The silver trace lingered behind the tree for only three breaths before vanishing into thin air.
Dugu Bo circled the tree and failed to find so much as half a footprint. He scraped wood shavings from the edge of the cut with his fingernail. They fell into his palm, and only after a while did their growth rings slowly appear.
Time had been displaced within that tiny patch of space.
"A hundred-thousand-year spatial Soul Beast." Dugu Bo flicked the shavings away. "You're awfully lucky."
"Thank you." Bai Jin accepted the compliment gladly.
"I'm telling you to go back."
"Then you should make it sound nicer."
Chen Xin took no part in their pointless exchange. He swept the forest with his Sword Intent, but just as the Seven Kill Sword neared the spot where the silver trace had vanished, its tip emerged beside a tree more than ten meters away.
Space had folded back on itself.
Tang San stood beside Grandmaster, pushing his Purple Demon Eye to its limit. Even then, he could only make out a few faint silver threads floating between the trees. They had no fixed shape: one moment they clung to the ground, the next they stood in midair, like a web forever being rewoven.
Bai Jin walked forward.
"Stay here."
He bent to pick up a pinecone and casually tossed it between two trees.
Halfway through its flight, the pinecone suddenly fell behind them.
He flicked a second one toward the ground, but before it struck the earth, it appeared in the treetops, as though an invisible hand had changed its course. A third pinecone lost half its body the instant it left his fingers. The remaining half rolled back from a distance several breaths later.
Bai Jin studied the three different paths, and his smile