117: Dancer in the Void

At the edge of the Void Thunder Abyss, even silence itself seemed to have been drained dry.

There was no wind here.

No sound.

Light was twisted and swallowed by an invisible force, making everything within sight appear dim and oppressive.

The air was filled with a strange scent, like rusting metal mixed with blood.

Every breath sent a needle-like sting through Su Meier’s Divine Soul.

She hid behind a relatively safe boulder, her slender fingers clutching a top-grade recording Magic Treasure.

The cold touch of the Magic Treasure could not calm the trembling in her fingertips.

Her gaze pierced through the distorted dimness, fixed on the figure at the edge of the cliff.

Lin Gou.

He stood there, one more step forward, and he would plunge into a bottomless abyss.

Beneath the abyss, there was no thunder and lightning as the world imagined, only streaks of pitch-black cracks.

They appeared silently, like phantoms in the night, and disappeared just as silently.

Each crack represented a spatial annihilation powerful enough to completely erase a Nascent Soul Cultivator.

Void Divine Thunder.

It was the embodiment of the purest and most merciless Law of destruction in this world.

Su Meier’s heart was in her throat.

She had witnessed Lin Gou’s countless acts of madness.

But this time, his target was the might of heaven.

He was challenging a forbidden zone that even Soul Transformation Grandmasters had to avoid.

This wasn’t courting death.

This was blaspheming the deity who wielded destruction.

Just as Lin Gou was about to take that decisive step.

An old and calm voice, without warning, sounded as if pressed against her ear.

“Feeding one’s body to the Thunder Abyss, seeking the Dao of space.”

“This old man has sat here for a hundred years, and it’s the first time I’ve seen such an interesting madman as you, little friend.”

Su Meier’s body suddenly stiffened.

A chill exploded from her spine, and she spun her head around!

Behind her, at some unknown point, stood an old man in a green Daoist robe, radiating an ethereal aura.

The old man’s hair and beard were white, his face lean, but his eyes were like a bottomless starry sky, seeming to absorb all the mysteries of the world.

He was clearly standing there, yet when Su Meier’s Divine Sense swept over him, there was only emptiness.

Late Nascent Soul Stage!

No, perhaps he had already touched that higher threshold!

Su Meier’s heart instantly sank to the bottom.

Lin Gou, however, merely turned his head calmly, as if he had known of his presence all along.

There was no surprise on his face.

“Senior is here to comprehend the Law of space; Junior is merely taking a shortcut.”

The green-robed old man stroked his long beard, and a hint of surprise finally appeared in his all-seeing eyes.

“A shortcut?”

“Little friend, do you know that this Void Divine Thunder brings instant death, annihilating the Divine Soul, leaving no chance for Reincarnation?”

“Is this also considered a shortcut?”

Lin Gou smiled.

“For Senior, it’s a dead end.”

“For me, it’s a thoroughfare.”

Upon hearing this, the old man first paused, then burst into hearty laughter, a long-lost sense of exhilaration in his voice.

“What a ‘dead end, thoroughfare’!”

“Interesting, truly interesting!”

He re-examined Lin Gou, his curiosity growing even stronger.

“This old man, Ji Xuan, a Loose Cultivator, has been studying the Formation of this Thunder Abyss for over ninety years, yet I have always failed to grasp its essence.”

“Since little friend has such unique insights into the Dao of space, would you mind enlightening this old man?”

He raised a hand and pointed to a seemingly unremarkable area in the abyss.

The space there was more distorted than elsewhere, and the black Divine Thunder appeared more frequently.

“This place is one of the three major spatial nodes of the Thunder Abyss, where forces intertwine and Laws are chaotic. This old man has tried hundreds of Formation deductions, yet I have always been unable to discern its Veins, let alone comprehend it.”

Ji Xuan’s tone carried a hint of testing that even he himself hadn’t noticed.

He wanted to see if this young man, who dared to challenge the Thunder Abyss with his life, truly possessed world-shaking talent or was merely a fool courting death.

Su Meier’s heart once again leaped into her throat.

This was a problem that a Formation Grandmaster had studied for nearly a century.

How long had Lin Gou been exposed to Formations?

Lin Gou’s gaze fell upon that chaotic node.

In his mind, the knowledge from the “General Principles of Formations” surged like a tide, verifying, analyzing, and reconstructing the destructive scene before him.

A moment later, he spoke.

