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He shouldn't have forgotten, but the reality was that because of that damned Meishen illusory realm, Xu Yuan truly had forgotten about it. The Meishen illusory realm was a grand dream hailing from twenty thousand years ago, but it had not been romantic in the slightest. On the contrary, for Xu Yuan and Tianyan, it had been a high-pressure living hell. Day and night, he and she had dragged their exhausted bodies, constantly searching for a way to survive tomorrow. A journey pitting oneself against the whole world sounded cool, but when the entire world was submerged in seawater, leaving only an isolated island beneath their feet to stand on, and all the malice of the world was forcibly inflicted upon them by the Meishen cherry tree, fleeing, pursuit, fighting, and injury became their endless, daily routine. Despair, yet driven by the instinct for self-preservation to struggle ceaselessly. From his current perspective, it was a fine memory; but to the two of them trapped in the illusory realm back then, as time dragged on, only numbness remained. In an environment where life could be snuffed out at any moment, Xu Yuan truly had lacked the leisure to remember minor flaws in the Stacked Inscription Secret Art. Only now, upon being reminded, did it suddenly rush back to him. Late that night, under a sky of stars and the moon, she had stood beside him, surrounded by enemy corpses. The starlight fell upon her small face, stained with enemy blood, radiating an enchanting purity. After the battle, both of them were covered in wounds. She was panting for breath. "Xu Yuan, try to use the Stacked Inscription Secret Art as little as possible from now on. After channeling through the thirteen collaterals of the Jinghuai meridian and Guiyuan acupoint, whenever you switch your qi circulation pathways, a momentary stiffness leaves a gap..." Gathering the Sumeru rings from the dead, he hadn't cared: "It's a secret art for saving my life; who has time to worry about so much?" Looking at him, her tone had instantly turned angry: "Can you listen and let someone finish speaking?!" She was suddenly angry. Xu Yuan, however, had already grown used to it. For an impoverished couple, all is sorrow. A proverb coined by tens of thousands of families worn down by financial strain. Xu Yuan and Tianyan were not poor, but the pressure of life and death only bore down on people more harshly. And so, faced with her sudden outburst of anger, he had merely glanced at her: "No technique can be called perfect; having flaws is normal. Doesn't your Heavenly Yan Art have flaws too? As long as it works, that's enough." "I'm just warning you! If an enemy notices this, you're dead!" "How could an enemy notice something like that so easily?" "Didn't I notice it?!" "So, are you my enemy?" "..." Her lovely azure-gold eyes glared at him in a huff. Yet he remained unbothered. The sky twenty thousand years ago was no different from today's. The young woman before him gradually overlapped with the girl in his memories. Unconsciously, Xu Yuan raised a hand to touch the already healed wound on his neck. So the Stacked Inscription Secret Art truly did have a gap. So she truly could become his enemy... Memories always seemed long, while reality remained fleeting. As Tianyan's words fell, the distance between them widened. Like maggots clinging to bone, the Four Symbols phantoms manifested around Xu Yuan once more, their profound ripples crashing down upon him in an instant. Watching everything unfold around him, Xu Yuan made no physical movement, but wisps of enchanting blood-ink began to spread into the surrounding space, blooming into a bizarre stain across the dark navy sky and swallowing the four divine beast phantoms that had manifested around him in the blink of an eye. "Roar—!" Dragon roars, tiger growls, phoenix cries, and tortoise bellows echoed through the clouds, but amidst that surging sea of blood, the Four Symbols phantoms were swiftly corrupted. During this process, their lifelike frameworks gradually dimmed and collapsed, ultimately eroding into nothingness, leaving behind only the blood qi that filled the sky. Using his own bizarre black qi—born of calamity—Xu Yuan forcibly neutralized Tianyan's standard Source Qi, melting away this binding seal technique. Tianyan and he were indeed the enemies who knew each other best in this world, yet they only truly knew who they had been in the illusory realm. Amidst the silence, Xu Yuan's voice was very calm: "An emotionless person has a purpose behind every step she takes. Voicing the flaw in the Stacked Inscription Secret Art was certainly no well-meaning reminder... So, you want to make me afraid to use the Stacked Inscription Secret Art again?" Tianyan's expression did not change as she gave an ambiguous reply: "Perhaps." Xu Yuan shook his head gently and murmured: "People always love to eulogize emotions—love, family, loyalty, and so on. But anyone with a shred of rationality can suppress those feelings, let alone someone like you, who suppresses her emotions with external aids. "I know your murderous intent toward me is genuine. "So if you truly had a way to crack the Stacked Inscription Secret Art, there wouldn't have been only a single Heaven-Severing thread slashing at my neck just now." Having said this, Xu Yuan smiled faintly: "Therefore, the gap in the Stacked Inscription Secret Art is very brief indeed—so brief that even with a surprise attack, you had no certainty of killing me outright. That's why you chose this method to make me hesitate out of caution." Tianyan fell silent for a moment before replying coolly: "A pointless probe. If you believe I cannot kill you, you are welcome to keep using Stacked Inscription..." "No," Xu Yuan interrupted Tianyan, his voice still tinged with a smile. "What I mean is, if you don't want to see the Stacked Inscription Secret Art, you could just tell me directly. After all, you were the one who helped me develop this technique back then." "..." Tianyan. For a moment, she couldn't fathom his intentions. Voluntarily sealing away his own advantage... Tianyan did not understand what Xu Yuan sought to achieve by doing this. Yet while she was still pondering, the youth in blood-red robes high above actually dispelled the Void Flash formula constructed around his body just like that. Xu Yuan's fingertips brushed through the blood qi surrounding him, sending ripples through it and breaking the silence: "I have no ulterior motives. You can consider this action the affectation of someone who still has feelings—" Tianyan cut him off: "I remember that you are not such