Chapter 838: Guardian

Dharma Protectors, or Dharma Protector Gods, are common companions for many Great Powers.

Specialization is key. A Great Power might be able to manipulate fate, maintain the world's operation, or even create worlds, but that doesn't mean he is a strong fighter among his peers.

Many powerful spells and even Divine Abilities that are effective against opponents of the same Rank have prerequisites. They don't just rely on Spiritual Artifacts or favorable timing and terrain; even simpler ones require sufficient opportunity, time, space, and casting windows, hence the need for Dharma Protector Gods.

Generally speaking, they are mounts, or Spiritual Artifacts, or they might outsource and hire some Dharma Protector Gods to protect themselves from being instantly killed by opponents of the same Rank.

While it sounds counter-intuitive, a mount isn't necessarily weaker than its owner, and a Great Power of high status isn't necessarily strong within his own Rank.

After all, cultivation is not brawling. The essence of Divine Abilities and spells are 'side effects,' things that accidentally emerge during the cultivation process. Few Dao seekers cultivate specifically for Divine Abilities and spells.

Cultivating purely for Divine Abilities and spells is actually very difficult to succeed in. It's not absolutely impossible, just hard.

After all, the purpose of cultivation is to seek the Dao, to find the truth one recognizes. In this process, combat is necessary, but not the most important thing.

Therefore, your status largely depends on the breadth and depth of your 'Dao,' and how much respect and recognition you can gain, rather than how good you are at fighting.

The Martial Dao is often looked down upon, and this is precisely the reason.

Many famous high-Rank cultivators are actually not very good at fighting. They are excellent at research and philosophical contemplation, but like Li Qi, they mostly rely on their cultivation to bully others in a fight. When they truly encounter a peer who excels in combat, they find themselves in a tight spot.

Of course, this is only some of them. Many Great Powers are not only good at research but also excellent fighters. It's just that Rank, cultivation, and actual combat power are not necessarily related.

Manjushri Bodhisattva was once trapped in a well, and the Dao Ancestor's Dharma Body had limited cultivation, and was once caught and hung upside down. Although they have very high status, if you were to talk about fighting, and their cultivation and Divine Abilities were restricted, they might not necessarily defeat a skilled fighter one Rank below them.

Therefore, at this time, Dharma Protector Gods become particularly important. Dharma Protector Gods are those who don't do much research but are particularly good at fighting. They use martial arts to protect the Great Power's casting wind-up, otherwise the Great Powers cannot unleash their full strength.

Li Qi, however, does not have a Dharma Protector God, mainly because he is not used to it and has no such intention. Finding a suitable Dharma Protector God is very difficult, and he usually doesn't need one.

By the time the Human-Shaman War began, it was already too late to find one. Few people were willing to intervene in the Human-Shaman War, and finding a Dharma Protector God generally required a cultivator of the same Rank who was also skilled in combat; just anyone wouldn't do.

So Li Qi could only rely on himself to train his combat skills.

Now, after all these years, Li Qi's fighting skill is far superior to what it once was, but he still hasn't reached the point where he can suppress one peer and still defeat three others.

If he were at his peak, he might be able to, as he is indeed stronger than his opponent in terms of spells and cultivation. But with his inner body spirits damaged at the moment, while Li Qi wouldn't necessarily lose, it's hard to say if he could win.

However, with someone acting as a Dharma Protector, that's another story.

Jing Wuzhen is currently Li Qi's Dharma Protector.

Li Qi can completely abandon all defensive measures and only needs to focus on how to break through the opponent's defenses.

This feeling is like transforming from an esports player to a spectator.

On the field, players must pay attention to lane details every second, last-hitting, positioning, calculating cooldowns, watching the mini-map for jungler movements, calculating monster respawns, controlling Dragons and Heralds, and all while engaging in combat.

But spectators are different.

Spectators just sit in front of the screen. All information is clear at a glance: cooldowns are marked, battles are replayed, all resources are clearly visible, lane details, last-hitting, equipment—everything is crystal clear.

This leads to the fact that while spectators may not be strong fighters, their understanding of the entire battle situation and post-game analysis can often be stronger than the players', and their understanding of various lane choices may also be more correct.

This isn't because the spectators are stronger, but because players have a lot of pressure, while spectators do not, allowing them to observe leisurely and make decisions slowly.

