The First Store System

Chapter 1551: Ancient Glorious City(22)

Aakesh stood before a space jump portal. The next part of the challenge awaited him on the other side of the device.

The leader who had given him the task was standing not far from him with a smile. The smile contained dangerous intent if Aakesh tried to escape. The task was too significant for the man to let others know and live to tell the tale.

Aakesh ignored the man and placed the Sacred stones in their sockets. The next moment, the portal turned active, and a spatial energy engulfed it.

Aakesh didn't waste any time and walked inside. The next moment, the Sacred stones in the sockets turned to dust as the space jump drained every bit of their energy, and the portal turned dark once again.

The leader didn't leave but sat down in meditation, waiting for Aakesh. He hoped in his heart for a successful task.

***

Aakesh looked around the dead city, trying to find the stone. The leader gave him the task of finding the stone and bringing it out.

The leader didn't tell Aakesh what the purpose of the stone was but only informed him of its appearance. Aakesh, who had more knowledge than the leader could ever have, immediately understood the intention behind the leader's actions.

The city around him was dead with corpses littered around, and even their skeletons had started to decompose. It usually took tens of billions of years for the corpse of a Supreme God to start decomposing, so from that, the destruction time of the city could be seen.

As Aakesh delved deeper into the city, the power level of the corpses grew, with the Sacred King's corpses becoming the norm. His face turned further solemn since the deeper into the city he went, the more intense the danger would prove to be.

The stone he was looking for was the Grestoriac Stone, a stone that contained the life of 100,000 universes and their inhabitants. If someone could channel that energy, their inner world would expand to match the size of 100,000 universes. Its most well-known application was as a means for a peak Sacred Emperor to step to the level of Sacred Monarchs after absorbing its energy.

An item of that level showed the difficulty of the challenge. Since danger could come from anywhere, Aakesh had already told the system to turn on automatic security.

If any danger crossed the threshold of what he could handle, the system would consume one of the protections and take Aakesh out of the challenge, returning him safely to the city.

Aakesh cautiously proceeded forward, trying to enter one building after another. He failed to find the stone despite searching for half the city.

The city wasn't very large but only had a small area of a few thousand square miles, so the situation wasn't like searching for needles in a haystack. A bad feeling suddenly enveloped his heart.

The next moment, he jumped out and rushed hundreds of meters instantly. He then turned around and saw a dangerous scene.

The place he was standing a moment earlier was nowhere to be found, and it was replaced by a large creature that alternated between ethereal and material. It was slightly weaker than the chimera he faced in the arena, so Aakesh breathed a sigh of relief.

He then immediately attacked, activating [Apocalyptic Blast]. The next moment, an energy ball the size of a football flew to the creature and exploded.

The energy affected both ethereal and material, so switching between the two stages didn't help the creature, and it was enveloped in a powerful blast.

The blast range touched Aakesh, but his immunity to the attack caused him to stand still. When the explosion finally calmed down, what was left of the creature was a severely injured material beast. It could no longer alternate between the two states.

Aakesh rushed forward, a sword appearing in his hand. A white light appeared around the blade as he slashed.

The next moment, the beast was cut into numerous pieces, and then the white light devoured it fully, ending the battle instantly. Aakesh looked at the sword in his hands and nodded in appreciation.

The sword was his reward for defeating the chimera, and it didn't disappoint him. Despite it only being of intermediate-higher grade, it easily cut through a peak True God level creature.

After the creature disappeared, a small piece of stone was left on the ground. Aakesh bent down to pick it up and couldn't help but become surprised since it was the one-thousandth part of the Grestoriac Stone.

Aakesh then stored it in the system space and immediately sat down to absorb Sacred stones. The attack had taken fifty percent of his energy reserves since Aakesh wanted to end the battle as soon as possible.

Aakesh had no issues with continuous absorption since the energy was extremely warm and traveled to his inner world without causing any trouble.

After absorbing thirty purer ordinary Sacred stones, Aakesh's energy reserve was full, so he stopped mediation and proceeded forward. Since the stone was broken into fragments, Aakesh had to prepare for numerous battles.

A few minutes later, Aakesh stood face-to-face with another opponent. It was no longer a peak True God but an early True God level beast.

Aakesh didn't even need to use the skill and slashed his sword. The next moment, the creature was divided into two clean pieces, resulting in Aakesh's victory.

When Aakesh picked up the stone fragments, he found them to be one part of ten thousand parts. The weaker the opponent, the smaller the stone fragments.

But even that tiny fragment contained an endless amount of energy. If Aakesh were to stand and face the explosion of that energy, he would get instantly turned into ashes.

The two stone fragments combined when they came into contact with each other. Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Time flew by, and around an hour passed in the blink of an eye.

Aakesh had faced several battles over that duration, but neither of his opponents had challenged him like the chimera, making the situation more manageable than he had anticipated. He had won one fight after another and had succeeded in forming one-fifth of the stone.