Wu Yulan and Lan Xiaohui appear inside my Inner World, just a few minutes before the sun completely sets beyond the mountains. It is just in time for them to witness a large number of cultivators disappear into the Pagoda of Infinite Slaughter. The second trial has already begun.
Rushing forward, Lan Xiaohui quickly explains to Wu Yulan how the challenge works — that she has to defeat all enemies to advance to the next floor and try to reach the highest floor she can within fifteen minutes.
She doesn’t tell Wu Yulan not to try too hard, even though she feels this sentiment in her heart. The reason is simple; only one of them needs to achieve the second place in order to be able to enter the Secret Sword Realm Nexus and, hopefully, comprehend the mystery of Empty Moon Prana, and then teach it to the other.
Furthermore, Lan Xiaohui knows that the reason she achieved a poor result last time was not necessarily only because she was not strong enough, but that she misunderstood the pacing of the Pagoda. Very early on, Lan Xiaohui expended a large amount of energy, wasting quite a bit of her fighting potential because she thought that few could match or outdo her.
Lan Xiaohui is a proud sword cultivator. Her experience in the dangerous ancestral lands of the Seven Killing Swords sect, and the few times she battled other cultivators near her cultivation level, had taught her that she is above average. This flaw in her character — this natural pride and arrogance — was, back then, further amplified by the fact that she had never pursued cultivation seriously, or measured her skills against others. In other words, she didn’t have a concept of relative strength, or even a grasp as to where the true limits of swordsmanship lie.
In her mind, when she challenged the Pagoda of Infinite Slaughter, she did not feel like she was wasting her energy on being too overbearing, because she expected that her result would be, at the very least, in the top ten.
The blow she received on that day when she found that she only ranked 134th and that Sun Zhen, the first ranker had achieved almost double the number of floors that she had, crushed every bit of pride and arrogance in her own abilities.
The world is so vast! — this was the sentiment in her heart when she realized the difference in ability, and how much more she had to grow. It exposed to her all the weaknesses of her strategy of challenging the tower, which she, before then, did not even realize were mistakes.
Wu Yulan, who is attempting to challenge the Pagoda for the first time and with a similar outlook as Lan Xiaohui — especially because she cleared all the floors of the Pagoda of Introspection — is bound to repeat the same mistakes as Lan Xiaohui.
For that reason also, Lan Xiaohui does not tell Wu Yulan that she would have to reach at least fifty floors to take second place. The lesson Lan Xiaohui learned that day would no doubt be of great benefit to Wu Yulan as well — especially because Wu Yulan had the [Eternal Moment Swordsmanship] — a method that expends a huge amount of Qi to deliver extremely powerful strikes.
They disappear into the Pagoda, and the challenge begins.
Lan Xiaohui’s domain deploys immediately at low power, to conserve her resources, and the moment the first light appears in the darkness, the Qi Condensation beast — a boar, same as last time — is crushed into a paste by the heaviness the domain exerts.
Even at this low power, Lan Xiaohui’s domain is this powerful.
Since the last time she has been in this Pagoda, Lan Xiaohui had not only further improved her control skills, but she had also stepped into the Core Formation realm, and her grasp on the laws of space has become many times more refined. From her Qi to her control, to the purity of her sword intent — all of these things have been refined by several orders.
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This Qi Condensation beast, just being in the presence of a Core Formation cultivator that has their aura released, would’ve been suppressed into immobility. A sword domain unleashed, on top of the aura, is nothing short of brutality.
For Lan Xiaohui, there is no need to even use her sword until she is well into the challenge. Since her domain is directly connected to her breathing method, and the generation of her pure sword intent, it does not use much energy until she is capable of directly using the domain in combat — something that is not possible with a single glimpse of the Sword Law.
It is not until she reaches the twentieth floor that all beasts that approach her die a brutal death — crushed or cut apart by the weak yet deep warping of natural laws — under her domain, not requiring her to make any sort of move. And after the twentieth floor, it takes only a simple stab or slash, with no energy at all, to dispatch the survivors.
Within two minutes, she reaches floor 30, her previous record, and unlike that time, she is neither exhausted nor unaware of the tactics of the four wolves that appear before her. She also does not underestimate the simple fact that the cultivation of these wolves does not reflect the actual power they possess. Though they share the same third rank moniker as other demonic beasts of the Core Formation realm, their body cultivation is deeper and more terrifying.
Those seemingly ordinary claws that other cultivators might foolishly scoff at, previously, managed to cleanly separate Lan Xiaohui’s head in a single swipe — and Lan Xiaohui’s skin was as soft as silk, yet as tough as iron thanks to her Physique.
It is almost as if they recognize her, and go through the same strategy as they have before.
The leading wolf howls and the sound is so loud that it could inflict injury on the previous Lan Xiaohui. However, this time, Lan Xiaohui does not even react. Her domain pulses once, and that is it.
One of the wolves, just like last time, dashes forward and leaps at Lan Xiaohui from ten steps away. There is a moment of confusion in the black-furred creature's eyes as it suddenly finds Lan Xiaohui standing right in front of it as if she crossed eight steps of distance in the blink of an eye.
Then my vessel is thrust forward, into the maw full of sharp fangs, and penetrates flesh and bones until it emerges through the back of the wolf’s head.
The wolf never even manages to make a sound. Just like that, this proud creature at the apex of Foundation Establishment is exterminated by a simple sword thrust and a movement technique.
Another wolf had also lunged at the same time as the first wolf, and this is the same simultaneous attack that brought Lan Xiaohui low last time.
Yet, this time, Lan Xiaohui turns her body and slashes my vessel at the wolf who experiences the same surprise and shock as the first wolf, and for a good reason.
How did Lan Xiaohui perform the many actions necessary to free her sword, turn her body, lift her sword, and then slash, so quickly? To the wolf, it did not make sense — it was simply impossible.
But to Lan Xiaohui, who uses Liminality Steps to compress, unfold, and warp space, those many actions are simply one, smooth motion — a straight line.
Even I do not understand if this is Lan Xiaohui using some form of higher dimension to move unobstructed, or if she is collapsing the many directions and dimensions of space into just one — a straight line. Previously, I thought that Lan Xiaohui was disconnected from cause and effect, but now I realize that this is not the case — this is certainly a warping and manipulation of space in subtle, yet extreme ways.
Lan Xiaohui’s understanding of liminality is deep — much deeper than I expected. In my estimation, the concept of liminality was the boundless potential of configurations between two points of certainty, but to Lan Xiaohui, it is this: a simple, straight line. An axiom shrouded in possibility, like a singularity hiding beneath an event horizon.
The until recently impaled wolf remains hovering in the air as if the force supporting its body had not vanished yet, while the second wolf tastes, first-hand, what true sharpness is. Its claws may be sharp enough to cut Lan Xiaohui to pieces, but my vessel — which also received an improvement since last time — is many, many times sharper.
She doesn’t use her sword energy or Qi to deliver this strike. Only a simple slash. Yet, the wolf is cleanly cut into two halves under the merciless edge of my vessel, and Lan Xiaohui feels neither pride nor satisfaction at this feat.
Third rank beasts are not qualified to die at her blade — this is merely a necessity of the situation.