The sword rose with wind and thunder

He was a very strange man.

At least, that was what Xia Anmeng thought as she possessed him.

His strength was clearly meager, yet he was unaffected by this place's erosion and could lay bare her predicament with a single remark.

And... why was this body so perfectly suited to her soul?

Xia Anmeng was puzzled, but the facts were undeniable.

Remnant souls could indeed seize bodies and be reborn, but it was nowhere near as simple as eating or drinking.

Unless one practiced demonic arts, the host body's "compatibility" and "rejection" played an enormous role.

Take Lu Caiwei, for example... although Xia Anmeng had no intention of harming her disciple, even possessing her could only give her cultivation a slight boost.

And it cost Xia Anmeng her own soul power.

The cultivation arts and techniques she had mastered could not be used directly through her disciple.

But things seemed different with Ye Wuyou.

There was no rejection, no incompatibility whatsoever. If Xia Anmeng wished, she could even let him instantly master the techniques she knew.

Xia Anmeng was tempted.

But she had sworn a binding oath upon her inner demons, after all...

[The wretched bitch harbors ill intentions toward you at this very moment. You foresaw this long ago and simply turn her scheme against her, making your body a furnace and her soul a cauldron for a breathtaking bout of spiritual intercourse... henceforth, your cultivation will advance a thousand miles a day, and your grand undertaking will succeed.]

Fucking amazing.

Accustomed as Ye Wuyou was to this, his steps still faltered. He took a deep breath before continuing down the passage ahead.

The passage was pitch-black. Its candles had burned out, leaving only the treasured sword in his hand, which gleamed with a chill light even in the darkness.

As for the little stammerer, Lu Caiwei, she lay quietly against his back, fast asleep with her breathing steady.

As her master, Xia Anmeng had still fulfilled her duty.

She had relinquished a portion of her own soul power and left it within Lu Caiwei to temporarily fend off the erosion.

It also allowed Lu Caiwei to rest a little.

After all, three days and nights of uninterrupted watch, along with fighting during that time, had long since pushed her to her limit.

Even so, that soul power had a time limit and could not be replenished.

Xia Anmeng had stated quite bluntly that she would not go so far as to let her own soul dissipate.

If they still failed to find a solution, Lu Caiwei might never wake again.

Rather than waste time waiting for death, they might as well take the initiative and break out.

Fortunately, with Xia Anmeng—a Sixth Realm remnant soul from who knew how many years ago—present, Ye Wuyou had finally obtained some valuable information.

First, barring special circumstances, two anomalies would leave each other alone.

Second, every anomaly possessed one and only one supernatural ability. That ability did not necessarily manifest as something lethal, but it could not be resisted.

Third, anomalies could be killed, but not eradicated. Even if someone with mighty supernatural powers crushed an anomaly, given enough time, the slain anomaly would reappear somewhere in the world.

Finally, there was the point that had prompted Ye Wuyou's decision.

The cages imprisoning anomalies formed self-contained spaces capable of blocking out all anomalies and erosion.

In other words, with a little luck, he only needed to kill an anomaly, take over its cage, and lock himself inside.

At the very least, he could survive here for a long time.

But...

Ye Wuyou stopped in the silent passage.

Even the temporary second-realm cultivation granted by Xia Anmeng's possession was enough for him to see into the darkness ahead.

In the dark passage, a white sheet of skin clung to one wall, swaying gently.

Though its form had changed, this was already Ye Wuyou's third encounter with it.

The white sheet of skin merely hung on the wall, making no move.

"There's an anomaly's presence on the wall ahead, to the right."

Xia Anmeng warned him within his mind.

A Sixth Realm cultivator's perception was terrifying, but that was all it was.

She could not see it directly as Ye Wuyou could.

Suppressing the urge to draw his sword, Ye Wuyou continued deeper into the passage, his expression unchanged.

With his objective clear, any pointless battle was unnecessary.

Besides, what "supernatural ability" did that white, jelly-like sheet of skin actually possess?

