The following day, surging tides echoed between the sea and sky.
Between Tianshu and the Profound, countless masses of earth, stone, gold, and iron surged upward like torrential rain, defying the heavens as they soared, rushed, and collided, scattering endless sparks in friction.
A magnificent, colossal spectacle enveloped everything. Innumerable streams of spiritus rose and transformed, while gathering stone and illusory light shifted ceaselessly, entangling with one another.
Ascension and fall; purification and contamination; extraction and conflict; integration and dissociation... The essence of alchemy erupted continuously amid the dazzling flashes of countless transmutations.
The rising and falling surges of spiritus stung every eye, making every artisan beneath those vast billows appear like an ant.
It seemed as though thousands of invisible hands were locked in an unending struggle, building and tearing down.
Through this grand transmutation, they wrestled with one another, vying for control of the space while relentlessly suppressing their rival's execution. The scheming, cutthroat strikes had begun the moment the arena began to take shape.
Before Tianlu and Elder Zhen, an entire, fully realized Border Realm manifested out of the void, rising straight from the earth. Within it, lightning and storms shifted incessantly until barren wastes and lush abundance rotated into equilibrium, completing an arena modeled after the mortal realm.
Beneath this open struggle and covert theft lay an untold number of calculations and battles, repeatedly destroyed and dismantled only to be rebuilt anew.
Creating for the sake of destruction; constructing for the sake of annihilation.
Embers and Stagnant Rot tangled and clashed, never reaching any harmony. Instead, they continually erased and neutralized one another, ultimately degenerating into an expanse of utter chaos.
After repeated collapses of material properties and spiritus overloads, it became a battlefield thoroughly insulated from both sides—and equally hostile to both.
"How wonderful it is to see such a sight once more."
Elder Zhen sighed softly with nostalgia, looking at Tianlu before him and Tianshu behind the man. He offered a faint smile. "Over two hundred years ago, I stood right here, standing as an enemy to your master."
"Is that so?"
Tianlu didn't even lift an eyelid. He countered, "Two hundred years, and you haven't made an inch of progress?"
"The Embers are cruel, showing no pity to the mediocre."
Elder Zhen kept his smile, patting his knees like a withered old man on the verge of the grave. "A mediocre fool like me dare not aim too high. I can only take things slowly, planning for the long haul. Fortunately, dripping water pierces stone, and a dull saw fells a tree. Has not a denizen of the Profound like me, a worshiper of sin, earned the right to stand as Lord Tianlu's foe today?"
"Then do you care to test that?"
Tianlu chuckled, asking with genuine curiosity, "Who knows, maybe I really am wounded. Some things never hurt to try."
"Let us forgo that."
Elder Zhen did not budge. "Let us wait a little longer. There is no rush."
He thought for a moment before saying earnestly, "Things should always be done slowly. I have always been slow. After all, I am no match for you."
It was neither an act nor an ounce of hypocrisy.
He truly believed it from the bottom of his heart.
Even if Tianlu were genuinely battered and drawing his final, dying breaths right before his eyes, he would never make a move, nor would he waver in the slightest.
Because the time had not yet come.
So there was no rush.
Just as Scavenger had once told Tianlu: from the day he became an apprentice, he had always been this way.
He never dreamed of reaching the heavens in a single leap, nor did he ever consider himself remarkable. Instead, he viewed himself as utterly ordinary, keeping his feet firmly planted on the ground, advancing step by step, clawing his way upward inch by inch...
In him, one could see none of an artisan's characteristic pride or self-satisfaction, because he truly never believed he was anything special.
It was precisely this that made him so terrifying.
If it served his purpose, he was ready to discard even himself.
His only obsession was the finish line.
Beyond that, nothing else mattered!
"Please begin, Lord Tianlu,"
he reminded him calmly. "Let us not keep everyone waiting too long."
Behind him, dim radiance surged from within the shadow of the Profound. A pale face emerged as an artisan robed in gray stepped out one deliberate pace after another.
Among the artisans outside Tianshu, a middle-aged artisan rose as well, drawing his axe and chisel.
Amid the solemn hush, even the spiritus channel fell dead silent.
