187: Chapter 187 Hurting Oneself Before Hurting Others?

Elements converged toward Nie Ning's palm, but they did not form any kind of energy body.

Under Nie Ning's horrified gaze, the skin on the surface of his palm inexplicably withered and dissipated into flying ash in an instant.

Flesh and bone followed immediately after.

Threads of stinging pain transmitted to Nie Ning's brain.

Startled awake, Nie Ning hurriedly stopped the circulation of magic power.

Looking at his palm again, a pit the size of a ping-pong ball had appeared in the center; he could even see the white bone inside!

"Did I fail?"

Looking at his self-healing palm, Nie Ning's heart could not settle for a long time.

Everything seemed extremely bizarre.

He clearly hadn't seen any elemental fusion, yet his body showed signs of being attacked.

Opening his panel again, Nie Ning discovered that Primordial Control and Primordial Affinity had actually turned into Chaos Control and Chaos Affinity.

But didn't this indicate success?

Looking at his still-recovering palm, Nie Ning tried a five-fold elemental fusion.

In just an instant, a light sphere with a colored vortex at its center appeared in his palm.

No problem!

Nie Ning tried an eight-fold elemental fusion, and similarly, no abnormal manifestations appeared.

It wasn't until the ten-fold fusion that the gathered Elemental Power began to erode his flesh.

Nie Ning used Spiritual Power to observe, but as his Spiritual Power touched his palm, an inexplicable suction force directly swallowed it!

"How is that possible!"

Seeing this scene, Nie Ning was stunned.

The nature of Spiritual Power was ethereal, belonging to a different type of power than the physically existing Elemental Power.

Under normal circumstances, a Spiritual Power attack could only be broken by using the same Spiritual Power.

But what just happened?

His Spiritual Power was swallowed by his own Elemental Power!

However, rather than being swallowed, it was actually obliterated just like the flesh on his palm.

Nie Ning couldn't understand where the problem lay.

The Runic Formula in his Spiritual Sea of Consciousness was stable, and the mental circuits on the formation map could also operate normally, so why couldn't he use the ten-fold elemental fusion?

Or was it that he could use it, but just couldn't control it?

Harming oneself before harming the enemy?

That's ridiculous!

Then what was the point of him fusing things here? It was completely unnecessary.

It was lucky he discovered this early and used little magic power during the experiment.

If he had gone all out from the start just now, he was afraid he would have directly turned himself into ashes.

But at least he had advanced, and his strength had taken a qualitative leap. Even if he only used the eight-fold elemental fusion, its power would far exceed most Tier 3 Wizard spells.

Nie Ning could only comfort himself this way.

The most important thing was that the new Runic Formula was operating normally; subsequent operations would be much easier, and there was more room for reinforcement.

He could only say thanks to the ancestors; the Eight Trigrams Formation map was indeed flawless!

...

After consolidating for a few days, Nie Ning went back to Ska City to take a look.

The citizens had already been settled by Valk, and people from The Federation headquarters had come to take over Skadi's body.

For some reason, the headquarters did not pursue the matter, as if they had completely treated the incident as an accident.

Those people had asked about Nie Ning's whereabouts, but Lida had brushed them off with the excuse of a long journey, after which the people from the headquarters left Ska City.

Nie Ning didn't care too much about this. As a Tier 3 Wizard, there was no one in the entire Wilbes Republic he feared.

As long as the Crimson Holy Blade didn't take action, he could essentially walk tall throughout the Wilbes Republic.

Nie Ning did not head directly to the Royal Capital because he had more important things to do now, which was to protect his back garden.

...

After returning to the mountains, Nie Ning entered a state of secluded cultivation once again.

However, it wasn't for cultivation; instead, he prepared to use the previously obtained Corruption Spirit to completely solve the problem of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine.

As his private garden, it was naturally better to resolve such matters as early as possible.

Because after multiple inspections, he found that the expansion speed of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine was getting faster and faster.

At this rate, in less than a few years, the entire mountain range would likely become the territory of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine, which was not a good thing for Nie Ning.

...

Half a month later.

Nie Ning prepared everything and stepped into the territory of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine once again.

Although it was a bit reckless, he didn't have a better way to handle it.

With his current strength, he indeed couldn't cause much damage to the corrupted Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine.

After circling the territory of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine, Nie Ning took out blank paper and began recording data, drawing out the range the array needed to cover.

As a wizard, one had to be rigorous in this regard; accurate data could increase the success rate.

The most important thing was to find the core of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine.

Without the core, the Corruption Spirit could not parasitize it, and naturally, the matter could not be resolved.

Fortunately, Nie Ning had found a Power of Corruption detection device among Skadi's leftover items.

Although it had a range limit and could only calculate Corruption fluctuations within fifty meters, that was already enough.

Nie Ning took out a purple tube inscribed with a Runic Formula, with a gray water droplet at the very bottom.

The purple tube was similar to a thermometer; the more concentrated the Power of Corruption was, the higher the gray water droplet below would rise.

Immediately after, Nie Ning summoned the Jerky Bear Head.

The Jerky Bear Head, with its Shadow Shuttle ability, was clearly more suitable for exploration than he was.

Moreover, the Jerky Bear Head's Power of Corruption wasn't as strong as the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine's, but it was higher in concentration than the Power of Corruption emitted by those vines.

This way, as long as the purple tube rose, the position of the plant core could be almost certainly determined.

As the Jerky Bear Head entered the range of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine, Nie Ning began setting up the Life Transmutation Array recorded in the notes.

The reason he spent so much time before was to craft it into an array disk.

While setting it up, Nie Ning also laid down the Blazing Sun Zenith Array along the way.

The Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine was too strong; he had to rely on external forces to suppress it, otherwise, the massive Power of Corruption would likely swallow the Corruption Spirit instantly.

...

Over the next two days, Nie Ning set up the Life Transmutation Array while recording the data brought back by the Jerky Bear Head.

Hard work paid off, and Nie Ning finally calculated the position of the plant core.

The next thing to do was much simpler.

Nie Ning used an Earth Spirit Puppet to lure over a nearby fourth-tier Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox.

Then, taking advantage of its lack of preparation, he used an eight-fold elemental fusion to knock the Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox into the territory of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine.

Although he couldn't cause damage to the Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox, the Blazing Sun Zenith Array could trap it inside for a short period.

Sensing an intruder, a large number of vines from the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine began to approach the Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox.

Furthermore, after suffering the suppression of the Blazing Sun Zenith Array, the surrounding vines also began to frantically attack the barrier.

The strength of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine was clearly higher than that of the Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox; for a time, the Jade-Colored Light-Treading Fox could only flee in distress within the corrupted area, drawing the attention of the Green Steel Devouring Strange Vine.

Seeing that the timing was about right, Nie Ning decisively activated the Life Transmutation Array.

...