Although the interior passage wound and twisted, there were no forks, and the lingering psychic trail pointed the way, so Chen Chuan and Hu Kan reached the rear section in little time.
Upon arriving here, both slowed their steps.
Chen Chuan remembered that Danliu School had the preserved, mutated bodies of its predecessors, and even Langtao Arena had once been garrisoned by an ancestor.
Anyao Arena's heritage and foundations exceeded those of the other two schools; it was quite possible such an entity existed here as well.
Yet even if there was one, they merely needed to exercise caution. It was merely the mutated body of a martial artist, after all. Even if it were truly alive, he would dare take it on, to say nothing of one that already had one foot in the grave.
As they reached this point, a thick wall indeed appeared ahead, sealing the passage's exit tightly.
Hu Kan looked it over, turning his head. "Brother, what do you say? How about your big brother goes up and hammers it open?"
Chen Chuan fixed his gaze forward as his field and mental power rippled outward. After a moment, the living organism began to tremble. A short while later, slivers of light seeped through the thick wall. The fleshy barrier squirmed toward both sides, slowly tearing open a seam that grew steadily wider.
Hu Kan glanced at the piercing light and muttered, "Looks like this leads to the other world, not a Confluence. Seems they've got some real wealth tucked away."
Chen Chuan gave a low hum of agreement.
A fissure directly leading to the other world required some entity on the opposite side to maintain mental communication with one's own people. It needed either an aberrant creature like the one blocking the seam just now, or the shell and lingering spirit left by a predecessor on the other side to act as an anchor.
In truth, before the Ring of the World appeared, none of this had been necessary; the various schools could even choose whether to cross into a fissure or a Confluence simply by varying the strength and continuity of their mental power.
It could be likened to a deep well where the owner could freely choose how far to descend. However, the Ring of the World had pressed down the once-high water level. If the well's owner found no way to hold it up, the only place left to go was a Confluence.
Yet doing so came at a cost. Now, every crossing to the other side depleted the residual mental power resting in the predecessors' remaining shells due to the need for psychic bridge-building. Even if it did not drain the shells, the burden fell upon whoever maintained the fissure.
The predecessor at Danliu School had likely lasted so long precisely because their technique had been lost for a great while, sparing them from opening the passage frequently over long periods. The elder at Langtao Arena had already vanished entirely—a sign that the threshold of endurance had been surpassed.
Anyao Arena appeared capable of holding out for now, but this too relied on ancestral legacy. Exhausting it was merely a matter of time.
Seeing that the fissure had widened sufficiently, Chen Chuan said, "Mr. Hu, let's go."
Hu Kan grunted in acknowledgment. As he stepped through the opening, he casually tapped the thick fleshy wall with his war hammer. "Wouldn't it have been better if you'd been this sensible earlier?"
Neither of them feared having their retreat cut off. They would immediately sense any disturbance behind them; however they came out was how they could go back. Furthermore, with Xiaoyuezhai having fled here, no martial artists remained on the island. Great Shun would only need to dispatch a small detachment to get a clear picture of the situation, after which taking control of the entire island would be trivial.
Once they stepped outside, the light abruptly brightened. Far off in the distance, Chen Chuan could see a massive, curving earthen wall like a levee, shielding them from most of the radiance shining from the opposite side.
Seated before the earthen wall were colossal figures, a scene somewhat resembling what he had witnessed at Langtao Arena.
The difference was that Anyao Arena clearly possessed substantial wealth. Every ancestral husk was draped in a uniform embroidered cloth robe inscribed with scriptures, and niches perfectly sized to accommodate their frames had been carved out of the earthen rampart.
Walking forward about a hundred paces, the two arrived beneath these seated statues, each towering twenty to thirty meters high. By comparison, both men seemed utterly minuscule.
Hu Kan raised his head, his wary gaze sweeping back and forth across the seated husks. If Xiaoyuezhai had come here, he was likely possessing one of them.
At that moment, one of the husks appeared to tremble. Large sheets of dust cascaded from its frame, followed by a creaking and groaning sound, like rusted joints being wrenched into motion. Then, the massive figure slowly rose to its feet.
Hu Kan hurriedly retreated several paces, spreading his twin war hammers at his sides in a combat stance, though his booming voice did not miss the chance to mock: "Whoa, Anyao Arena's ancestors sure treat their descendants nice—scooping out the gourd and leaving behind the shell!"
Chen Chuan remained where he stood, his calm gaze fixed ahead. After rising, the colossal frame did not attack immediately. Clouds of vapor billowed around it, and its stature was actually shrinking downward.
Such a move was likely because the Spiritual Fire of his Divine Visage was insufficient to sustain so immense a frame, and an oversized body lacked agility, requiring him to compress it to a size suited for combat.
