Liluo wanted to move, but the instant he did, his shoulder dug into the sharp blades of Ryu's Great Swordstaffs.
"Hand it over." Ryu said plainly.
Amie, Grim and Dru stood outside the formation, their eyes widened in shock. Was Ryu's Body Realm cultivation really so exaggerated? To be able to deal with such an existence with absolute ease?
The truth was that Liluo was indeed a joke to Ryu.
For one, the root of an Immortal Ring expert's strength was their Immortal Ring. The more powerful they were, the greater their foundation, the larger their Immortal Ring would be and the larger area of ambient qi they could gather to strengthen themselves.
Previously, before his breakthrough, Ryu could control at most a quarter meter radius of atmospheric qi. After his breakthrough, it had risen to about one meters worth. These might sound like small numbers, but the truth was that this alone allowed his strength to rise exponentially.
A warrior with a Common Grade Immortal Ring would have an Immortal Ring of half a meter in size. This would allow them to control the a radius of about half meter around them. A warrior with a Black Grade Immortal Ring like those Zu elders Ryu had faced would have an Immortal Ring of a meter in size and would be able to control a meter radius around them.
This was a small change, yet an Immortal Ring expert with a Common Grade Ring didn't stand a chance against one with a Black Grade Ring, all things being equal.
The fact Ryu could control a quarter meter radius around him at all would be shocking enough. But now that he could control a full meter, he was already no worse than any Black Grade Immortal Ring expert.
What was this all to say? It was to point out the fact that the strength of an Immortal Ring expert was almost inextricably linked to their Immortal Ring. Yet, Liluo hadn't even brought his out.
To make matters worse, even if he had brought it out, it would have been Earth Grade at the very best. Such an existence was nothing more than a joke before Ryu.
There was a valuable hidden secret here, though…
The Zu Ancestors, they were measured in terms of Lower, Middle, Higher and Peak. However, all the experts Ryu had run into in Osiris so far were measure from one to nine…
However, to the current Ryu, he had yet to find a single individual worthy of making this difference matter.
Liluo coughed, blood flowing from his lips.
"Fuck you." He said with a sneer hanging from his lips.
"Oh?" Ryu pursed in his lips and nodded as though this response wasn't a big deal. "Alright."
With a wave of his hand, the spheres floating in the air suddenly converged, being pulled toward Ryu as though they were his own to begin with.
"You…" Liluo felt as though he had experienced a lifetime's worth of shock in just this single day.
Those treasures were his. It didn't make sense for Ryu to just be able to take them as he pleased.
But the truth was that Ryu hadn't just taken them.
Rather, this formation, as Ryu had speculated, was designed to suppress not the Heavens, but rather the normal functions of Osiris. If there really was a treasure that existed to cut off the Heavens, it would be at the pinnacle of the Origin Grade at worst. In fact, it might even have to be something beyond that.
This aside, in order to suppress the normal function of Osiris, the formation was deployed very cleverly and would have to change depending on the environment. Ryu simply shifted the tides of qi such that the formation would converge toward him of its own accord.
Of course, this required both understanding the principles of Osiris and the formation being deployed as well. The second was easy enough, but even Ryu shouldn't have been able to see through Osiris so easily.
Or rather… He normally wouldn't have been able to until his eyes evolved.
Even without trying, Ryu could see the fundamental runes of Osiris with such utter ease that he could probably display strength far beyond his means in this world in comparison to anywhere else.
At first, Ryu had thought that his ability to see floating Fundamental Runes would mean that he could do so in the outside world as well. But, after some thought, he realized that this was ridiculous. Even though his eyes had evolved, the Immortal level was still the mere Immortal level. Beyond it, there was still the Cosmic realms.
Ryu speculated that if he evolved his Pupils once more, only then would he be able to see Fundamental Runes in the real world. And even then, it would probably be greatly limited until he progressed a good ways into the Cosmic realms.
However, fundamentally, Osiris was a dream world built by the hands of man. How could it compare to the true universe? Because of this, Ryu could easily see through it despite having only opened nine nodes of his Heavenly Pupils.
This truth was enough to run circles around Liluo.
Ryu observed the treasures from up close. In this state, they lost the ability to effectively seal off the world, so the expanse of grey Ryu had seen before became vibrant once more.
Ryu suddenly looked up into the distance, his lip curling. 'A bit too late now.'
He flicked a finger forward.
To others, he hit empty air. But, to Liluo it felt as though his soul had loss the connection to something precious. When he realized what it was, his eyes widened in shock.
"No!"
Unfortunately it was already too late, Ryu had taken hold of the spheres and redeployed them.
Liluo felt as though the world had forsaken him in that moment. Despite not having Heavenly Pupils like Ryu, the world felt more dreary and dark as though everything truly was painted in black and white.
He suddenly realized just how right Ryu was. Let alone 500%, it felt as though the strength of this formation had increased tenfold in Ryu's hands.
At that moment, several lurking auras entered the range of the group, each of them just as powerful and a few even more so than Liluo.
The elites of Deep Valley had appeared.