Chen Chuan hovered in midair, examining the thing before him. Its appearance was peculiar, markedly different from the beings he had encountered before.
It looked like an enormous face, its body supported by something resembling a nasal bridge. Shimmering crystalline mist drifted around it, but its surface was covered in skin and muscle, with flesh, sinews, bones, and flowing blood beneath. It lacked that elusive, insubstantial quality of shifting fog.
After entering this world, the original spiritual entity must have gradually become more material, until its transformation had become fairly stable.
Where the crystalline mist drifted, cracks flickered in and out of sight in the air, looking like tiny electrical currents.
Its Domain Field was actually trying to force open a Rift, but the ritual within the city restrained it. And the ritual was not merely restraining it; it was continually suppressing its power.
The information the First Visiting Delegation had given him designated this being as the "Wanderer," but the details were obscure. Beyond that name, there was no introduction at all.
He understood the reasoning behind this. Over the long ages, the power of many such beings had seeped into their world, some deliberately and others unconsciously. They had become the earliest objects of worship among ancient humans, and some had even become local gods. Since those images and the beings behind them were effectively one and the same, worship of many old religions and former deities had been prohibited after the New Era began.
It was just like Old Sin: the more people knew, and the more widely that knowledge spread, the more likely his power was to revive. Against the backdrop of comprehensive defense, using this sort of indirect designation was appropriate.
Still, the name "Wanderer" seemed to imply something more.
While he observed his opponent