Xiao Xiao's luck was terrible.
The first method he thought of was blocked at the very first step.
Once Blue Sparrow's sword left its sheath, it transformed into a needle-thin gleam. It stabbed down into the ground, and with a boing, after piercing only about an inch into the rock crust, the "needle" was bounced back out.
"—Did it hit some kind of stone?"
Fatty Xin guessed. Then, seeing Blue Sparrow's long face, he immediately corrected himself. "I mean, something as hard as a stone..."
"My sword cuts through iron like mud," Blue Sparrow declared stiffly. Her finger trembled slightly as she directed the "needle" to stab into the ground again.
"...It could also be bone fragments left behind by Waghar. After all, Legend bones might be a little harder than... whoa... there can't possibly be this many bone fragments underground!"
Fatty Xin had still been scrambling to come up with another excuse, but while he spoke, Blue Sparrow's needle-sword had circled the Xuanhuang Wood and stabbed a huge patch of rock crust seventy or eighty times. Every single time, it had been bounced away.
"—Something's wrong."
Zhang Jixin tugged at his gauntlets and took a deep breath. The muscles in his gloved arm instantly swelled and bulged. He swung his arm back, his entire body like a fully drawn bow, while every joint in his body made a faint, dense series of cracks.
"Wait..."
Dylan's somewhat nervous voice sounded weak amid the rapid cracking.
Zhang Jixin ignored him.
He slammed a fist into the ground.
Crack—
A sound like muffled thunder collided between earth and air. The instant his fist touched the ground, the rocky crust seemed to turn to quicksand, abruptly sinking toward the point beneath his fist. Then, a thin black line shot winding out from between