Boulder nodded.
He stood up from his throne, walked to the edge of the steps, and looked down at the charred mark of the array.
“Ethan Leo,” he muttered softly, as if speaking to himself. “You took eight of my Second-Tier wizardry models, the complete diagram for my Spirit-Deceiving Array, and my Coral Brew.”
He raised his foot and stepped directly onto the center of the array mark.
“And you tricked me into calling you a soulmate so many times.”
Grinding his foot down, spiderweb-like cracks spidered across the charred flagstone.
“One point one three million Triangular Cannibal Crabs, every single one equivalent to a human peak Great Knight,” Boulder said, pulling back his foot and turning back toward his throne. “Even if you have the ability to kill a thousand, ten thousand, or a hundred thousand, the remaining million plus will still gnaw you until not even bone fragments are left.”
He sat back down on his throne, resting his arm on the edge of the armrest.
“Bring up the arena screen.”
A guard took out a fist-sized crystal ball from his waist and held it above his head with both hands.
An emerald-blue glow welled up from within the crystal ball, expanding in midair to form a circular projection screen over five meters in diameter.
The ground of the wasteland was composed of some kind of dark red volcanic rock, its surface riddled with holes and fissures.
A string of bubbles occasionally rose from the depths of the fissures, only to be crushed by the immense water pressure halfway up, dispersing into a fine white mist.
The seawater was a murky dark green, suspended with countless tiny mineral particles.
These particles floated slowly above the wasteland, fragmenting the distant silhouette of the circular arena's outer wall.
The circular outer wall was constructed from massive blocks of black basalt, each stone the size of a carriage.
The surface of the wall was densely carved with runic lines that flickered in the deep sea. With every flash, a ripple of pale gold expanded across the wall.
The interior of the arena spanned over ten kilometers in diameter.
The ground was paved with the same dark red volcanic rock, polished as smooth as a mirror by some unknown force.
The seawater suddenly warped.
A blue orb of light over three meters in diameter squeezed out of the void, pushing the surrounding seawater away in all directions.
Densely packed runic lines flowed across the surface of the orb, each rune vibrating at high speed and emitting a low hum.
The orb exploded.
Ethan tumbled out of the light.
Smooth volcanic rock lay beneath his feet, his body instantly enveloped by icy seawater.
The temperature of the water was extremely low, carrying the bone-chilling cold unique to the deep sea as it poured in through his collar, cuffs, and boots.
He breathed.
Water rushed into his nasal passages, filling his trachea and his lungs.
But then, he realized he could breathe.
The moment the seawater entered his lungs, there was no sensation of drowning.
Oxygen separated from the water, passing through his alveoli and into his bloodstream.
It was worth noting that this wasn't Ethan actively filtering the air; rather, the seawater here was doing it automatically under the influence of some power.
“Heh, interesting.”
Ethan stood up straight.
The seawater flowed slowly around his body, the hem of his robe fluttering gently in the current.
He raised his right hand and spread his fingers in the water, letting the current slip through his grasp.
Exerting force through his feet, he shot upward.
His body tore through the seawater, leaving a white wake of bubbles trailing behind him.
He stopped when he reached a height of a hundred meters above the ground.
The seaweed growing in the crevices of the arena stretched out, automatically weaving a platform beneath his feet to support his weight.
Looking down from above, the entire layout of the arena was clear at a glance.
The circular outer wall enclosed the arena into a perfect circle, ten kilometers in diameter.
The ground was flat, devoid of obstacles or cover.
Along the inner side of the outer wall, thirteen passage openings were evenly distributed.
Each passage was a circular opening over thirty meters in diameter, with gates made of several thick bars of deep-sea profound iron.
The bars were rusty, encrusted with a thick layer of calcified barnacles and tubeworm shells.
All thirteen passages were completely sealed.
Ethan was currently the only living thing in the arena.
Furthermore, wood-element energy particles were suppressed to an extremely low degree here.
In this deep-sea arena, water-element energy particles held absolute dominance, while wood-element particles were as sparse as moisture in a desert.
Had it not been for his numerous passives and his high wood-element affinity, the seaweed beneath his feet probably wouldn't have been able to grow at all.
“Well, looks like I'll have to show a bit of my strength.”
Ethan let the seaweed beneath his feet disperse and slowly descended to the ground.
The moment Ethan touched down on the arena floor, the gates moved.
The bars of all thirteen passages rose simultaneously.
The bottom of the gates ground against the stone bases, emitting a heavy metallic rumble.
Tsk, he wondered how the sound could be so clear through all this seawater.
Although sound traveled faster and clearer through solids, this was still a bit too vivid.
Deep within the passages, the darkness writhed.
A dark red torrent surged from the first passage.
The torrent gushed out from the depths of the passage, like lava erupting from a volcano.
The moment the torrent rushed into the arena, it spread in all directions, crawling along the ground and scaling the rock walls, trampling over each other to stack three, four, or five layers deep.
It was the Triangular Cannibal Crabs.
Each crab was only the size of a fist.
Their carapaces were dark red, with edges of a rusty dark brown.
The surfaces of their shells were covered in sharp spines, each as thick as a finger with tips curved into barbed hooks.
Three pairs of walking legs extended from the sides of their carapaces, with sharp, serrated protrusions at the joints.
At the very front was a pair of massive pincers, their inner biting surfaces lined with three rows of fine, serrated teeth.
The crabs' eyes were positioned at the tips of two short, thick eyestalks.
The eyestalks could rotate in any direction. Their eyes were a dark yellow with vertical pupils, containing no emotion whatsoever—only pure, unadulterated appetite.
These creatures were the purest of killing machines.
A second torrent poured from the second passage.
Then a third.
Then a fourth.
All thirteen passages spewed dark red torrents of crabs at the exact same moment.
The crabs' pincers snapped open and shut, producing a dense clacking noise.
The sounds layered on top of one another, carrying through the seawater like the synchronized clipping of countless scissors.
Ethan stood his ground, staring at the dark red ocean surrounding him.
Every single Triangular Cannibal Crab was a lifeform equivalent to a human peak Great Knight.
This was the arena Boulder had prepared for him.
A death arena meant to amuse him.
Unfortunately, Ethan had no intention of playing the clown.
Straining himself in this arena, only to die a tragic, resentful death under the siege of a million crabs due to elemental suppression?
What a joke!
Just then, the first Triangular Cannibal Crab lunged in front of Ethan, its pincers snapping directly at his shin.
In the next instant, a wood thorn shot out.
A second later, the entire crab exploded from the inside out.
Carapace, muscle, internal organs, and pincers—everything lost its structure in an instant, disintegrating into a pile of dark red debris that was swept away without a trace by the seawater.
【Life Energy +193, Current Life Energy: 3.83 million+】
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