Ruin Trial of Sixfold Combat Power

Ruin Old Demon glanced at Yun Jingheng. There was no emotion in those pupils, like two deep wells sealed with ashes.

He turned around, tapped the crutch in his hand on the rock surface, and walked out towards the gravel road on the north side of the round platform.

"Let's go." He said without looking back, "The process is over, it's time to take the right path."

When Yun Jingheng followed, he heard the sound of soft footsteps coming from behind.

He knew who it was without turning around. The soles of his boots knocked on the rocky surface in a light and dense rhythm. It was Xie Xie.

The one with a heavier step and more even spacing than Xie Xie is Tang Wulin.

Behind them are two pairs of lighter footsteps, Xu Xiaoyan and Yuan En, and Ye Xinglan and Gu Yue that are almost inaudible.

All six people followed.

Ruin Old Demon walked in the front, tapping his cane on the ground, click, click, click, with a constant rhythm, which was completely inconsistent with the beating frequency of the purple-black embers in Yun Jingheng's heart. But strangely, his pace actually made Yun Jingheng's breathing slowly stabilize.

The gravel road extends downward, bypassing three huge rocks. The terrain suddenly sinks, and the rocks under the feet are gradually replaced by dark soil.

The composition of the air is changing, and the salty smell is taken away, replaced by a thicker and more humid smell, like the humus accumulated at the bottom of a deep forest that has been accumulated for thousands of years is being turned over, mixed with the aftertaste left by burning certain minerals.

After walking for about a cup of tea, the gravel road came to an end.

Devil's Valley unfolded in front of them.

The valley is not big, about a hundred feet square, and is surrounded by rugged black rock walls to form an almost complete ring. The rock walls are covered with dark brown and almost black roots. The roots are as thick as an adult's arm and as thin as a hair, with a very faint golden fluorescence glowing at the tip.

In the center of the valley stands a huge piece of purple-black ore, nearly two people tall, with its bottom embedded in the ground and its surface covered with dark red crack lines. Those lines are slowly squirming, contracting, and expanding like living creatures, with a rhythm like the breathing of a sleeping giant beast.

The entire ore exudes a purple-black mist visible to the naked eye, which is as thick as the smoke rising from heated ink. It is peeled off from the surface of the ore one by one, and is blocked by a faint light film about three feet away from the ore.

That layer of light film continued to gush out from under the ground around the valley, wrapping the entire fragment, like a thin eggshell wrapping a poisonous core.

Inside the eggshell, in the three-foot-square space, the air was dyed translucent and dark by purple-black mist. The soil on the ground was dark purple and barren of grass. The edges of the stones all showed a corroded, rounded shape, as if something had been held in the mouth and worn for many years.

There is no living thing within a radius of three feet.

Yun Jingheng stood at the entrance of the valley, his eyes falling on the purple-black ore.

Every time the cracked lines on its surface squirm, the purple-black embers wrapped around his Dantian will also beat, and the frequency is completely synchronized.

Ruin Old Demon stopped at the entrance of the valley, turned around, and faced Yun Jingheng.

"This is the rightful owner."

Yun Jingheng didn't answer, but he didn't move his eyes away from the fragments.

"The extraterrestrial debris that fell into the center of Devil Island thousands of years ago is part of the origin of Destruction."

"The Destruction breath that escapes can tear Soul Master's physical body and corrode the soul."

"Ordinary Soul Master will be within three feet, the soul will be stinging, Soul Power will collapse, and if you are unlucky, the body will be melted on the spot."

Ruin Old Demon's voice was very calm, as if he was reciting an explanatory text that he knew by heart, "The fact that you can stand here without falling down means that the Life Origin in your body has blocked the first layer for you, and the embers in your Dantian have given you adaptability. But the body of this fragment is hundreds of times larger than the one you just touched."

Xu Xiaoyan stood behind Yun Jingheng. Her voice was very soft, but everyone heard her when she spoke, "... What are those lights over there?"

Ruin Old Demon's gaze turned towards the golden light films emerging from the ground for a moment.

"Life energy and this piece of Destruction Fragment have been balancing each other for more than a thousand years."

"It is also your only support. Without those life energies, you would have already started to melt while standing at the mouth of the valley, let alone getting close to the fragments."

Tang Wulin took a step forward and stood beside Yun Jingheng.

He looked at the dark purple area in the center of the valley, his Adam's apple rolled, and then he spoke in a low voice, "How long do you want to stay in there?"

"One month."

Ruin Old Demon answered for Yun Jingheng, "Thirty days are counted from the moment he steps into the three-foot boundary. By the time the sun sets on the thirtieth day, if he is still standing inside, conscious, physically intact, and able to walk out on his own, it will be considered passed."

