Because Chen Luo sensed that the Mountain Giant Elephant he killed was a Tier 1 Abyssal monster, he naturally assumed that in this world, the Apostle level above the True Guard level also possessed Tier 1 Abyssal combat power.
But he was wrong!
The Apostles of the Heart-Soul Path were entirely different beings.
They burned their souls to the extreme, incinerating their physical bodies and spirits,
Ultimately, by merging their souls with Heart-Soul Steel, they achieved an alternative form of life transformation.
At this point, the originally weak mortal soul had completely dissolved.
What remained was a battle armor that had completely transformed into the Apostle level!
This Apostle-level battle armor was the answer given by Nine Dragons after breaking through the end of the Heart-Soul Path!
After fusing with the soul that had undergone extreme sublimation, the originally soulless battle armor completely came alive!
Humans were no longer Tier 0 mortals, and battle armor was no longer lifeless equipment!
They became one! Leaping to become entirely new life forms of Tier 2 Calamity or even Purgatory!
This was Nine Dragons' true ultimate battle armor!
...
Life tier represents the level of life, and danger level displays combat power within different tiers.
A Tier 0 Purgatory could contend with a Tier 1 Calamity, and even the exceptional ones could successfully fight back.
However, a Tier 1 Abyss would not have a significant advantage against a Tier 2 Purgatory, because the further one progressed in life tiers, the greater the gap became.
Of course, there were still exceptional individuals like Chen Luo who could fight back, but in most cases, the outcome would be crushing defeat by those of higher rank.
Even reaching Tier 3 might result in some form of absolute suppression, such as the Great Origin's suppression of Chen Luo.
Although Chen Luo already knew that the suppression he experienced came from both the Great Origin and the game's rules,
Undoubtedly, the Great Origin born in the lower worlds, which Chen Luo could shatter with a single punch, could indeed suppress the power of the Tier 2 domain.
Regarding this, Chen Luo had a conjecture: perhaps the Great Origin, like the Great Lords, were Tier 3 existences, which was why he could not truly perceive it and why he was suppressed by it.
Tier 3 represented a complete qualitative change, entirely different from the previous leaps in life tiers.
Therefore, even the Great Origin of a lower world, whose actual combat power was clearly inferior to Chen Luo's, was sufficient to cause significant influence on Chen Luo due to the suppression of life tiers.
To put it another way, the so-called "Apostle level" in this world was essentially the fusion of soul and battle armor.
Unlike the Human-Armor Fusion of the True Guard level, where if the human soul was completely burned out, the battle armor would remain unharmed.
Even when others reached the True Guard level, they could inherit this battle armor, although it would not be as compatible as the battle armor that ascended together, and the special abilities gained would be greatly reduced.
However, the Apostle level abandoned the human body, integrating the soul into the battle armor, and it was even uncertain whether the soul itself still existed!
At this stage, the battle armor was the Apostle! The Apostle was the battle armor!
Because humans have limits, these Apostles were no longer human!
...
"Extreme stimulation, in the past, only Lord Long Jiu achieved it through his own abilities."
"According to Lord Long Jiu, it required experiencing a hellish pain and reaching it within extreme emotions."
"Afterward, many True Guard level beings within Nine Dragons made various attempts, but all failed without exception."
"However, through the efforts of the research department, we discovered an alternative method to achieve extreme soul stimulation."
"That is, by forcibly achieving extreme stimulation through soul combustion, allowing the soul to sublimate to its extreme!"
"And the number of souls required to fuel the birth of an Apostle is approximately two billion!"
"This is the highest number of fuel souls. Under such fueling, True Guards have about a ten percent chance of completing the promotion."
"Through the accumulation of countless souls, those True Guard powerhouses chosen by fate will be reborn amidst the flames of countless fellow souls."
The AI calmly narrated the terrifying cost. Two billion, one-third of the population of Chen Luo's former mother world,
Here, it was used as fuel to forge an Apostle of Tier 2 Purgatory.
After becoming an Apostle, Apostles could reforge human bodies using Heart-Soul Steel.
The further strengthened battle armor itself could hide between reality and illusion, much like the Heart-Soul Fire.
However, the human body at this stage was merely a simulated product of Heart-Soul Steel, not a true flesh and blood body.
Therefore, to remember their human identity, Apostle-level beings often developed peculiar habits.
"For example, Ivanoff of the Fourth Sequence really likes to drink piping hot black coffee."
"And Lord Dickens, the Eighth Sequence and guardian of the Fourth Sea Domain, always likes to hug some ugly black women, yet insists on emphasizing that he likes white girls."
"They are all just deceiving themselves. I believe they are no longer considered human."
"However, under Lord Long Jiu's influence, these trends have become quite prevalent among the higher echelons of Nine Dragons. I truly cannot comprehend their thoughts."
"Due to the specificity of the Apostle level, the battle armor is their true form. I can still sense the safety signals of all Apostle-level battle armors to this day."
"After entering the Zero Battlefield, they did not receive any attacks, but for some unknown reason, they seem to have remained in one place."
"Therefore, I believe 'Leidi' is not dead, and in fact, none of the other Apostles are dead!"
Upon hearing this, Chen Luo's gaze became profound.
Consuming human souls, yet still believing themselves to be human?
Gazing at the lifeless little girl's corpse behind the glass curtain wall beside him, Chen Luo suddenly felt like laughing.
But Chen Luo couldn't laugh; instead, he wanted to smash those bastards' heads in!
...
Chen Luo had now found Nine Dragons' solution to soul combustion.
According to the intelligent brain's explanation, the key lay in Heart-Soul Steel and a large number of souls.
Heart-Soul Steel was a special material that flowed from the hands of Long Jiu. It possessed almost perfect shaping ability, reaching the limits of the material world in this regard.
But Heart-Soul Steel, named after the heart and soul, already hinted at its true specialty.
It could envelop souls!
When Ivanoff issued the order to massacre the city, the metal curtain walls enveloped Dragon Heart City completely. It seemed that these metal curtain walls were only to prevent people from escaping during the massacre.
But that was not the true function of these metal curtain walls.
These metal curtain walls were mixed with trace amounts of Heart-Soul Steel, and their true purpose was to intercept the souls that should have entered the Netherworld after death!
Every new city on the ground was surrounded by such curtain walls.
Normally, the families within the cities only needed to submit mature humans according to requirements.
These humans would be gathered into rooms of Heart-Soul Steel and massacred all at once.
But when an Apostle needed to be promoted, at least two hundred new cities would be completely massacred within the metal curtain walls.
After the cities were cleared, new cultivated Heart-Soul users and humans would soon arrive in the cities to continue their lives unknowingly.
And those souls enveloped by Heart-Soul Steel would then be extremely compressed.
Some would be placed into battle armor above Dragon Rider generals to help them slow down the rate of soul combustion.
The remaining majority, however, served as sustenance for the survival of Apostle-level beings.