All earlier laughter and banter vanished without a trace.
"Won't you have another cup?" Jiang Tongguang raised his wine cup. "To see you off."
"No need. I never could grow fond of it."
The mason-like man shook his head. "I'll have a taste after I get back."
With that, he turned his head for a final glance and smiled faintly.
"Everyone, I shall take the lead."
No one answered. Everyone rose in silence.
They watched him walk step by step toward the Border Realm between the sea and sky, heading into that barren land of chaos. The Border Realm rose, sealing the interior completely from the outside.
There were no lengthy speeches, nor any hollow pleasantries.
Even less was there any need for referees or announcements.
The moment they laid eyes on their opponent, the duel had begun.
Across the barrier of the Border Realm, the onlookers could only glimpse the play of light and shadow within.
The axe and chisel in the mason's hands gave a slight tremor. Fissures split across the earth, tearing straight ahead from beneath his feet to rend open a bottomless abyss of dark void.
Expressionless, the gray-robed artisan of the Profound suddenly swelled and dissolved, transforming into a cloud of grayish-black mist. Yet the mist, too, was carved open by an invisible force.
Torn apart.
Soon, an eerie contour flickered faintly within the mist. Concealing some unknown transmutation, it rapidly mended and reconstituted itself, only to freeze stiff in the very next instant.
It was halted dead in its tracks.
"Exquisite grain, magnificent flow... what a fine piece of material."
The mason sighed softly. The skin of his face slowly peeled away, and blood trickled down his hands, flowing into the axe and chisel he held—or rather, sinking into his Regeneration form.
Like the vast majority of artisans, he had forged his Regeneration form into tools and creations, entrusting his entire being to a pair of tools he treasured more dearly than life itself.
He raised his hands, aiming from afar at the frozen gray mist.
Instantly, the faint silhouette of a chisel manifested in the void, pressing tight against the incorporeal gray mist. Right after, an axe took shape and swung down with crushing force!
*Boom!!!*
Amid a deafening roar, an Encircled Realm flashed and vanished.
—【Cleave】!
It possessed no persistent territory, no lasting form, and lacked even substance or duration. It simply assembled naturally in that split second of manifestation, then dissolved just as naturally.
His Encircled Realm existed solely within the 'process'—or rather, it was the 'process' itself!
Entrusting his entire body and soul, staking even his own life, every facet of the Encircled Realm was meant only for this instantaneous change.
In that single moment, axe and chisel struck home, chopping down with inevitable certainty!
And so, all things broke at the strike!
A straight fracture split across the gray mist, shattering it entirely from top to bottom. Within the cleaved mist, a disintegrating body finally emerged, exposed beneath the celestial light.
The Profound artisan froze in stunned surprise for an instant, then let out a sigh of realization. Just like that, he toppled backward toward the sky.
His entire body had been severed cleanly into two halves.
Under the intervention of 【Cleave】, just as the character literally implied, he had been split down the middle, his innards hollowed out completely.
Nothing remained but an empty husk.
The exhausted mason raised his head and smiled soundlessly.
The victor was decided.
Then, the smile froze on his face. The axe and chisel in his hands let out a mournful wail as cracks spiderwebbed across them. Right down the center of his face, a crimson fracture surfaced...
Creeping downward, inch by inch.
It was as if he had been cleaved apart by his very own Encircled Realm!
He was split into two.
In the Profound artisan's eye socket, a glass-like orb covered in cracks shattered and faded silently away.
In the dead silence, not a breath of life lingered on either side.
Now, the outcome was truly decided.
"...Mutual destruction, then."
Jiang Tongguang paused for a moment, lifted the wine cup beside him, and poured it out into the dust beneath his feet.
Tianlu remained calm; Elder Zhen remained indifferent.
Both had long anticipated this.
In past clashes between the Embers and the Profound, the first match, the second... even the entire first day, almost all ended in mutual destruction. It was like a curse: even a master could suffer an upset against an apprentice, and even an experienced veteran artisan could have their soul scattered by a lethal counter-tactic.
Both sides maintained a heavy silence, not uttering a word as they sent people in to collect the remains of the dead.
"Next," Tianlu said.