a person." "I certainly am not, so you could also understand it as the absolute confidence of a superior." "As arrogant as ever." "..." Xu Yuan said no more, merely curling his fingers in a light beckon toward the girl below. Tianyan moved instantly. Accompanied by the bleak, chilly wind of a morning after rain, her petite figure darted like an ethereal spirit, fleet as a white colt flashing past a crevice, revolving seal arts constantly flickering within her azure-gold pupils. Countless Heaven-Severing threads manifested from thin air. Empowered by the Instant True Word, they wove an inescapable net of certain death for Xu Yuan in the span of a single breath! For an ordinary Transcendent, this combination of techniques from Tianyan alone would likely force out their trump card—their Dao domain. Yet watching this unfold, Xu Yuan still stood quietly in place. However, there was no disdain in his eyes as he considered his countermeasure. During a clash between high-ranking cultivators, every choice and every circulation of qi for a technique could become a gambit deciding life or death. Without using Void Flash, his best option right now was undeniably to use the Dao charm of death to evade this lethal damage. It consumed little and had exceptional longevity, allowing him to preserve enough Source Qi to guard against a surprise attack from Luo Wei and Wen Xinyun. However, without unfurling the Life-Death Dao domain, entering the death state would turn the meridians in Xu Yuan's body into nothingness, leaving him entirely passive and unable to use techniques. Tianyan expending such a massive amount of Source Qi to create this colossal Heaven-Severing net was bound to be an attempt to force him into action—perhaps to force him to use the Dao charm of death. Though Xu Yuan intended to hold back, he had no desire to dance to her tune. At least, not for now. Spiritual vision swept outward as Xu Yuan investigated every minute fluctuation in qi dynamics around him. The Instant True Word of the Heavenly Yan Art was difficult to guard against, but it still fell somewhat short compared to Void-Stepping Slash. At the arrival point of the Instant True Word technique, faint fluctuations of Source Qi would appear first. Such fluctuations were exceedingly hard to catch. Yet just as Tianyan understood Xu Yuan, Xu Yuan understood Tianyan equally well. He remembered the ripples of every single technique she cast. For example, right now, Xu Yuan knew clearly that the faint tremor manifesting at his Baihuai acupoint was the herald of her Seal True Word, while the qi dynamic wavelengths appearing in the seventeen collaterals of his Kuzhui and Jiutan acupoints belonged to her Instant True Word. A very familiar playstyle: disrupt the enemy's technique pathways with the Seal True Word, then delete them in an instant with a mage's devastating burst damage. The thoughts flashed through his mind, and Xu Yuan's form began rocketing across the sky. Within the boundless blood qi, six crystals quietly coalesced, revolving continuously around his body. The time for words had vanished in an instant, and the clash of techniques brought forth an earth-shattering clang. *Clang—!* The first Heaven-Severing thread manifested before his eyes, slashing diagonally toward his cheek, only to be blocked by a revolving blood crystal. It left a deep slash mark across the sharp-edged, smooth surface, nearly shattering it. Although Xu Yuan had never fancied himself a genius, the reality was that not only was he one, his talent far exceeded ordinary men. The countless life-or-death crises in the Meishen illusory realm had honed his microscopic control over Source Qi to a level rivaling anyone in this world. And so, when the second Heaven-Severing thread shattered the void and arrived before him, the slash mark upon the blood crystal had already been mended by his circulating qi. Yet having blocked two Heaven-Severing threads in succession, Xu Yuan felt no joy whatsoever, for this was merely the beginning. The third, the fourth, the fifth... Countless Heaven-Severing threads arrived one after another! *Clang! Clang! Clang—!* Resounding clashes of metal rang out continuously. The moment the battle between Xu Yuan and Tianyan truly erupted, nearly all the Sect Alliance higher-ups present—apart from Luo Wei—were stunned to discover that the combat between these two juniors had already exceeded their wildest imagination. Fast. Far too fast. In barely the span of a cup of tea, their battlefield had shifted across a dozen li, fighting from the heavens down to the earth, from seas of forest into jade towers. Countless towering ancient trees toppled, millennium-old monuments collapsed, and the mountain-protecting grand formation atop Heaven Sword Peak was shaken to the brink of collapse by their clash! "Too exaggerated," someone whispered in shock from the spectator seats. "Two Transcendents are actually wreaking destruction on the level of Saints." "That girl's strength truly lives up to the reputation of the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion's Saintess. But don't you think Xu Changtian is still holding back?" "Are you referring to his Life-Death Dao domain?" "No, I'm referring to Sect Master Luo and Mister Wen. With war on the brink of erupting, do you really think this kid dares to go all out against the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion's Saintess without holding anything in reserve?" "..." "That aside, it seems the Sword Sect truly is declining. Paired alongside the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion's Saintess, that First Disciple of the Sword Sect has just been standing by the side the entire time, without even the courage to make a move." "I don't think it's necessarily a lack of courage; perhaps she's simply unwilling." "Is Elder Li referring to that rumor?" "Hasn't the rumor already been proven true? That girl, the Sword Sect's First Disciple, has her feelings written all over her face." A sigh rose from the spectator area over the Sword Sect First Disciple's choice, but everyone's attention was quickly drawn back by a sudden shift on the field. *Hum—* It was a gigantic array formation that appeared abruptly across the heavens. It descended from the crest of the firmament, parting the churning sea of clouds, piercing the blood qi that filled the sky, allowing brilliant sunlight to spill unchecked through the breach and shine upon the white-robed girl at its center. Her sleeves fluttered as Tianyan's azure-gold eyes remained unsullied by the dust of the world, like a celestial maiden descending to earth. "Is this... that Saintess's Dao domain?"