Sheer Force Training!

Hu Liena's piercing screams seemed to travel through time and space, echoing in my ears once again.

The despair in Xie Yue, Yan, Dugu Yan, and Ye Lingling's eyes as they were swept away by the giant wave is etched into my heart like a brand.

Their fate is unknown!

He must live!

We must find them!

"Hold on...!"

Lin Xia bit her tongue hard, the intense pain and strong taste of blood Sheer Force stimulating her nerves, which were on the verge of collapse, and forcefully suppressing that trace of weakness.

His eyes regained a fierce and resolute intensity that bordered on madness.

The excruciating pain persisted, but his will remained as firm as iron.

Now, we need some breathing room.

With difficulty, his thoughts sank into the space between his brows, attempting to communicate with the silent, Vast Sea Cosmic Shroud.

The once-powerful and nimble artifact now gave him a response as if he were looking through a thick, cold frosted glass.

The mental energy felt like it was stuck in a sticky swamp; every push was extremely difficult and brought a stinging pain like being pricked by needles.

"Buzz..."

A faint, weary chirp rang out.

A faint, almost Frisk blue aura, like a candle flickering in the wind, struggled to spread from between his brows, forming a thin, translucent blue shield that seemed ready to shatter at any moment— the Vast Sea Protective Shroud.

The light shield enveloped him, isolating him from the icy seawater that kept crashing against him, and temporarily concealing his aura and figure.

However, looking at this protective shield, Lin Xia's heart sank to the bottom.

It's so gloomy!

It lost its former pure and deep blue luster, like the deep sea, and became gray and hazy, as if covered with a thick layer of dust. The shape of the light shield was also extremely unstable, with the edges flickering and distorting slightly as if there was a poor signal.

What alarmed him even more was the sensation coming from between his eyebrows.

The mark that housed the divine artifact now resembled an overdrawn, nearly dried-up spring, conveying only a profound weakness and a sense of stagnation... as if its spirit had been tarnished.

Clearly, in order to withstand the Demon Whale King's devastating attack, the power of the Vast Sea Cosmic Shroud had been exhausted to the extreme, and it may even have damaged its very essence.

Even you...

A heavy feeling welled up in Lin Xia's heart.

The Vast Sea Cosmic Shroud is his only reliance at this moment; it is Barrier that isolates him from danger, and also a bridge for him to communicate with the ocean and restore his strength.

If it falls silent, the road ahead will be even more treacherous and unpredictable.

But now is not the time to worry about magical artifacts; the most urgent task is to save ourselves!

He forced himself to regain his composure and concentrate all his will on the world of meridians within his body, which resembled an apocalyptic battlefield.

He closed his eyes again, clearing his mind of all distractions, and focused all his attention on his dantian.

The excruciating pain, like a maggot clinging to his bone, relentlessly gnawed at his will.

He no longer tried to take deep breaths, but instead adopted an extremely weak, extremely slow, and thread-like "Turtle Breathing" method, inhaling only a barely perceptible wisp of air each time, with his chest cavity barely expanding, in order to reduce the strain on his meridians.

Even so, each delicate breath was accompanied by a sharp, throbbing pain as the meridians within the body were stretched.

He gritted his teeth, his body trembling slightly on the cold beach, cold sweat already soaking the sand beneath him.

Time, blurred and drawn out by the boundless agony, stretched on endlessly. Each breath felt like an eternity.

Lin Xia focused all his energy on the faint core of his dantian.

There, his last remaining wisp of pure Venusaur Soul Power, like a faint candle flame in a raging storm, struggled to remain undying amidst the surrounding torrent of turbulent, viscous, and ferocious purple-blue Soul Power exuding the malevolent aura of a demonic whale.

"Lead!"

The will, like the strongest thread, tightly Wrap that meager amount of one's own Soul Power.

This wisp of Soul Power was the only seed within his body that he could still barely control.

Start!

Lin Xia let out a silent cry in her heart.

Driven by his will, that faint green Soul Power moved forward with extreme slowness and difficulty, like the most clumsy boatman, following the most basic and core execution route—the trajectory of the Ren and Du Meridians.

This movement is a billion times more difficult than an ordinary person pushing a mountain thousands of feet high!

Ahead lay a blockade of alien Soul Power, as hard as steel and infused with the destructive power of the Demon Whale King!

Every tiny step forward felt like cutting into the inner walls of my meridians with the dullest knife!

That faint Venusaur's Soul Power was like a traveler trapped in an endless swamp, exhausting his strength with every step, while also enduring the frenzied compression and erosion of the surrounding raging alien Soul Power.

The connection between his will and that wisp of Soul Power became precarious under the intense pain and the impact of the foreign energy, as if it would break at any moment.

"Well..."

Lin Xia's throat Rollout, and another mouthful of blood, sweet and metallic, surged up, which he swallowed back forcefully.

His body trembled violently, his fingernails digging deep into the sand in his palms, leaving bloody indentations.

Consciousness teetered on the edge of Abyss of excruciating pain and dizziness, as if it were about to completely collapse at any moment.

Give up... it hurts too much... stop and it won't hurt anymore... a Captivate voice whispered deep in my mind.

No!

We can't stop!

Stopping means your meridians will be severed, and your body will explode, resulting in death!

If you stop, you'll never see them again!

Lin Xia's soul is roaring.

He bit his already wounded tongue again, and the intense pain was like a whip lashing his fading consciousness.

His eyes were bloodshot, like Ferocious Beast ready to devour its prey. He frantically squeezed out the last bit of his spiritual power, desperately maintaining the connection between his Soul Power and will, driving it forward at a speed a hundred times slower than a snail's crawl, little by little, "digging" forward through the blocked meridians!

Every inch of progress was accompanied by excruciating pain as the meridians were Sheer Force stretched, scraped, and torn apart, akin to being slowly sliced to death.

As it moved forward, that faint Venusaur's Soul Power painstakingly and slowly absorbed and assimilated Sisi extremely weak strands of Whale Spirit's Soul Power that were Sheer Force pushed aside along the way.

This process was equally agonizing, like having a scorching hot iron forcibly pressed into one's soul.

But Lin Xia was pleasantly surprised to find that with each wisp of the Demon Whale King's alien Soul Power absorbed and refined, the Sisi of Venusaur Soul Power grew stronger, and its color changed from pure green to a faint but exceptionally tough dark golden luster!

At the same time, the extremely pure and powerful Life Energy after being refined, like the gentlest spring rain, soaked the torn and Burn inner walls of the meridians along the way, bringing a slight coolness and tingling, relieving the endless pain.

This slight relief, like a firefly in the darkness, gave Lin Xia immense encouragement and the motivation to persevere! It worked!

Although the process was as painful as being in hell, this path was the path to survival!

He frantically focused his will, enduring excruciating pain, and drove that wisp of Soul Power, shimmering with a dark golden luster like a spark, to stubbornly carve out a tiny passage through the blocked torrent of meridians.

Time lost its meaning; his world consisted only of boundless agony, a faint hope, and a tiny spark of Soul Power stubbornly moving forward in his desperate situation.