His voice was not loud, but it clearly reached Ji Xuan and Su Meier’s ears.

“Senior is mistaken.”

Ji Xuan raised an eyebrow.

“Oh? Where am I mistaken?”

Lin Gou extended a finger, pointing distantly at the chaotic node.

“Senior’s approach is how to ‘sort out’ this chaos.”

“You wish to tame a raging beast that can destroy heaven and earth into a docile domestic animal.”

“But the essence of this Thunder Abyss is not meant to be sorted out.”

“Its essence is destruction.”

Ji Xuan’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Lin Gou continued.

“Therefore, one should not sort it out, but rather ‘detonate’ it.”

“The reason the spatial power here is chaotic is because there are thirty-six miniature nodes colliding and annihilating each other in a completely irregular manner.”

“If Senior wishes to comprehend it, you only need to find the three most crucial core nodes.”

“Using the power of Formations, simultaneously activate them.”

“Allow the chaos in this area to reach an extreme, instantaneous, Peak.”

“In that instant of annihilation, all Laws return to one, and the Origin of the Law of space will naturally be revealed.”

“Of course, this process may cause the destructive power in this area to instantly increase a hundredfold.”

“If Senior wishes to try, it’s best to keep a good distance.”

These words were not a clap of thunder.

Instead, they directly split open a whole new world in his Dao Heart, which had been stagnant for nearly a century!

Detonate?

Not seeking stability, but rather seeking destruction?

He had never thought of this approach.

Because it was too crazy, too dangerous, completely contrary to the fundamentals of the Dao of Formations!

But when he followed Lin Gou’s line of thought and re-deduced the thirty-six miniature nodes.

His Formation Bottleneck, which had been stagnant for decades, actually let out a cracking sound under the strain at this moment!

Suddenly enlightened!

So that’s how it was.

So, that’s it!

His gaze towards Lin Gou completely changed.

It was no longer looking at an interesting madman.

Instead, it was looking at a fellow Daoist who stood at the same height as himself, and in some aspects, saw even further than himself!

“Born from death...”

Ji Xuan murmured, his eyes bursting with unprecedented brilliance.

“So, this is the true Dao of being born from death!”

He bowed deeply and solemnly to Lin Gou.

“A single conversation with you, little friend, is worth a hundred years of my cultivation.”

“Little friend, please accept this old man’s bow!”

A Late Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, a Formation Grandmaster standing at the pinnacle of the cultivation world, actually paid such a great tribute to a Middle Golden Core Stage Junior.

Su Meier was completely stunned.

Lin Gou accepted the bow calmly.

“Senior is too polite.”

“Our Daos merely lead to the same destination through different paths.”

“One for seeking the Dao, one for seeking death.”

Ji Xuan laughed heartily, the gloom in his heart completely dispelled.

He looked at Lin Gou, finding him more pleasing to the eye the more he looked.

“Little friend, this old man has decided to make you his friend!”

He turned to look at Su Meier, who was still in shock.

“This girl, she’s your Dao Companion, isn’t she?”

“You can go without worry.”

“With this old man here, I will surely protect her until you… return.”

He had originally intended to say “until you perish,” but he forcefully changed his words at the last moment.

Because he suddenly felt that.

This young man might truly be able to walk back from death.

Upon hearing this, Su Meier’s heart warmed, and she gracefully bowed to Ji Xuan.

“Thank you, Elder Ji.”

Lin Gou nodded at Ji Xuan, as a gesture of thanks.

He turned around, once again facing the bottomless Thunder Abyss.

There was no longer any hesitation.

Under the increasingly shocked gazes of Ji Xuan and Su Meier.

Lin Gou let out a hearty laugh.

“Heaven and Earth as the furnace, creation as the craftsman!”

“Today, with my body, I implore the Thunder Abyss to grant me the Dao!”

Before his voice faded.

He leaped.

His entire being, like a falling leaf, drifted into the dark abyss that represented absolute destruction.

There was no sensation of falling.

The moment he entered the Thunder Abyss’s range, Lin Gou’s body lost its weight.

He floated in mid-air.

Around him was endless darkness.

And those streaks of black Divine Thunder, silently tearing through the darkness.

He did not sit idly by.

Just as a Void Divine Thunder was about to touch his body.

His body twisted sharply at an incredible angle.

Narrowly, he avoided the black crack that could erase everything.

Immediately after.

The second one.

The third one.