This is also why 'coaches' exist. When coaches are off the field, they observe these things and are responsible for telling the players what to do.

While they cannot fight for the players, the coach's role in tactics is undeniable.

Li Qi, with a Dharma Protector God, is like a player with a spectator's view, and at the same time, he is also a coach who can jump into the fight with an omniscient perspective at any time.

The combination of a Great Power and a Dharma Protector God is a tried-and-true gold standard partnership.

The Three Demon Lords outside the maze began to manipulate Demonic Qi, attempting to interfere with Li Qi and Jing Wuzhen, making them reveal flaws.

But Jing Wuzhen remained completely unmoved. Her Martial Dao Divine Intent illuminated the Void Realm, countless acupoints in her limbs and bones spewed out Qi and blood, and her entire body's strength flowed as one. With a single punch, her muscles coordinated perfectly, her Qi and blood circulated smoothly, like a well-trained army, obeying orders perfectly, unleashing all her power.

However, at this moment, the Demon of the Five Aggregates Qi burst forth.

Jing Wuzhen's senses were obscured, her bodily sensations became chaotic, and the bridge between her mind and Physical Body was forcibly tampered with!

What is the effect of the Demon of the Five Aggregates's chaos?

It means, you want to raise your hand, but when you move, you find you've kicked forward. You try to jump, but when you move, you find only one leg jumped, the other didn't.

Jing Wuzhen is now experiencing this very situation!

Her Physical Body, which was originally perfectly obedient and trained as one, began to rebel, internal strife!!

Some muscles exerted force, some muscles slacked off, and some even interfered with each other, fighting amongst themselves.

Her entire body was in complete disarray!

She originally wanted to stir her Qi and blood, but before her heart and organs even moved, the disobedient muscles already pressed her bones, making a Ga Ga sound, and her Inner World began to let out painful wails.

Jing Wuzhen merely wanted to exert force, but in reality, her strength was not conveyed to the desired place at all, but exploded midway!

Her skin consequently shattered, and the rampant Qi and blood immediately tore her body to shreds. The continuous internal explosions from within caused the female Martial Artist's arm to directly burst out a blood arrow, flying out with some碎肉, and the wound was deep enough to see the bone.

That spot was the location of an acupoint, where the power stored within should have been used to unleash killing force, but at this moment, it uncontrollably exploded internally, directly piercing through her own body.

“Is that all?” Jing Wuzhen scoffed.

Merely disrupting her Physical Body, while it would interfere with her output of force and even cause self-inflicted injuries, wouldn't be enough to defeat her.

However, just then—

“Be careful,” Li Qi said, and the Buddhist Heavens appeared behind him.

He had already learned this move when he went to the Buddhist Kingdom.

The Heavens unleashed a Divine Ability.

Divine Ability is a natural ability developed during the cultivation process. So-called 'Divine' means being able to do what others cannot, and 'Ability' means reaching what others cannot reach; this is 'Divine Ability'.

The pressure from the Buddhist Heavens forced the Demonic Qi to retreat.

Jing Wuzhen was surprised to feel her body regain control.

“Hmph… you've got some skill,” Jing Wuzhen looked at Li Qi.

“Stop marveling, it's delaying things. Let's move, I'll guide you,” Li Qi didn't say much more. The ritual he was performing, without any interference, started completely.

Under normal circumstances, it would certainly be impossible, but Jing Wuzhen helped him block all interferences and all attacks targeting Li Qi, creating a comfortable environment for him to perform.

The role of a Dharma Protector was fully demonstrated at this moment.

Li Qi empowered his Dharma Protector, providing her with intelligence, analysis, defense, and assists, and even allowing her to channel certain extremely powerful ultimate moves without fear of interruption.

As Li Qi's Dharma Protector, Jing Wuzhen had ample resources. As long as she followed his commands, she could unleash all her strength, and as long as she protected Li Qi, the fight would be particularly easy.

As for getting injured or beaten, that was naturally unavoidable. However, as a Martial Artist, injuries were commonplace, and her usual intensity in practicing punches and Sword Qi was horrifying.

It didn't matter at all; these minor injuries would heal on their own.

Jing Wuzhen crashed into the boundless dimensional maze. The expanded Calabi-Yau space had completely different rules; here, space had nine directions.

