You Come, I Go

Back and Forth. Purlulu.

Bubbles clinging to the rocks broke free from the stone walls and drifted upward in the gloom. A pitch-black, bottomless underground cavern came into view, steeped in deathly silence.

The Octopus King's body shape was unimaginably enormous. An ordinary person would be terrified merely facing it, yet the passage it had drilled out was strangely narrow, only a few zhang in diameter.

"It really is an octopus."

Liang Qu halted at the mouth of the cave and did not rashly dive in.

He had "Cannot Move" prepare the Divine Wood Brand, storing its power without releasing it.

Whoosh! White currents wrapped around him.

In an instant, the White Ape suddenly appeared! Having changed his "gateway," he continued inward.

A hundred li away, Old Toad closed his froggy eyes and raised his head high, muttering mystically to himself. Then, at a certain moment, he suddenly yanked Fat Catfish's left long whisker.

The White Ape, exploring deep within, pressed close to the rock wall, hiding in the darkness and doing his utmost to conceal his qi.

The sun slanted westward.

The remnants of sunlight in the cracks around the cave entrance gradually faded. The road ahead and behind were both shrouded in darkness, making one hesitate.

A full quarter-hour passed.

Old Toad tugged the right long whisker.

The White Ape's long fur floated upward.

"What a fierce clash!"

Liang Qu thought to himself.

Old Toad and the Octopus King—one avoided fortune and calamity, the other divined hexagrams and calculated fate; one relied on instinct, the other on skills. They were locked in a back-and-forth battle, evenly matched. Though they had yet to meet face-to-face, blade-light and sword-shadow already filled the air, with dark tides surging beneath.

Moreover...

Liang Qu pondered as he communicated with the Creation Long Qi