Hundreds and thousands of Void Divine Thunders, from all directions, from past and future, attacked him without any pattern.

Lin Gou’s figure began to dart and weave within this web of death.

His movements were completely devoid of any earthly trace.

Sometimes like a startled wild goose.

Sometimes like a Dragon entering the sea.

At other times, like a phantom, he slipped through the gap between two Divine Thunders.

That was not an escape.

That was a dance of death, blooming freely on the edge of a blade.

This scene was filled with the most extreme contempt for death.

And also, a kind of intoxicating, frenzied artistic sense.

Above the cliff.

Ji Xuan’s mouth hung wide open, his long beard trembling slightly.

His Dao Heart, which had been as still as an ancient well for centuries, was now churning with monstrous waves.

What did he see?

A Golden Core cultivator, strolling leisurely in the Void Thunder Abyss?

This… this had completely exceeded his scope of understanding.

This was illogical.

This was not cultivation!

Su Meier, beside him, was equally stunned.

She stared blankly at the figure dancing gracefully amidst endless destruction in the recording Magic Treasure.

The fear and worry in her eyes had long vanished.

In its place was an unprecedented, intense pride.

And a crazy possessiveness that even she herself hadn’t noticed.

This madman.

This Genius who treated the might of heaven and earth as nothing.

This monster who transformed death into art.

He was hers.

And could only belong to her!

Deep within the Thunder Abyss.

Lin Gou’s dance continued.

Every evasion was a personal comprehension of the Law of space.

Every brush with death made his Divine Soul even more excited.

He was enjoying it.

Enjoying this feast of death, personally directed for him by heaven and earth.

He could feel that the “Gou Dao Points” within him were burning at an alarming rate.

The reward he had targeted, “Spatial Teleportation,” was resonating wonderfully with the Laws of this world.

Soon.

Just a little bit more.

As if in response to his expectation.

Suddenly.

The entire Thunder Abyss fell silent.

All the black Divine Thunders vanished at this moment.

An indescribable great terror enveloped Lin Gou’s heart.

He looked up.

His entire vision was completely covered by a colossal black crack that defied description.

That was not a single thunderbolt.

That was the ultimate strike, formed by the accumulated destructive power of the entire Thunder Abyss over ten thousand years.

It had locked onto Lin Gou.

There was no escaping it.

Lin Gou abandoned all attempts to dodge.

He slowly spread his arms, a satisfied, brilliant smile on his face.

Facing it head-on.

Boom!!!

There was no sound.

No light.

Lin Gou’s figure, along with the space he occupied, was thoroughly and cleanly erased by that gigantic black crack.

He did not turn to ash.

He did not turn to nothingness.

He simply vanished from this world.

[Targeted Death successful!]

[Detected host annihilated by pure spatial energy, death method perfectly matches specified type.]

[Reward settlement in progress...]

[Congratulations to the host for obtaining: Nascent Soul-level movement Divine Ability “Void Shuttle Art” fragment x1!]

Just as Lin Gou’s consciousness was about to be pulled back by the System.

At the location of his death.

That space that had just been erased.

A nascent power and a destructive power collided with a roar.

That was the most fundamental Law power that the System dissipated during his resurrection.

And that trace of Heaven and Earth Law power he had invoked during his “Targeted Death.”

Two supreme powers, in this already extremely unstable spatial node, triggered a violent, unpredictable chain reaction.

Buzz—

The entire Void Thunder Abyss shook violently.

The stable spatial structure shattered at this moment with a roar.

Centered on the point of Lin Gou’s death, an immense spatial vortex, emitting terrifying suction, began to collapse inward frantically.

Above the cliff.

Ji Xuan’s face suddenly changed drastically.

He cried out in alarm.

“No!”

“Space is going wild!”

“Retreat quickly!”

He grabbed Su Meier’s shoulder, intending to use a Divine Ability to escape.

However.

It was too late.

That terrifyingly extreme suction had already enveloped the area.

Whether it was a Late Nascent Soul Stage Formation Grandmaster or a Late Golden Core Stage Demonic Path temptress.

Before this mighty power, comparable to the collapse of heaven and earth, they both appeared so insignificant.

Ji Xuan and Su Meier’s bodies were uncontrollably pulled, dragged, and swept by the immense suction towards the wildly spinning spatial vortex that led to an unknown place.

And at the center of the vortex.

Lin Gou’s figure was slowly, gradually, re-coalescing.