If one wasn't clever enough, even a Fourth Grade mind would find it truly difficult to imagine what a nine-directional space looks like. If you simply moved in one direction, you would find that even after moving an infinite distance, you could not return to the origin.

Imagine a Mobius strip, flying on a rocket. That's a three-dimensional space curled into a two-dimensional shape.

At this point, a two-dimensional creature moving within the Mobius strip, although it can return to the 'two-dimensional origin' countless times, because the Mobius strip is moving in three-dimensional space, it will never be able to return to the origin in three-dimensional space.

And now, such a space has nine dimensions.

You can't even perceive what kind of changes are happening to yourself. You think you're moving 'forward,' but in reality, merely because of your movement, every part of your body might be heading in a different direction, leading to 'self-tearing.' Your hands and feet go in different directions, but the force applied is real, and it truly tears you apart.

The danger level of the dimensional maze is precisely this: complex, perilous, and indescribable.

However, Li Qi, on his side, chose to construct a probability density function independent of direction, fitting the data with a high-dimensional normal distribution, utilizing its geometric and probabilistic properties. Through the random projection theorem, he mapped the high-dimensional space approximately without deformation to a low-dimensional space, and then could tell Jing Wuzhen how to proceed in a way a Martial Artist could understand.

Yes, it was actually just to make Jing Wuzhen understand. After all, for Li Qi, he could even 'intuitively' see nine dimensions; the True Knowledge Dao Resonance could clearly display the dimensions.

After all, dimensions are nothing special; they are just 'directions of space'.

The nature of space and the nature of matter have not changed; only the direction has changed. This is just an added direction.

A one-dimensional world is a straight line, with no left or right, and only forward and backward directions. In this world, matter can only move along one direction.

Two dimensions have two directions, three dimensions have three directions, and so on. These are all just changes in space.

For matter itself, the number of directions truly doesn't matter at all. After all, 'space is merely the trace left by matter.' In what direction it moves, matter doesn't care. If anything, changes in dimension only increase the complexity of matter's movement, with no actual impact on matter itself; it remains as it is.

Therefore, for Li Qi, the difficulty of this thing is actually just about computational power.

Now, without frontal pressure, he connected to the outside world through the ritual, using a Karma line from the outside to connect to himself, and then straightening the Karma line naturally revealed the shortest path.

Jing Wuzhen followed this shortest path, sprinting wildly towards the outside!

A Martial Artist's greatest killing power is always at close range!

And the Three Demon Lords were not afraid, not even dodging.

Because the opponent's Martial Dao Divine Intent had already been revealed, that Martial Dao Divine Intent, displaying 'Quasar Sword Qi,' was a destructive Martial Dao Divine Intent.

Therefore, this kind of Martial Dao Divine Intent poses very little threat to the Demonic Dao.

The Demonic Dao has extraordinary resistance to this type of damage, especially the Heavenly Demon lineage, which can almost be said to be 'immune' to this pure physical damage.

As a Fourth Grade Martial Artist, of course, she would have some other means to cope, but it would be like Seal-ing Li Qi's ritual ability, equivalent to cutting off one of your arms and greatly reducing your combat power.

Reality has no balance; mutual generation and mutual restraint are naturally occurring. When encountering something that is countered, such as the Heavenly Demon lineage Demon Lord just now facing the Purification Method of the Heavens of the Formless Realm, he was suppressed with almost no resistance.

Similarly, a Martial Artist who only excels at frontal destruction will also be very powerless against the Demonic Dao, which focuses on the bizarre, illusory, and mind-based attacks.

However, this judgment immediately made the Three Demon Lords regret their decision.

When Jing Wuzhen arrived, she suddenly switched to a different weapon.

It was also a sword, but not the heavy sword from before.

It was a ceremonial sword.

Ceremonial swords are extremely long and designed for beauty rather than practicality. They are not made for killing but for ceremonial purposes, decoration, indicating status and position, or certain ritual uses.

The most famous ceremonial sword in the world is the 'human emperor sword'.

And this ceremonial sword in front of her, Li Qi found somewhat familiar.

It was somewhat similar to the 'Zai' used in Shaman rituals.

Zai is responsible for carving up the 'sacrifices' used in rituals, and those who possess the power of 'Zai' are 'Sovereigns'.

Later, it even evolved into terms like 'Prime Minister'.

Why would Jing Wuzhen have a Zai sword?