In the last instant before his consciousness slipped away, Zhou Xuan felt like a feather hurled into a raging wind.
He lost all control of his body, tumbling out of the torn rift in Return to Void and falling toward the endless void below.
He had exhausted his last ounce of strength to force open the passage just as it was about to close. Now his dantian was utterly empty, and he could not squeeze even a trace of divine power from his meridians.
The Token Master Mark on his arm seared his flesh and divine soul like a red-hot branding iron, while an aura of nothingness spread wildly through his meridians.
His vision spun, then finally dissolved into total darkness.
Just as he was about to lose consciousness completely, several suffocatingly powerful wills surged in from every direction. Like invisible nets, they instantly locked onto his falling body.
One of those wills made no attempt to conceal its greed or icy killing intent.
"How dare a whelp lay his hands on the Immortal Court Relics!"
A shrill, piercing shout tore through the sky.
The Court Guardian Pavilion Master, who had been lurking nearby all along, finally struck!
Her withered hand, as scrawny as a chicken's claw, emerged from her loose sleeve. With her fingers curled and nails pitch-black, she clawed viciously at the heart of the falling Zhou Xuan!
The strike carried no earth-shaking fanfare, yet it tore straight through space, ignoring distance. It seemed poised to pierce Zhou Xuan's chest in the very next instant and pluck out the Supreme One Token from his sea of consciousness, where it had just acknowledged him as its master!
Yet her claw abruptly stopped less than three feet from Zhou Xuan's body.
Bang!
A deep, thunderous crash boomed through the void