No one knew how long the fierce battle had lasted, but the starlike lights above the chessboard had dimmed considerably.
The once-distinct crisscrossing white jade lines were covered in magnetic sand and fragments of spiritual essence, faintly exuding an aura of slaughter.
Both sides had made more than twenty moves, and the fighting had long since reached a fever pitch.
The geomagnetic channels had been churned into a tangled mess, and every inch of space reverberated with the aftershocks of clashing magnetism spells.
Even with Qing Chen, a river-crossing pawn whose strength exceeded the limits, the red side (Mystic Origin Exalted Immortal) had fallen behind and was already showing signs of defeat.
Nearly half its pieces had been lost, and its remaining forces had been divided and surrounded by the black formation, with suffocating pressure everywhere.
The thirty-zhang-tall red marshal was trapped in the center of the nine-palace grid.
Of the two twenty-five-zhang-tall red advisors before it, one had already shattered, leaving the sole remaining advisor desperately guarding the right flank.
The twenty-zhang-tall red elephant on the left had long since turned to ash, leaving the left side of the nine-palace grid completely exposed. The eerie blue light of the black cannon was locked firmly onto that spot, as though it would blast through the defenses the very next instant.
Only one of the red side's two twenty-five-zhang-tall chariots remained.
That red chariot was currently trapped at the river's edge by a black horse and a black pawn, yet it still barred the vital route, barely holding back the black side's advance;
-it was clearly a barrier Mystic Origin Exalted Immortal had deliberately left in place, solely to buy the central palace a moment to breathe.
Another red cannon stood alone on the left flank, its muzzle aimed deep into