1565 The Ethereal Altar's Transformation

This was the first time Lin Mu was seeing anything this complex.

Lin Mu had the great sword which was formed from countless runes composing its body. Jing Luo had obtained it back in the fragmented plane, and Lin Mu had taken it later on. Studying it had proved to be useless as the runes continued to change and transform.

But even that complexity was several steps below what Lin Mu was now seeing unravel in front of him.

The runes shifted and turned, first assembling into a large circle that easily covered a few tens of kilometer of area. Then with this circle as the center, hundred more concentric rune circles rose, each moving farther and farther from each other.

With each new circle that was added, Lin Mu could tell that their size was increasing by multiples.

"Just how many more will be added? That's already over a hundred…" Lin Mu muttered in shock as he watched it all happen.

Xukong who was observing it all was also at a loss.

"I can't perceive them either now… they've gone beyond my range of sensing." Xukong stated.

~gulp~

Lin Mu swallowed his saliva in astonishment. After all, Xukong had traveled the ring for a long time before just to see if it had limits. And even then he was unable to find its end. Thus him being unable to sense the end of the circles only meant that it was at a size that might be hundreds of thousands of kilometers.

~HONG~

~SHUA~ SHUA~ SHUA~

But that was merely the first step of the entire process.

"More?" Lin Mu next saw the runes assembling into more circles.

But this time these circles were small, being only a few meters in size. After forming, these circles stacked on top of each other, forming tall towers that were hundreds of meters tall.

These formation circle towers kept on growing until they too were beyond the range of Xukong.

Now the there were formation constructs in two dimensions. The concentric circles below Lin Mu, and the vertical towers that extended above and below Lin Mu. These two constructs intersected, making it look like a plate that had countless strings hanging from it.

~SCREECH~

After all these had been formed though, Lin Mu heard a screeching sound.

It was as if a bunch of nails were grinding over a plate of metal. The sound was loud and harsh, making Lin Mu clamp his ears.

~KACHA~

"Huh?" But then he heard a sound that was like that of breaking glass.

"It's breaking! The space is breaking!" Xukong exclaimed.

He looked above and below him, finding there to be invisible cracks. These cracks were causing the spatial energy streaks within the ring to circle around them. It was like a vortex that would form in a water bucket when holes were poked into it.

"How can the space here be cracking?!" Lin Mu was stunned.

~SHUA~

But before he could become scared, he saw more runes appearing. These runes were appearing from the cracks, and they were of different colors.

"Wait a minute, these runes…" Lin Mu saw the seven colored runes that matched those that of the second ring.

These runes transformed into long strings that waved around the formation towers that had formed earlier. Soon, the formation towers were all wrapped in seven colored strings, making it look something like a straight candy cane.

Just that it had seven colors instead of just two.

"The two rings are probably doing their final linking." Xukong commented seeing the change.

"Mmhmm." Lin Mu nodded his head, as there didn't seem to be any other option.

Once the towers were all wrapped, no new runes or other formation constructs appeared. Silence spread in the area, making one feel unnerved.

~HONG~

A minute later though, the silence was broken as all the formation constructs started to disappear. They faded away into nothingness, and the familial blank darkness appeared behind them.

"Look! The barrier," Xukong spoke up.

Lin Mu turned his attention to the barrier around the altar and saw it turning translucent again.

"No… its actually opening up." Lin Mu could feel the altar beckoning to him.

He watched as the barrier fully turned translucent before walking closer.

"It's calling me." Lin Mu spoke.

"Go in then." Xukong urged. "I'll wait here."

"Mmmhmm," Lin Mu gave a nod and placed his hand over the barrier, causing an opening to appear for him.

Having entered the barrier, he continued on straight until he reached the altar.

~DENG~DENG~DENG~DENG~DENG~DENG~DENG~

And upon reaching there, Lin Mu heard seven sounds.

Each sound was distinct to him, and along with each sound, a pillar rose from the base of the altar. Each altar was of a different color, matching the colors of the second ring. In a few seconds, the original altar was surrounded by seven pillars.

Each of the pillar had different runes on them too that were unreadable to Lin Mu.

'They are similar in style to the runes that appeared before. They must be of the same source.' Lin Mu reckoned.

The Ethereal altar glowed brighter, before seven strings of energy rose from it. Each string attached to the seven pillars and completed its network.

And with that the linking of the two rings had truly finished.

"It's done…" Lin Mu could now feel a close connection with the second ring too. "No, not the second ring… the same ring, they are just connected now. Part of one…" he muttered.

'Come…' with that done, a thought appeared in Lin Mu's mind.

"Huh," Lin Mu gazed at the runes flickering on the altar.

They looked like swimming tadpoles, and yet there was a certain rhythm to them.

Seeing this, Lin Mu knew what was about to come.

"So it finally is ready for it…" Lin Mu took a deep breath and extended his hand.

As soon as he placed his hand on the Altar, a large stream of information poured into his head.

But in all that, a few words stood out.

'Omnicore Ascendancy'