When some of the weaker Spiritual Saints in that group realized what Minos was attempting, it was too late for them to escape.
The black hole that Minos was controlling with difficulty at the moment could easily absorb even high-level Spiritual Saints. So it would not be these mercenaries who could escape it.
Because of this, when three of those individuals were caught by surprise by Minos' unexpected action, they were all easily swallowed by that region of space devoid of light.
The spiritual fluctuations of the three of them disappeared in the blink of an eye. In this way, such a thing shocked all the Spiritual Saints in the area, who felt the souls of the three of them ceasing to exist in a way they could not even describe.
Each of them was startled by this, promptly floating off in the opposite direction of Minos' black hole while activating their strength to the maximum they could.
They then made their soul avatars appear, the most powerful form of a Spiritual Saint.
The avatar could be activated through a soul technique, something cultivators could only learn from the 8th stage when they fully awakened their soul power.
Through the avatar, a cultivator could use their six techniques other than cultivation, exposing a cultivator's true powers by using the free energy in nature as fuel.
Cultivators could use the energy of the surroundings from the very first levels of cultivation. But this only became enough to influence a battle from the 8th stage.
And with this, every technique, Natural Law behind them, was presented at its best level from the 8th stage on, through the avatar, which had greater compatibility with the cultivation world than ordinary human bodies.
Because of this reality, all cultivators there capable of activating the avatar used their energies to put everything they had at their disposal into this troublesome moment.
Minos clearly could not easily use that thing to devour them. So they intended to impose as much resistance as possible so as not to end up like the first three.
At the same time that many soul avatars were appearing in that region, the many Spiritual Emperors of the enemy forces were already fighting Minos' men.
They were terrified of the appearance of Minos' black hole and the end of those three low-level Spiritual Saints. After all, if that had happened to 8th-stage cultivators, they, as 7th-stage people, would have had no resistance at all.
Then fear began to spread in the surroundings; something also intensified by Minos' Dark Sea, which was activated to its total capacity now.
But unfortunately, Minos was a bit distant from those people, and the effect of his soul ability was not enough to manipulate all those individuals. On the contrary, such action of his was, at most, increasing the fear and uncertainty in the minds of these people.
In this way, Minos' allies acted against these fearful opponents, using their advantages to put pressure on these powerful enemies.
"Fight!"
"Use everything you have!
"Ah, kill!"
Shouts of encouragement were coming from the throats of the most proactive among Minos' soldiers and subordinates, those people between levels 63 and 64.
Thus, several spiritual blows were slicing through the space toward the enemies scattered around the area, quickly making all the signs of a battlefield appear in that place.
As the many weaker individuals in the area struggled to hold off their opponents while their leaders worked, Minos' wives acted to help him.
This emperor worked hard only to manipulate the grandiose black hole he had fattened up, so he did not have much strength or energy to fight.
In practice, this meant that he could not use his Devouring Art on the many enemies, nor could he use attacks that relied heavily on his movement.
He was only managing to use the techniques necessary to manipulate the black hole, protect himself and release his Dark Sea.
As such, he could not act much against the opponents who wanted to attack him while manipulating the black hole against the stronger Spiritual Saints.
Thus, Abby, Ruth, and Gloria did their best to avoid headaches for Minos.
Abby had several techniques activated, helping Ruth by using her defensive mirrors, which she constantly used along with cursed chains to surprise opponents.
Thousands of hexagonal mirrors rotating around that area's outskirts gave Abby many attack options. That way, she used one or the other to surprise the most vulnerable opponents.
At the same time, Ruth was using her fists and more powerful techniques to disrupt the level 70 Spiritual Saints, just trying to push them toward Minos' black hole.
As for Gloria, the strongest one there, this woman had her soul avatar activated, fighting against level 71 and 72 Spiritual Saints and making up for Abby and Ruth's lack of strength.
Gloria was powerful, with a soul technique that created an avatar similar to seraphim, allowing her to attack using six wings as if they were special hands.
And with the pressure Minos put on their opponents, she and those two were performing satisfactorily.
"Abe, it's time for you to die, you wretch!" Minos shouted as he swallowed another Spiritual Saint with his black hole.
"Disgrace!"
"That monster!"
"How did he manage to produce something so abominable?" The Spiritual Saints in the surrounding area shouted similar things, feeling the ultimate terror of the black hole.
Their own soul avatars were beginning to distort, given the amount of spiritual energy and free Natural Laws in the surroundings the black hole was devouring.
Minos was manipulating such a thing to steal everything those Spiritual Saints were trying to gather to attack him, so almost nothing was left for these experts.
At the same time, some of them had been sucked into that region of space due to Minos' dangerous movements, swinging those things around like a spinning top.
Due to the action of the black hole, when it gained angular motion, its event horizon distorted in a way that the enemies could not predict its position.
And so, more and more of them were dying to the fusion of Minos' techniques, frightening the others in the surrounding area who were trying their best not to be affected by the enemy.
Meanwhile, Abe was shocked by Minos' abilities, which went far beyond what he imagined he would find in this place.
'Damn it!'
'This is not the way I planned it!' He thought while failing to use his escape device to teleport away from that area.
Minos' black hole had reached such an out-of-the-ordinary level that space was slightly affected, even tens of kilometers away from its event horizon.
That was not enough to affect the living things there. Still, sensitive devices like arrays were not functioning correctly in the surroundings.
And so, Abe, who had thought he could easily escape if his plans went wrong, was now nervously trying to survive, fearing his enemy.
"Now it's your turn, Abe!" Minos shouted as the spinning motion of the black hole brought the event horizon of such a thing closer to that enemy.
...