Judging by how it had manipulated those corpses earlier, it seemed somewhat like possession...

A long while later...

The white, jelly-like sheet of skin still clung to the wall, swaying gently.

And Ye Wuyou came walking from one end of the passage, just as he had at the beginning.

Looking at the eerily familiar scene before him, Ye Wuyou spoke calmly.

"How long have we been walking?"

Xia Anmeng considered briefly before answering.

"About a quarter of an hour since we set out."

A quarter of an hour was enough for an able-bodied person to run two round trips along the eighth level of the imperial prison.

Yet Ye Wuyou was still walking through this dim passage, with no cells in sight.

Hmm... back in my old world, wouldn't people have called this a "ghost wall"?

Looks like we've already fallen into some anomaly's "supernatural ability"?

But isn't this seemingly low-level "ghost wall" loop just a cheap trick?

"Senior, did you notice anything unusual just now?"

Xia Anmeng was briefly taken aback at being called "Senior." After a short silence, she answered.

"I noticed nothing."

She truly had detected nothing unusual.

Though her strength as a Sixth Realm remnant soul was no longer what it had once been, her knowledge and perception had not diminished in the slightest.

If even she could not detect anything amiss, this little trick was not so simple.

A "ghost wall" was a loop, and so was a Möbius strip. Who could call either simple?

"Why not get rid of that thing causing trouble on the wall?" Xia Anmeng asked, puzzled.

Ye Wuyou sighed.

"Senior, haven't you noticed? That thing is trapped here, just like us."

Xia Anmeng's thoughts stalled, but then Ye Wuyou moved.

With his cultivation temporarily elevated, the Formless Heart Sutra circulated ever more smoothly.

Ye Wuyou had not spent those three days sitting silently in the cell doing nothing.

He had become thoroughly familiar with circulating the Formless Heart Sutra through his mind and body.

Previously, Ye Wuyou had been somewhat puzzled. This sutra provided only a cultivation method, with no techniques whatsoever beyond that.

A cultivation art without accompanying techniques, even when cultivated to its peak, would at most make him a warrior with absurd stats but no skills.

But as his cultivation rose, all those questions melted away like ice and snow dissolving into spring waters.

The Formless Heart Sutra had no need for techniques.

There were no perfect techniques in this world. Or perhaps...

The best things in the world were always in someone else's hands.

Brilliant sword light shone.

It was still the same sword, but the one holding it was no longer the woman from before.

The sword rose.

Wind and Thunder.

The exact same technique Lu Caiwei had used earlier now materialized within the passage.

Did anomalies possess intelligence?

Ye Wuyou believed they did.

At the very least, they possessed a degree of instinctive thought.

Otherwise, that white anomaly would not have tested them again and again, even attempting to wear them down to death.

Because Lu Caiwei could not see it, it had examined her at close range without a care.

Because it believed Ye Wuyou could not see it, it had clung brazenly to the wall.

When the sword light swept past and the keen sword intent shredded it until only a palm-sized piece remained, the white, jelly-like substance actually began trembling.

And when Ye Wuyou stepped on it, then even reached down and seized it with unerring precision, its last shred of hope vanished.

Xia Anmeng's voice in his mind grew more and more astonished, finally transforming into an exclamation thick with disbelief.

"How can you sense it? Or... y-you can see it?"

Ignoring the wretched bitch's fuss, Ye Wuyou merely squeezed the jelly-slime-like sheet of skin in his hand, feeling its soft texture.

Tsk... why does this feel just like that fifty-cent slime I played with as a kid?

This thing is what they call an anomaly? Or the Great Dao Remnant?

Ye Wuyou gazed calmly at the thing pinched in his hand and spoke one word at a time.

"You know how to get out of here, don't you?"

"Then lead the way."

As his words fell, Ye Wuyou violently swung the hand holding the anomaly against the wall.

Smack.

The white anomaly struck the wall with a crisp sound.