And then, the second match began.
A noblewoman with hair writhing like serpents walked toward the Border Realm to face a young man from the Profound.
For an artisan, physical appearance was the least essential thing. The form of one's flesh was purely a matter of habit and preference—or even an intentional deception to mislead enemies...
In a showdown between the Embers and the Profound where both sides fielded their elite, those who looked old might truly possess real skill, but every single one of those who looked young was an absolute monster without exception!
Before they had even properly met, the moment they stepped into the Border Realm, both sides unleashed ruthless killing moves.
The flesh on the noblewoman's face sloughed away, exposing the pale bone of her skull.
Beneath her feet, a forest of corpses and bones rose from the ground, tangling together into towering buildings. Gold and jewels wrapped around dry white bones as they danced frantically and chanted verses.
Yet opposite her, brilliant light blazed as a halo resembling that of a deity manifested above the Profound artisan's head. Beneath the dazzling brilliance, all things were coated in a layer of resplendent gold.
It was almost impossible to tell which side was righteous and which was evil.
Yet that no longer mattered.
After a few brief opening probes, both sides went all out. Separated by the Border Realm, Ji Jue could not see clearly and could only deduce the shifting situation through the fleeting glimpses of light and shadow.
Yet the battle turned far too quickly. Both sides were bent entirely on trading life for life. Once they felt out the basics, they unleashed their ultimate techniques from start to finish, leaving the onlookers without even a second to blink.
In less than half a minute, bones evaporated, and the halo shattered.
As the fading light poured out, the magnificent, blazing radiance incinerated the noblewoman to ashes. At the same moment, the shrill chime of a bell rang out. From behind the shadows trailing the blazing light, a blurred silhouette slowly rose, grasping a scythe, and swept it across in a fluid motion!
The sounds of shattering souls overlapped.
No victor; mutual destruction once more.
"Next."
Tianlu was indifferent as he waved his hand again.
And so, another person stood from the crowd and walked toward the Border Realm.
Turmoil erupted anew.
This time, it was a sea of pale clouds against mountains shifting and rising like knife blades—a brutal war of attrition between Entropy and the Barren Ruins. The rapidly swelling mountain ranges were continually annihilated within the clouds of permafrost.
Yet in the end, a shred of foundation survived.
With the dissipation of the last trace of mist, a staggering figure stumbled out, nearly torn to pieces. Across his stony face spread a grin of ecstasy.
Wild ecstasy!
"I won! Hahaha, I'm the one who won!"
The Profound artisan staggered forward, lifting his head to look at Elder Zhen.
Elder Zhen gave a slight nod.
Amid an earth-shattering roar, the Pillar of Perdition suddenly shot up a notch. The effect of the Mutual Transmutation of Virtue and Vice had already manifested.
Just like that, he walked out of the Border Realm step by step, bathed in sunlight. The smile remained frozen forever on that stiff face.
Thoroughly petrified.
He was dead.
Perhaps he had died long before, holding on purely by sheer will so as not to collapse inside the arena.
He had outlasted his opponent.
Even if only by a single hair.
"I'll take the next match,"
Despina, cradling her dachshund, suddenly spoke up. Jiang Tongguang paused slightly, shaking his head. "It's not your turn yet..."
"Isn't it the tradition of the Ember-Profound clashes for juniors like me to clear the path for the older generation, leveraging small stakes to probe the other side's cards?"
Despina smiled mischievously. "I'm not old enough to sit back and reap the rewards."
Jiang Tongguang fell silent for a moment and sighed softly. Just as he was about to speak, a hand pressed down on Despina's shoulder. It was Aignu.
"Let me. Leave it to me."
Aignu's expression was grave. "Please leave it to me."
Despina tried to speak, but Aignu had already risen decisively, walking straight into the Border Realm without the slightest hesitation.
In the silence, Despina made no further sound.
Only the dachshund in her arms whimpered in a low rumble.
No roar could be heard, but the entire Border Realm was instantly dyed blood-red. Amid the boundless blood that gushed like a waterfall, a skeleton shot into the sky like a colossal tree.
Flesh and skin grafted onto it, and eyes opened all over the body, shooting forth beams of light.