"What did he do this month?" Gu Yue's voice came from behind. His tone was very calm, but there was something tight at the end.

Ruin Old Demon turned his head and glanced in her direction, then turned back.

"Three things: survival, cultivation, and actual combat. They must be done at the same time. He can only move within the three-foot boundary. If he goes out, he will escape the assessment and be directly sentenced to failure."

He paused and tapped the ground with his crutch.

The dark red bead on the head of the staff flashed, and the air around the purple-black ore in the center of the valley suddenly rippled, like the ripples of an expansion kit after a stone hits the water surface.

Where the ripples passed, three vague humanoid outlines condensed out of the purple-black mist. They had no facial features or faces. The entire body was composed of the power of dark red Destruction. The edges of the limbs and torso were constantly flowing, melting, and reorganizing.

"These three shadows are condensed from the power of Destruction. They will continue to attack you and force you to fight."

"While you are fighting, you must maintain the balance of the two sources in your body. You cannot let the battle distract you and cause the power of Destruction to go out of control. They are here, and you are here. Both are indispensable."

Yun Jingheng looked at the three dark red humanoid outlines moving slowly in the mist and turned towards him.

They have no eyes, but the feeling of being "watched" is like a thin needle pricking the back of his neck, precise, persistent, and unrelenting.

"... just one more question."

He spoke, his eyes still falling on the three shadows, "How can I deal with them in there? I must have some skills to work, right?"

Ruin Old Demon's mouth moved.

"While the Destruction power of the fragments is poured into your body, you can run any technique in that continuous tearing and repairing cycle."

"But the core practice you need to do is to actively draw the life energy in the valley and fuse it with the power of Destruction in your body, so that the two can form a dynamic coexistence structure in your meridians."

"If you can't build this structure, you will always be beaten passively in a month's time."

He paused for a moment and then added, "Once it's set up, you can fight standing up."

Yun Jingheng was silent for a few moments, then withdrew his gaze from the center of the valley, turned around, and faced the six people following him.

Tang Wulin stood at the front, the usual curve at the corner of his mouth disappeared, and his lips pursed into a straight line.

Xie Xie was behind him, with one hand in his pocket, but the pocket was so clenched that the fabric was wrinkled.

Xu Xiaoyan stood next to Yuanen Yehui, both of them looked worried.

Ye Xinglan stood beside Gu Yue, holding the seams of his pants tightly with his hands.

Gu Yue stands at the back.

She looked at him and said nothing.

Yun Jingheng looked at her for a moment.

That glance was short, but in that glance he said everything that needed to be said.

Then he turned back, faced the valley, and stepped across the invisible three-foot boundary formed by the life light film.

When he crossed the border, he felt as if his face had passed through a curtain of water.

The warm life energy brushed past his body surface and closed behind him, and what he encountered was the completely opposite, cold and dry breath of Destruction. Like the breath of a giant beast, it hit his entire face the first second he stepped in.

The purple-black embers outside the Dantian suddenly exploded.

Then more came.

A steady stream of purple-black mist rushed toward him from all directions, seeping through his skin, pores, and even the inside of his eyelids.

The meridians all over his body were poured into a large amount of Destruction power at the same moment, and the feeling of "being polished from the inside by sandpaper" became the level of "scraping from the inside by broken glass". Every inch of the inner wall of the meridians was simultaneously undergoing the dual effects of tearing and corrosion.

His knees bent sharply.

He held his knees with both hands, his back arched, and the sweat on his forehead was dyed gray-purple by the purple-black mist as soon as it broke out. It dripped down the bridge of his nose into the dark purple soil at his feet, making a soft "hiss" sound, like a drop of water falling on a red-hot iron plate.

His back molars were clenched so tightly that the blood vessels of the temporalis muscles on both sides bulged under the skin, and the skin at his temples was stretched like a thin layer of paper.

"... fuck."

He squeezed out one word through his teeth.

The voice was hoarse, short, and was stuck in the chest and did not come out.

Then he straightened up.

The legs are shaking.

A new purple-black crack appeared under the skin on the outside of the forearm, extending from the top of the wrist bone to the elbow bend.

But he stood up straight.

Ruin Old Demon's voice came from outside the three-foot boundary. The barriers between the layers of purple-black mist became very thin, but every word was clear. "Now, you carry it yourself."

The three dark red human figures in the center of the valley have moved.

The speed was not fast, but every step dragged out a dark red afterimage in the purple-black mist. Three shadows moved toward him from three different directions at the same time, like three knives closing from different angles.

