear of their impending death. They stretched out their deformed arms, trying to seize him, tear him apart, and drag his soul from his body to join their ranks.

But they couldn't touch him.

Three feet away from Jiang Chen, there was an invisible barrier. The will honed by a thousand years of battles had long since solidified into a tangible aura. The attacks of these dead souls were essentially a form of spiritual erosion, and his spirit was a mountain that even Astra couldn't break.

The souls crashed against the invisible barrier, letting out silent screams, before dissipating into grayish-white smoke. But more souls surged forth from the mist, one after another, endlessly.

Jiang Chen looked at them calmly.

"Soul imprisonment," he murmured, revealing the essence of this layer. "Imprisoning the souls of the awakened ones who died here, turning them into puppets. The number has accumulated over three hundred years; that's quite a lot."

He raised his right hand, bringing his index and middle fingers together.

"But the soul—"

A faint golden light emanated from his fingertips. The light spread out from his fingertips, transforming into a golden ripple that extended in all directions.

"—In the world of cultivation, it's used for salvation."

Golden ripples swept across the entire ocean of the dead.

The first ripple swept across, and the souls at the front row stopped. Their distorted features began to become clear under the golden light—they were human faces, young and old, male and female. Their expressions before death were all different: some were fear, some were anger, and some were resentment. But at this moment, all these expressions slowly melted away in the golden light.

As the second ripple swept across, the edges of the souls' bodies began to turn into pale golden specks of light.

The three-hundred-year imprisonment was broken by a higher power, and the pain of those who were imprisoned finally found an outlet.

As the third ripple swept across, the entire ocean of souls began to collapse.

Countless souls raised their heads at the same moment. They had no throats, no voices, but something was being conveyed in the golden light—their last sounds in life. Some were calling for their mothers, some were calling their children's names, some were reciting the names of their hometowns, some were saying sorry, some were saying thank you. Those voices overlapped, like thousands of streams flowing into a single great river, echoing and merging in the void, finally transforming into a long, drawn-out sigh.

Then, in the same instant, a million souls transformed into pale golden specks of light and soared into the sky.

Points of light pierced through the greyish-white mist, through the ceiling of the first level, through the black walls of the Apostles' Temple, and rose into the leaden grey sky of Scandinavia, like a reversed flow of golden snow. Tens of millions of live viewers simultaneously witnessed that scene—the Apostles' Temple, a symbol of inviolability, emanated countless golden rays from within, illuminating the entire ice field in gold.

After the golden light dissipated, the mist completely vanished from the first level of the Twelfth Apostle's Hall. The gray, flowing light on the ground also disappeared. In its place was a clear, transparent void, as clean as a sky that had just rained.

Jiang Chen withdrew his finger. He glanced at the empty first floor, then turned and walked towards the teleportation array leading to the second floor.