Chapter 1150 1150. Defenses

The Hive as a whole held Chasing Demon's funeral during the months following the return of the powerhouses.

Months of political silence followed the dispersion of his ashes. The Hive didn't make any move, and even its borders remained peaceful while the higher-ups held their event.

The rank 5 Elders held banquets to recall his moments as a leader. Flying Demon, Dreaming Demon, and Elder Julia joined those events to tell stories that the weaker assets had missed, but Noah didn't go to any of them.

Noah had promised a full-on invasion. It was his first time ordering something on that scale, but the Hive's powerhouses knew that he wasn't joking around.

Chasing Demon's death had to be a signal. His sacrifice had to state that the Elbas family couldn't be part of the new continent, and Noah intended to make that idea real.

Still, he had some projects to finish before approaching the tight defensive formations that surrounded the four regions under the control of the Elbas family.

Noah remained inside his new quarters during the political funeral. The Hive had built an incredible underground mansion for him. It was a proper palace that featured areas meant for all his needs.

The location was also optimal for Noah's training. The mansion was under one of the territories inhabited by hybrids, so he could ignore any restraint when testing some new techniques.

The new mansion had a cultivation area with so many "Breath" blessings that the air in there had surpassed the peaks of the piece of Immortal Lands when it first fell.

It had a training room filled with formations that could replicate various battle sessions. Noah could even use some of his memories to improve their effects.

Another area had many materials capable of releasing heavy pressure. That could help Noah's mind improve, but the Hive knew that he had access to the Seventh Kesier rune, so it focused the training on strengthening the mental walls.

Noah couldn't cultivate just yet. His dantian peaked after the breakthrough, but his cultivation technique required the Demonic Sword.

The living weapon had to evolve before it could enlarge Noah's dantian again. The amount of energy that it could absorb at its current level wasn't enough to train the center of power.

Noah often traveled toward the Divine Cut to exchange blows with Sword Saint. His normal training didn't interfere with his improvements with the sword arts, and his existence continued to rise toward new peaks as he kept on fighting with the will.

Sword Saint had shown him his best attacks, but Noah didn't mind training with someone who could endure his blows. The divine will was the perfect sparring partner.

The Demonic Sword eventually evolved. Noah had invested many of the magical beasts' corpses inside his space-rings to feed the living sword, but his expenses saw good returns in the end.

The blade could endure all his attacks after it reached the sixth rank. It could even perform Sword Saint's core techniques at that point.

However, Noah wasn't satisfied with its current form. The Demonic Sword had to express the entirety of his existence, but it lacked one core material.

The dark sphere had transformed into a black hole after the breakthrough and the dark matter that it released only helped Snore in its basic form.

The dark world used Noah's higher energy as its fuel. He had yet to test that technique's power with experts at his level, but he knew that it contained an incredible value.

Noah had managed to suppress King Elbas' golden flames with his dark world. The restrictions didn't last long, but that period was enough to defeat any opponent near his level. That was the kind of weapon that could defeat stronger cultivators, but Noah didn't accept to have only one of them.

Noah began his experiments with the Demonic Sword almost immediately. It only took a month for his first experiment to fail, but the mansion contained the detonation.

The failures didn't affect Noah's anymore. His body was so strong that even the explosion of rank 5 and 6 materials couldn't hurt him. His companions didn't have to worry about him.

The Demonic Sword accepted every test happily. It felt the pain lingering inside Noah's mind, so it preferred to help him through those stages in the best way that it could. The blade endured every modification, and it even went through countless painful tests.

The experiments took a while, but Noah eventually succeeded. He was attempting to modify a living being, and Noah wouldn't care about its behavior too much. Yet, he wasn't willing to make his living weapon suffer pointlessly.

Noah succeeded in the end. His project consisted of fusing dark matter in the Demonic Sword, and the blade accepted that treatment. Torrents of dark matter had flown inside the Demonic Sword and improved its structure. The living weapon's anatomy was peculiar, but Noah followed the process closely from beginning to end.

Noah ignored any social stimulus in that period. He had too much to do, and any eventual opponent wasn't worth the time wasted when he didn't prioritize his power.

The Demonic Sword became bigger as dark matter fused with its structure. It reached the point when it didn't need to shrink from performing specific attacks anymore.

The living weapon didn't change shape before meeting an enemy, but its internal structure improved in ways that he couldn't describe. It absorbed all the missing pieces of his existence, and it had naturally improved as if it was waiting for that experiment to happen.

Divine Market city appeared in Noah's eyes after he ended his training session for good. The area had so many defensive formations that he didn't even begin to count them, but he cared about them.

Second Princess appeared behind the enemy protections, so Noah had a limited set of actions. Yet, he was ready to fight there for years only to drag her out.

"We can decide on the matter in a far more enjoyable place," Second Princess said when she saw Noah nearing the defensive formations alone.

She had learnt about the events inside the void from the pieces of information concerning the powerhouses' last mission, and she truly feared Noah's mindset at the moment.

Noah wasn't the type to do anything reckless unless it benefitted his cultivation level. Yet, the situation was different now. He didn't want to join negotiations. He only wanted to create a mess to honor Chasing Demon.

"The time for negotiations is over," Noah replied while the Demonic Sword roared while inside his space-ring and landed in his hand. "I want every member of the Elbas family out of the new continent, and I'll use everything in my power to accomplish that."

"Demon Prince of the Hive!" Second Princess complained as the light of the inscriptions in front and behind her lit up. It seemed that she had activated a signal that triggered all the defenses in the area.

A rocky giant appeared behind her, and a building released a fire that compelled anyone in the area to retreat. All the defenses became clear in Noah's mind, but he didn't care about any of them.