Yun Jingheng took a deep breath.

Halfway through the breath, the purple-black mist choked him into his trachea. He coughed, and the vibration of the cough was transmitted from his chest to the Destruction embers wrapped around his dantian. The embers jumped suddenly, and a thin black light leaked from the gap in the halo and pierced into the gap between his left ribs.

The pain was so painful that his entire left arm went numb for a moment.

He gritted his teeth to prevent the pain from escaping.

He turned his toes, turned his body half an inch to the side, put his weight on his right leg, and moved his left hand across the body to protect his chest and abdomen. Every meridian in the bone seam was emitting fine, high-frequency stinging pains, like thousands of needles piercing from the inside out at the same time.

But he stabilized the core balance, and Life Origin was continuously drawn up from the spring at the bottom of his feet, and the Destruction power that had been scattered in the Dantian was wrapped up again.

The first shadow has arrived.

It raised its right hand, spread its fingers, and gathered a purple-black light ball the size of a fist in its palm, pushing it toward the center of his chest.

Yun Jingheng did not hide.

He raised his left palm from his chest, palm facing outward, slightly flexing his fingertips, and pressed a ray of life energy that had just been drawn up from the sole of his foot to the outermost layer of his palm, and forcefully caught the front of the ball of light.

When the two forces collided between his palms, every inch of his left arm from the shoulder joint to the fingertips was vibrating with a "buzzing" resonance. The skin of his palms cracked a very thin gash, and blood beads seeped out and were instantly evaporated by the purple-black mist, revealing the dark purple fascia underneath.

The aftermath of the collision poured back into his body from the palm of his hand along the meridians, like a hammer smashing into the balance structure he had finally built. The halo was shaken away by one layer, and Destruction took advantage of the opportunity to push forward half an inch. There was a dull pain under his left rib as the bones were being scraped from the inside.

"... hold it down..."

He gritted his teeth and recited, "Suppress it first..."

He took back his left palm and clenched it into a fist. At the same time, he took a half step back with his right foot, lowering his center of gravity even lower.

The scattered golden halo at the dantian reunited under his active guidance, building a new barrier on the path of Destruction's power advancing towards the core.

The barrier was thinner than before, but pressed closer, almost touching the outer wall of the core of the dantian, blocking the purple-black airflow that wanted to penetrate half a step away.

He groaned.

There was a faint line of dark blood at the corner of his mouth, but his waist was not bent.

The second shadow had arrived three steps away to his right.

The dark red outline dragged out an almost solidified afterimage in the purple-black mist, like a scimitar slashing across from the side.

It had no entity, but the feeling of pressure it caused when it moved in the air was real. A layer of fine goosebumps appeared on the skin of Yun Jingheng's right rib, spreading from the armpit to the waist, as if something extremely cold had rubbed against that skin.

He didn't have time to completely shift his weight to his left foot.

Just as his right foot took half a step back, the second shadow's attack had already arrived. A purple-black beam of light about two fingers wide shot out from its palm and pierced his right waist and abdomen.

Yun Jingheng twisted his waist.

The beam grazed the edge of his clothing, burning a black mark on the side seam of his coat. The edge of the fabric rolled up, revealing a thin layer of skin underneath.

Purple-black dots appeared on the area where the edge of the beam rubbed the skin, like a small piece of ink that spreads quickly after being dropped on rice paper. It spread from the side of the waist to the upper and lower directions for a finger's width before stopping.

The pain only caught up later.

About half a beat after the beam passed, the scraped skin started to feel hot, then stinging, and then a continuous burning sensation that penetrated from the superficial layer of skin inwards.

Yun Jingheng The muscles on his side of his waist twitched involuntarily. He tilted half an inch to the left, bent his knees and straightened them again. In the process, the burning sensation penetrated from the skin surface into the external oblique muscles. Every muscle fiber was tightening and hardening, like tendons that had been roasted by fire.

The six people and a ghost outside the field just watched three shadows faintly suppressing Yun Jingheng.

I couldn't help but be surprised.

After all, before coming here, Yun Jingheng beat them with just Soul Spirit, making them unable to lift their heads, and now they are being beaten down?

Ruin Old Demon also spoke at the right time, "The intensity of the shadow condensed here is related to the people participating in the trial."

"The stronger the person participating in the trial, the stronger the shadow. The three shadows you see now are each about twice as strong as him."

"Twice? That means Jing Heng is dealing with six times as much of himself at the same time?! Do you have to maintain the balance of the two sources in your body under such circumstances?!" Xie Xie was shocked.

Ruin Old Demon nodded.