This was a battle, not a sparring match. Chen Chuan had no intention of allowing the opponent to complete the process. Leaping forward, he drove his elbow straight ahead, slamming into its abdomen with a thunderous crash. Struck by the blow, the hulking figure lost its balance and stumbled back two paces, crashing violently against the earthen wall behind it with a dull boom. Instantly, huge chunks of dirt and a waterfall of dust rained down from above.
Upon landing the strike, Chen Chuan immediately sensed something was amiss. While the husk felt remarkably tough, there was no power of Spiritual Fire guarding its interior.
His eyes flashed. The truly possessed husk was not this one; the entity before him was merely meant to divert their attention.
Sure enough, the very moment he struck, a figure materialized behind the two of them, slashing a blade straight toward Hu Kan's neck.
Xiaoyuezhai had used this trick precisely to buy such an opportunity. Facing both of them at once offered no hope of victory, so he had to eliminate one first.
Confronting the blade slicing toward his throat, Hu Kan appeared motionless, as though unable to react in time. Yet just as the edge grazed his neck, he suddenly leaned forward, evading the sharp edge. He then twisted his waist toward the origin of the blade, swinging his entire upper body along with the twin war hammers in his grip.
The twin hammers swung in wide, overlapping arcs. The first hammer smashed directly into the blade the enemy raised just in time to parry, bursting with sparks and blazing light that knocked the weapon aside in an instant. With nothing left to block it, the second hammer slammed violently into the figure's chest with a resounding bang. Spiritual Fire exploded outward in all directions, sending the figure flying.
Hu Kan let out an enraged roar: "I was waiting for you!"
He was by no means devoid of combat intellect. Previously, unfamiliarity with the man's fighting style had cost him an early disadvantage, but he would never fall for the same trick twice.
Chen Chuan dropped back to the ground and glanced behind him. He saw the hammered figure fly straight back over a hundred meters before smashing into the earthen wall off to the side, kicking up billows of dust. Yet he could tell that although the strike had landed, the spiritual power within that body had withdrawn in time, preventing it from being completely scattered. The damage was likely not severe.
Of course, this was also because Hu Kan had not exerted his full strength just now. That strategy was sound: since there were two of them, keeping themselves safe and steady before fully grasping the situation was paramount. As long as they showed no flaws, victory would remain on their side.
Presently, a figure emerged anew from the dust. Standing roughly two meters tall, his facial features and silhouette bore a seventy to eighty percent resemblance to the original Xiaoyuezhai. Not only that, even the blade he held closely mirrored his previous weapon.
Evidently, this husk shared some bloodline connection with the original host; only through such ties could the body's original power be brought out more effectively.
Xiaoyuezhai looked toward the two, raising his weapon. With a flick of the saber, ripples of blade silhouettes stirred, each seeming to cast a shadow upon the ground before coming to rest at his side. Yet those shadows continued to sway all around, as though countless invisible blades filled the air.
From behind, Hu Kan remarked, "Huh? If my eyes aren't deceiving me, is that Anyao Arena's Layered Shadow Saber? I never heard of this old rascal knowing it before. Most likely, the husk he possessed knew it, and now he's mastered it too. Damn, if I'd learned a trick like that back when I was training, I'd have been floating on cloud nine!"
Chen Chuan studied it for several moments. If Xiaoyuezhai had truly not known this saber art before, that was indeed a plausible explanation, though it demanded an exceptionally high degree of harmony between spirit and vessel—a stringent condition.
However, these were purely matters of technique. When speed and strength were roughly equal, techniques were remarkably useful; but when a gap in raw power existed, any move lacking extreme specialization was little more than an ornament.
Having observed enough, Chen Chuan waited no longer. Pushing off his toes, his figure shot forward like an arrow.
Seeing his advance, Xiaoyuezhai exerted force with both hands from over a hundred meters away, executing an upward slash. Layers of blade shadows swept rapidly across the ground, surging toward Chen Chuan's path of advance.
Chen Chuan had not intended to take the attack head-on, but he realized these blade shadows were accompanied by a form of mental assault. As long as he remained within the opponent's line of sight, evading them was nearly impossible. Thus, he abandoned evasion altogether, stirring the Spiritual Fire across his body while maintaining his charge.
When the blade shadows slammed into him, they shattered layer upon layer, merely jolting his Spiritual Fire into heavy ripples.
Xiaoyuezhai had not expected this strike to stop Chen Chuan; he aimed only to stall and blunt his momentum, buying himself a sliver of time.
His whitish pupils locked onto Chen Chuan's approaching figure. Seeing the young man close the distance, he suddenly raised the saber high with both hands, holding it vertically above his head. A bizarre sound escaped his lips, and in that instant, a burst of brilliant light erupted from the blade.
The moment this radiant light flared, the giant husks seated along the earthen wall trembled simultaneously, as if in resonance. Broad swathes of brilliant light poured down from above, turning the entire area into a boundless sea of white where nothing could be seen.
Chapter 813