Li Chengfeng looked at Su You, speechless, while Su You grinned apologetically. “Doesn’t matter if you’re not good at arrays, it’s fine. We’ll cross the bridge when we reach it.”
“What if we encounter an array that can transform again? Like the last time? What do we do then?”
Su You went still as wax, his expression as if he had just eaten poop. Grand Senior Brother saved him by saying, “The array involved in today’s challenge is the Illusory Sword Array.”
Su You heaved a sigh of relief. “Grand Senior Brother, what’s that?”
Chengfeng wasn’t sure to laugh or cry. If even Su You didn’t know what that was, they were in deep trouble!
Please, I hope we won’t end up like the last time…
Chengfeng privately grew alert as he turned to Zhao Xiaobao. “Stay close. Let’s not separate. Remember to look out for yourself, don’t rush to rescue me like the last time. I can save myself, you just protect yourself, Xiaobao.”
Zhao Xiaobao was nervous too. He nodded lightly.
Grand Senior Brother turned to Su You. “You’ll know when you see it!”
Su You sulked. “Grand Senior Brother, I know us juniors are mediocre and weak compared to you but you can’t just let us risk our lives every time we train!”
Grand Senior Brother huffed. He walked towards Yanjiang Hall while the rest of them looked at each other, hesitated for a moment, then finally resigned to their fate and followed.
All of them walked into the gigantic Yanjian Hall, their knees weakening upon looking at the vast, dark and mysterious stone hall.
Grand Senior Brother walked towards the door and turned to leave. “To defeat this array, the most important thing is… trust!”
Chengfeng watched as Grand Senior BRother walked out and closed the large door with a boom. They turned and looked around nervously, frightened that a few animated corpses would jump out at them.
Chengfeng was not too afraid of these zombies. Every element had another element to its detriment, for example fire spells could defeat his ability to control plants- in terms of the elements, fire defeated wood. The reanimated zombies from before were made of rock and considered of earth element. Coincidentally, the wood element defeats earth, and his ability was considered a wood attribute.
If they appeared again, he was confident to defeat them all.
At this moment, mechanical clicks and movements rumbled across Yanjian Hall. Everyone looked around, frightened, while Su You yelled, “Everyone, let’s spread out! Grab a spot immediately!”
One’s position within an array was important. While they did not know what array it was, once the mechanisms had been activated and it revealed itself, they would be able to tell which points they should stand in. This was a training arena anyway, the training objective was for cultivators to familiarise with the arrays as fast as possible.
Everyone quickly spread out. No matter what array appeared, they would be able to claim critical points immediately.
However, when they separated, the floor tiles did not move. Instead, with a deafening rumble, walls shot out of the ground, separating them all.
Chengfeng and Xiaobao had been standing less than two metres apart. When the stone walls appeared, they did not move, merely gawking at the walls that quickly rose to connect with the ceiling.
The stone chamber had been divided into three sections. Shrieks of surprise could be heard through the thick stone walls, dull and faint. Su You asked, “Junior Brother Chengfeng! Are you alright?”
Chengfeng was on the other side of the wall, hammering it with his fist as he yelled, “I’m fine!”
Su You yelled, “Junior Brother Chengfeng, do not use force. If this is some sort of complex mechanism, it’ll…”
Chengfeng waited for the rest of the sentence but it never came. He was so angry he pounded on the wall, “HEY! You didn’t finish! What will happen?!”
Xiaobao was staring ahead intently. He tugged at Chengfeng’s sleeve and said, “Young Master, look!”
Chengfeng turned and inhaled sharply. Before them was a cloud of white mist drifting slowly. His mind raced with anxiety. Was it poisonous? Hallucinatory? Or something else?
It shouldn’t be poisonous. If Grand Senior Brother wants to kill us, would he take this much trouble?
This is the ‘Illusory Sword Array’, perhaps the keyword was ‘Illusory’. This mist must be a gas that can induce hallucinations! Before Grand Senior Brother left, he told us the key to defeating the array was trust!
Chengfeng calmed himself down. Although he had never seen this array before, he could analyse it thoroughly.
Once the mist engulfed both of them, Chengfeng and Xiaobao stood back to back, looking around nervously.
The mist was thick. They could not see one metre beyond themselves and dared not move. After about ten minutes, the mist dissipated.
A long, narrow path appeared before them with two green stone walls on both sides. It was pencil straight leading right till an end far ahead.
Zhao Xiaobao looked up, his voice trembling as he said, “Young Master, look!”
Li Chengfeng looked up and leapt in fright. Above their heads were sharp swords floating densely together, looking as if they could fall right at him any time.
Chengfeng’s chest tightened. “Don’t worry. It’s probably just hallucinations, probably can’t kill us.”
“Oh…” Xiaobao calmed down a little and took a step towards Chengfeng while looking up at the blades above.
“When are these swords going to fall?” Xiaobao looked up and stared. He had just asked the question when the blades trembled and started to fall around the pathway near Chengfeng.
“Damn it, you jinxed it! RUN!” roared Chengfeng as he turned to sprint. Xiaobao followed and hurried up to Chengfeng.
Chengfeng was stunned to see that swords were also falling at the end of the tunnel, so densely packed that the ground was completely blocked by swords.
“Young Master, what do we do?!” Zhao Xiaobao’s eyes were filled with alarm, seeing the falling swords approach them from both ends of the tunnel.
Chengfeng’s mind raced as he continued to run towards the centre of the tunnel. “This array is meant to test our mutual trust, it’s not supposed to be a complete death trap! There must be a way to escape! Look around! Look for a clue!”
Only
Zhao Xiaobao regarded his surroundings and pointed. “Look!”
Chengfeng looked in the direction to see a circular hole on the wall at the centre of the tunnel. It was unassuming, yet so striking against the neatly arranged stone bricks.
Chengfeng pounced over to the hole and focused his gaze to see a turn handle within the hole. Reaching inside, he twisted hard and a mechanical rumble followed immediately. Within the pathway in front, all the fallen swords suddenly flew upwards with a huge whoosh and floated midair as before.
Behind them, the swords continued to fall like rain that was quickly approaching them both.
Chengfeng finally understood the meaning of this. Still clutching the knob, he yelled at Xiaobao loudly, “Hurry, there must be another knob in front like this one!”
Zhao Xiaobao clenched his teeth and ran ahead immediately, soon arriving at the end of the tunnel. However, he seemed stunned when he turned to shout out in fear, “Young Master! There’s another path in front!”
Chengfeng’s heart sank and he yelled, “Go check it out then! The knob must be there!”
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