It was the signature creation of the Hundred-Eyed Giant Workshop. Around the perimeter of that Hundred-Eyed Giant, threads seemed to hang, rising up toward the sky.
Regeneration Form: Living Suspension Thread!
What answered him was a rain of falling stars.
At the summons of the Masterwork, the Star-Echo Platform, meteors plunged from the sky like a tempest. Wild surges swept through the Border Realm, rising and falling as scorching, incinerating gales swept across the land.
The earth's gravity abruptly surged, dragging down the giant's massive form and binding it to the soil as subterranean flames surged forth, leaping from the ground.
Amid the storm of falling stars and thunderous fire, the bound giant was swiftly battered into bloody mush, blown apart with blood spraying everywhere.
Immediately after, under the gaze of a single eye, countless stars turned to nothingness. Flesh reconstituted over the charred body, and within the gestation of 【Encircled Realm: Vesicle】, the Hundred-Eyed Giant regenerated in an instant, evolving even further.
The cracked earth spouted blood, and tentacles reached out from the fissures, coiling around the towering Star-Echo Platform like living things.
Guided by the suspension threads, Aignu raised a hand, gouged an eyeball from his own body, and crushed it instantly. From the shattered flesh, a grotesque greatsword manifested out of thin air.
Even more chillingly, the hideous aura of Stagnant Rot emanated from within it.
The most terrifying aspect of the Hundred-Eyed Giant lay in its ability to evolve and adapt. Even if completely destroyed once, it would rapidly recover.
It would even engrave the very wounds that had once grievously hurt it as eyeballs upon its regenerated body, building resistance from that point on.
The more eyeballs the giant bore, the more times it had evolved, and the more terrifying the stored damage became.
When necessary, it could even reproduce that very same damage...
Now, with a single strike of the greatsword—wielding the very wound left by the Profound in the past—it cleaved the Star-Echo Platform cleanly in half!
The Star-Echo Platform detonated with a deafening crash like an erupting sun, incinerating the giant to ash. Yet within the ashes, flesh reconvened, and the living suspension threads reconnected once more.
Right after, the fire rekindled. Within the surging flames, a pair of murky eyes opened—it was the Profound artisan, who had merged his Encircled Realm and soul entirely into the flames!
Once again, the flames expanded wildly, burning and bursting eyeball after eyeball, no matter how Aignu tried to counter them.
The giant wailed, burned to ash, only to revive and assemble once more, before being slowly and brutally incinerated all over again.
Through repeated cycles of destruction and rebirth, even the earth melted. Amid the thoroughly evaporated blood, a suspension thread bearing residual flames reconnected.
A skinless body slowly crawled out from the molten rock.
It raised its head, looking toward the sky.
*Boom!!!*
Behind Elder Zhen, the Pillar of Perdition trembled violently. The height it had just gained plummeted rapidly, ending up three-tenths shorter than its original state!
Witnessed by Supreme Virtue and Great Sin, judged by Embers and Stagnant Rot.
The victor was decided!
Within the opening Border Realm, Aignu spat out a mouthful of blood and phlegm. Leaning on his own stripped thighbone as a crutch, he hobbled back to Tianshu.
He sat down once more.
Across the charred face that exposed bare bone, the flesh twitched, as though offering them a faint smile.
"Mission accomplished."
From Despina's arms, the dachshund reached out and licked his wounds. Flesh began to regenerate rapidly.
Unfortunately, as though detonating, the regenerated flesh suddenly burst apart and caught fire anew, billowing with thick smoke.
A stray spark flicked into the seawater, where it seemed to take root and sprout, gradually spreading.
Flames like a curse, clinging relentlessly!
"Just a minor injury, don't worry about it. Once it finishes burning, it'll go out on its own."
Aignu vomited up two chunks of internal organs that still bore flames and waved his hand weakly. But then he saw Ji Jue step forward, placing a hand against his body.
Ji Jue felt the wisps of savage flame tangled within the viscera, flesh, and even the soul, still slowly burning away at everything he had.
"It really is troublesome, but nothing too difficult,"
Ji Jue said. "Leave it to me."
