Alarm bells rang in Shen Yi's mind.
He hesitated no longer. With a flick of his right hand, an ancient, unadorned longsword appeared in his palm.
The blade was dull and lusterless, like ordinary iron. It was the sword Feng Qingyao had given him.
Shen Yi had never figured out what this sword was for. Feng Qingyao had only said at the time that it might be different for him. Now, faced with this bizarre stone book, he instinctively drew it out.
The instant the longsword appeared.
The massive stone book turned to its first page.
There was no sound, no light, yet the laws of the entire deep void trembled for an instant.
The page was blank.
Yet that blankness was not mere emptiness, but an ultimate "nothingness," like the absolute void left behind after every concept, every existence, and every possibility had been erased.
Just looking at that blank page made Shen Yi feel a faint stirring from both the Shadow Authority and the Flame of Continued Combustion within him.
"Shen Yi..."
Fei Mi's voice carried an almost imperceptible tremor.
"My power is being suppressed."
Wen Ke'er's expression was equally grim. "Mine too."
Shen Yi said nothing, but he could sense an invisible field spreading outward with the massive book at its center.
That field neither attacked nor devoured. It merely denied.
It denied all active power around it, denied every trace of life, denied every fluctuation of laws. Like a realm of absolute silence, any living thing that entered it would gradually be reduced to stillness.
Yet the longsword in his hand gave off a warm sensation at that moment.
It was faint, but undeniably real.
Shen Yi lowered his gaze. On the dull blade, the patterns that had once seemed purely decorative were beginning to glow