12 Blue Thunder gauntlet

Li Zhu and the illusion circled around each other, each waiting for an opportunity to strike.

Although the illusion could not think, it had clearly been made to fight, and Li Zhu did not dare underestimate it.

Finally, realizing the illusion would never make the first move, Li Zhu pounced forwards, circulating his heavenly energy into his right fist, while he kept his left arm close to him, ready to block any counterattacks.

As his fist almost reached the face of the illusion, the latter quickly sidestepped to the left, before using the momentum of the dodge to kick towards Li Zhu's exposed right side, with full force.

Seeing this, Li Zhu instantly brought both of his arms to his right, blocking the incoming kick. At the same time, his left leg flashed, quick as lightning. With his leg, Li Zhu tripped the illusion, which was still in the midst of kicking, meaning it only had one leg on the floor.

The illusion could not block this sweep, instantly falling to the ground, which gave Li Zhu the opportunity to strike.

And that he did, as he viciously jumped onto the illusion, both arms winding up punches.

Before the illusion even knew what was happening, fists began raining down, mercilessly crushing it.

After a few powerful blows, the illusion dissipated into the air, having been defeated.

"Good warm-up" said Li Zhu, attempting to look cool, though there was no one in the room but him.

Although the fight had been quick, Li Zhu realized that one small miscalculation could have costed him the match.

And this was only the first floor, while the ones later on would become much harder, reaching a level that Li Zhu could possibly risk dying from.

As he worried about the challenges ahead of him, a bright light suddenly shone from the center of the room, where the spatial chest was located. Turning his head to look at the disturbance, Li Zhu noticed that the chest was slowly opening, as though it had a will of its own.

As the top of the chest uncovered, the bright light vanished, leaving behind a small round object, with a glossy texture. The sphere was white, though it had small green patterns on it, each depicting different legendary beasts, such as dragons and phoenixes.

"Divine beasts pill!" exclaimed Li Zhu, identifying the sphere in the chest.

Divine beasts pills were extremely rare in the Endless Sword continent, to the point that even the Heavenly Dragon Empire only had a few in their treasury. Although this particular pill was very low leveled, being at most useful for Qi gathering realm cultivators, its presence here meant someone who had the pill formula had placed treasures in this tower, which baffled Li Zhu, who was increasingly curious of the Flaming Saber Sect, which apparently had been influenced by many great experts.

Picking up the Divine beasts pill, Li Zhu was ecstatic, since it could help him increase his cultivation, which was currently his biggest weakness, apart from the fact that he had not started a fighting path yet.

While Li Zhu was admiring the treasure he had found, a door opened on the first floor, leading into a flight of stairs, presumably used to reach the second floor.

Spotting this from the corner of his eyes, Li Zhu stored the Divine Beasts pill in his pocket, while he ran towards the door, now excited about the rewards he would find on the next floors.

_____

A young man could be seen, slowly walking up stairs, panting. The young man was riddled with bruises, and his face was now full of dirt, yet the determination in his eyes was undeniable, and it formed quite a contrast with the rest of his body, which looked pretty beaten up.

Li Zhu, who was now reaching the fourth floor, the last one with illusions at his level of cultivation, the second stage qi gathering.

The previous two floors had contained three and five illusions respectively, and Li Zhu dreaded the fact that there would now be even more. In the two fights, there had been many close calls, and some light injuries, yet it wasn't all bad, since he had received two great treasures.

On the second floor he had received a martial technique for sword users, "Sword of the Wind War" which was useless to him, since he was going to be a summoner. That said, he could sell it for quite a bit in an auction, so he wasn't overly disappointed.

He was very happy about the reward from the third floor, though, since he had received a gauntlet, which he could use in the upcoming fights. The "Blue Thunder" gauntlet was a spirit weapon, albeit of the lowest grade, and it could help him get past the fourth floor, if used correctly.

Spirit weapons were classified into Poor, Initial, Intermediate, Advanced and Masterful, with each level being further divided into three stages: Low, Middle and Peak. The "Blue Thunder" gauntlet was a Low stage Poor spirit weapon, which although the weakest of them all, was still a force to be reckoned with, since it contained heavenly energy that could be used in a fight.

