Southern Saint Domain, Hanhai City

"Taxue!!"

"Rui'er!!"

Lu Changsheng dropped to his knees at the edge of the Green Lotus Platform, both knees striking the lotus petals with a dull thud. His hands clenched the raised spirit patterns along the platform's rim, his knuckles white from the force, his nails digging deep into his palms. Scarlet beads of blood seeped through his fingers and dripped onto the light-cyan spiritual glow, splashing into faint rings of blood-colored ripples almost too subtle to see.

His eyes turned bloodshot in that instant, the corners nearly splitting as he stared fixedly at the violent black torrent that had swallowed Murong Taxue and Rui'er. The storm was still howling. Countless Spatial Storms were like innumerable sharp blades, slicing madly through the tunnel. That streak of ice-blue light and that pale-green figure had long since been completely swallowed by the darkness; not even the slightest trace of them remained.

Lu Changsheng had never felt pain like this before. From the Eastern Mausoleum Domain to the North Divine Domain, from the Ancient Ruins Forbidden Land to the Domain Artifact Conference, he had brushed past death countless times and suffered wounds beyond counting, but never once had it been like this—powerless.

Murong Taxue had rushed out to save Rui'er, while he could only kneel at the edge of the lotus platform and watch them be swallowed by the storm. The woman who had bandaged his wounds on Proud Snow Peak. The woman who had fought shoulder to shoulder with him at the Domain Artifact Conference. The woman who had said before Qingyang Palace, "Wherever I go, you follow," and then truly traveled thousands upon thousands of miles with him from the North Divine Domain back to the Eastern Mausoleum Domain. He had promised Abbess Fahua that he would take good care of her.