Decisively, he drew Mercy and stabbed it straight into Aignu's heart. Then Zhanlu rang out, and purple lightning and black flame erupted from Ji Jue's hand, swallowing Aignu whole. It looked as though he had been set ablaze, turning into a roaring torch.
Caught completely off guard, everyone stared in dumbfounded shock.
Yet from within the flames came a venomous hiss.
Soon, when Ji Jue pulled his hand back, Aignu—burnt entirely to charcoal—twitched. His flesh regenerated once more, and this time, the clinging curse fire was nowhere to be seen.
It was effortless.
Aignu stared in disbelief, never imagining that Ji Jue possessed such a creation.
The effect was phenomenal, a total cure!
Aside from the fact that he hadn't died at the hands of the Profound only to nearly be cremated alive by Ji Jue's fire, there wasn't a single flaw to speak of.
It was only because it was Aignu; had it been anyone else with a less tenacious life, wouldn't they have been cremated on the spot by Ji Jue?!
"...Thank you."
After expressing his gratitude, he remained silent for a long time. Finally, unable to hold back, he turned his head to look at Ji Jue and offered earnest advice: "You know... you really ought to brush up on your life sciences theory. Continual study brings new insight, after all... I have connections at a hospital. Interested in taking a tour?"
*Brother, where did you learn first aid?*
*The rescue was great—don't ever rescue me again...*
"Next time for sure, next time for sure."
Ji Jue coughed awkwardly, feeling too embarrassed to show off his obstetrics and gynecology license.
In truth, that wasn't the only method. Using corrupted alchemy could have saved him even more easily, but he didn't dare reveal it out in the open. Otherwise, he might have been greeted on the spot by a Great Sin and forced to sit on the other side of the aisle.
Assuming he was still alive by then...
***
"Only the fourth match of the first day?"
High in the sky, Elder Zhen raised an eyebrow slightly. "Sending an artisan like Aignu so early... aren't you acting a bit too rashly?"
"The Association doesn't cultivate talent easily; we can't squander them recklessly like your Profound does, can we?" Tianlu smiled. "This is what's called friendship and bonds. An old fossil like you wouldn't have heard of that, would you?"
"I've heard of it plenty, but I never expected to see it applied to artisans one day." Elder Zhen sighed with emotion. "The Association truly possesses some remarkable flair when it comes to such heretical notions."
"How many years of accumulation, how many years of achievement, hoarding that tiny bit of fortune, only to measure it out in pennies and spend it like dirt... Don't you feel any heartache at all?"
Tianlu asked curiously, "Do those things waving flags and shouting battle cries for you, risking life and limb, know that you don't give a damn about them at all?"
"The victors live, and the losers die. Isn't that fine?"
Elder Zhen remained placid. "A cozy game of house can never nurture fine material. In petty squabbles and entanglements fit for insects, even a genius will be ground to dust.
"Weren't two hundred years of preparation all for this day? Artisans either succeed or fail.
"I gave them the chance. If their skills fall short, dying is on their own heads.
"Only within absolute, impartial cruelty can true power be born. Only after washing away the mediocre can the genuine jade and fine timber truly reveal themselves."
Tianlu chuckled. "Even if the one weeded out is you?"
"And why not?"
Elder Zhen replied resolutely, "Survival of the fittest is the fundamental truth of the Embers, an unalterable law of nature. Why must a creature of Stagnant Rot like me always be the one to teach you this, Lord Tianlu?"
"Well said. In that case, let me witness the powerhouses that your Profound has filtered out through survival of the fittest."
Tianlu smiled, his expression filled with admiration, without a trace of irritation.
He said, "Next."
And so, among the artisans of Tianshu, someone tried to stand, only to find they lacked the strength to push themselves up.
"...Substitute."
Jiang Tongguang paused for a moment and looked toward the young man in the corner, letting out a soft sigh that blended praise and pity.
"This match is yours, Ji Jue."
He relayed the grandmaster's command with solemn gravity. "Win."
Ji Jue slowly rose, gazing into the distance at the opponent walking into the Border Realm step by step. Suddenly, he let out a soft laugh.
"All right."
Chapter 796