Rise of the Cosmic_Emperor

As the nine elders rose into the air as one, Runes appeared on their arms, and from each rune, they all channeled a curious mixture of Astral energy, Bloodline energy, and Cosmic energy to form a Pentagon that spun in their midst.

The moment the Pentagon appeared, Hal felt a tug on his consciousness and knew the effect of the Formation had begun.

The Elders began to murmur spell words into the Formation to further strengthen it and the tug continued to grow stronger while Hal slowly got pulled towards the Pentagon.

That was the effect of the Formation and Hal had known it since they first started the activation.

One of the Elders took a break from chanting to say to Hal,

"You feel that? That tug on your mind? That is the power of the great Crimson formation! You can try fighting it if you wish but you can never get free. It is your willpower and mental might against the joint willpower and Mental might of us Nine. You can never win." the Elder gloated and his fellows agreed with him.

'Well, that's just not true' Hal thought with a chuckle referring to the statement that their combined Willpower and mental strength were greater than his.

The Crimson formation targeted the, considerably, most vulnerable part of any normal cultivator which was their mind... Only in the case of Runemasters did the reverse become the case i.e seasoned Runemasters usually have stronger minds than they have stronger bodies and cultivation.

Anyway, the Formation worked just as the Elder had gloated and it combined the willpower and mental strength of all those invoked in its activation to trap and imprison the mind of their target.

If it worked well, which it did, then the target would feel a tugging on his/her consciousness, and the tug would only get stronger with time until the imprisonment was complete and once that was the case, the said individual would be at the mercy of the Elders to do with as they deemed fit- if he/she was not already mentally broken which was an effect the Formation had.

The effects could be fought against, especially by Runemasters whose mental strength was stronger than the average cultivator but even then, breaking free of the effects would still cause damage to their mental health which would still make put the target at the mercy of the Elders.

Once the Formation was successfully activated, then a bond had been formed and severing that bond would still be damaging.

All in all, the Elders saw no way they could lose.

The Formation was basically made to be activated by ten at the very maximum but the nine of them would be enough, They all thought with confidence.

Use of combat strength, of which Hal was clearly proficient, would not be useful once the Formation began its work and thus, they had nothing to worry about- Or so they thought.

Hal never planned to truly fight the effects of the formation when he saw a flaw in the formation that he could use in his favor...

The formation involved a mental connection of the nine Elders... The formation was practically a Nexus that Hal could use to get into their minds and subvert their will.

Once the Elder had gloated, Hal let himself get pulled into the formation and he even let go of his Trident and Scepter in the process because the pull was making it impossible for him to physically act as he wished...

Both his Trident and Scepter floated in the air where he used to be and when Hal was finally in the center of the pentagon both physically and mentally, the imprisonment began.

Before it was complete and could truly take hold though, a snap sounded and it resounded all about the courtyard- Billowing strong wind that knocked down a few Crimson fox experts battling down below.

Following the snap of what sounded like fingers, the space around the scepter warped, and its location was changed so that it was right atop Hal who was right in the middle of the pentagon.

From the blue jewel at the top of the scepter spread an infinite wave of Sovereign Might that very easily enveloped the entire courtyard... It seized control of the Nexus which was the very center of the formation.

The minds of every single one of the Elders as well as Hal's were pulled from the physical plane and into the illusionary realm that was Hal's Sovereign space.

Alas, Hak could quickly tell a difference...

Unlike how it usually was, he did not have ultimate manipulative control over the current occupants of the space and was now vying for control with the Nine elders because the Elders had joint command over the formation that made the transition possible.

Also, unlike how it had been for the Elder he had tricked with false victory, every single one of the nine Elders knew immediately that the location had changed even though the Sovereign space had morphed into a perfect replica of the courtyard- Even including the background battles of the Crimson fox army against the Devil beats who were led by the hybrid serpent woman.

The Nine Elders recognized it all as the illusion that it was.

"The hell is this...? What have you done, Infidel?!" yelled a female Elder and her question was what the others, including the Elder who had previously gloated, wished to pose as well.

Hal drew a hand through his nightmarish black hair and let out booming laughter thick with malevolence before he then said,

"I simply made it all easier and much more direct. I have no interest in killing anyone of you... I want to subdue you... 

As you can already feel, you all possess Cosmic energy -of some sort- in here which also means you still have your cultivations. 

You also have access to illusions of your bloodline as well as your Ordinances and whatever trump cards you ever had in your arsenal- All of them are available to you and the same is true for me..." Hal punctuated his words by summoning both his Devil Trident and Sovereign Scepter.

He continued after he briefly let his words sink into the psyche of the Elders, some of whom were still looking around for the Pentagon of their formation,

"In here, you never run out of Cosmic energy and your physical strength will never wane but for every hit that is landed on you, your mental stability will gain an additional crack.

Once it is damaged enough, I will seal you as my subjects and the battle will be won and come to an end... There is no mending of mental stability... Not while you are in this mental space at least.

The same is also true for me; For every hit that you ever manage to land on me, my mental stability will also gain an additional crack and once the damage is enough, your formation, which is still active outside of this space, will imprison my mind and the damage is such that I will never recover from.

If you succeed, I will be as mentally dead as any cultivator can possibly be.

It's a winner takes all situation with all nine of you against the singular me.

Those are the rules... The battle will now begin" Hal said with a wicked grin and while he cracked his neck, the courtyard morphed into an arena to better represent the intense battle that was about to go down. 

The Elders wasted no time, with them all numbered from one to nine by Hal who did not know or care about their names, they sprung into action.

They had quite easily verified that all Hal had told them was the truth but they also held reservations at the thought that there was likely so much Hal had neglected to tell them as well.

That said, defeating Hal was still a must, and none of them thought of approaching with calm diplomacy... The time of that was past or might have just never existed in the first place.

Elder-One and Elder-Two charged right for Hal while the others spanned out in various directions while masking their exact locations with both speed and techniques they had as the powerful experts that they were.

Hal quite liked the coordinated movements because it was clear the Elders knew what they were doing and every one of them had his role which he/she had been tasked to accomplish.

All of the elders were in the primal beastly forms and they moved as such(on all four) with a savagery that greatly increased the strength they usually had in base. 

*Clang!*

That was the sound that Hal's thorny Trident pole made with Elder-Two's claws as he knocked him aside while Elder-One went for his jugular.

Hal sneered and made to strike him with his scepter but a black hole appeared to swallow his arm- Scepter and all.

The appearance of the black hole was curious as Hal knew that neither of the two Elders who had charged at him possessed the Ordinance of Void... This was clearly the work of another Elder lying in wait.

With his body radiating Infinity which was capable of negating Ordinances, the black hole couldn't close around his arm, and swallowing Hal's arm was the best the Ordinance could do but that gave Elder-One enough time and space to make contact... Almost.

After a calm ripple effect that spread from a smiling Hal, Elder-One kept flying towards him but never could make contact... The space between him and Hal was stretched continuously without end so that he kept flying in the air but was never capable of reaching his target.