Li Zhu wore the gauntlet on his right arm, and it reached his elbow, with lightning coursing through it, somehow not harming him in the slightest.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Li Zhu entered a room exactly the same as the previous three, with a chest in the middle and illusions standing guard. The only difference was that instead of three or five illusions, there were actually nine!

Generally, in the Qi gathering realm, each further cultivation stage gave a person the capability to fight five people of the previous stage. This meant that this floor, with nine opponents, was actually harder than fighting someone one stage above him, which surprised Li Zhu, who was expecting a slower progression in difficulty.

That said, with the Blue Thunder gauntlet, he was confident in his fighting capabilities, so he charged into the clones, right arm first.

As Li Zhu circulated his heavenly energy into the gauntlet, lighting instantly spewed out from it, shooting in all directions, though always avoiding him, as though it had a will of its own.

The illusions, now in fighting stance, quickly retreated, blocking the thunder at the best of their abilities.

Li Zhu took this as a chance to strike, as he charged towards the nearest enemy.

His first strike was with his left hand, aimed at the illusions' temple. This forced the latter to block, exposing his left side, which Li Zhu quickly struck with his lightning infused gauntlet, instantly destroying the illusion.

Although he had already defeated one enemy, there was no happiness on Li Zhu's face, as he noticed the rest charging towards him, from all directions. This did not give any chance for Li Zhu to keep defeating them one at a time, since if he focused in any single direction then the rest could easily injure or kill him.

Maintaining his calm, Li Zhu racked his brain to figure our a way to get out of this situation, though he only had about a second to reach a conclusion, since the illusions were quickly approaching.

'That's the only way, isn't it? Well, here goes nothing' thought Li Zhu, who was not positive that his idea could go as planned.

As the illusions almost reached him, he suddenly punched the ground with his gauntlet, using all the force and heavenly energy he could muster.

The moment his fist hit the stone tiles, lightning erupted engulfing the entire room, while Li Zhu was sent flying from the rebound force of hitting the unshakable ground.

This force was so great that it catapulted Li Zhu over the illusions, who were temporarily blinded by the fierce light.

Li Zhu did not waste any precious time, as he immediately pounced towards the nearest illusion, quickly punching its face, turning it into dust.

As quickly as he could, Li Zhu tried to kill off as many illusions as he could, thanks to this rare opening. As he destroyed the fourth one, though, the remaining five had finally returned to their prime fighting state, and they started charging towards him once again.

This time, though, instead of surrounding him, the illusions were in one single group, making Li Zhu smile, since their lack of intelligence had just caused their downfall.

"I don't know why you are doing my work for me, but i'll gladly accept your gift" he joked, before activating the Blue Thunder gauntlet fully.

Now that the illusions were all together, he could hit all of them at once with a full force strike, that he was hoping would "kill" them on the spot.

His gauntlet activated, as the room was suddenly filled with lightning, of an eerie blue color. The color did not lessen its destructiveness, though, as it hit the illusions straight in their chests, blasting them against the back wall, though they did not dissipate.

Li Zhu, not wanting to take any risks, ran towards the fallen enemies, quickly finishing them off, before falling exhausted on the floor, panting.

Although he had won this battle in a short amount of time, his heavenly energy was now fully depleted, meaning that if he had failed this last attack the illusions would have had free reign over him.

Li Zhu did not grow cocky, since he understood that without the Blue Thunder gauntlet, beating this floor would have been impossible, even with his fighting skills. At the same time, he dreaded the next floor even more, realizing it could only be harder than this.

As he lay there, a bright light flashed, as the chest on this floor started to open. Li Zhu did not look surprised in any way, since he was now used to this happening; he just waited for the treasure to be revealed.

'What could it be this time?' he wondered, though the one thing he knew for sure was that it would be no simple reward, since the third floor had already given him a spirit weapon, and this floor's prize could only be better.