The dark-red energy spear tore through the relatively calm space at the edge of the Order island, carrying a shriek that promised annihilation, and stabbed straight toward the Shadow Fiend Fragment where Ming Xin was!
Too fast! So fast that there was no time to think, only instinct remained!
Under the threat of death, Ming Xin's battered soul erupted with unprecedented potential!
He did not try to clumsily control the fragment and evade—the attempt would have been futile.
Instead, he poured all his focus, along with the sliver of energy accumulated within the fragment and the last strength of the "key" frequency deep in his soul,
all of it into the lingering motes of light from the Origin Resonator on the fragment!
It was neither defense nor attack, but the purest and most direct kind of "resonance"!
Its target was the pale-blue Order crystal fragment beneath his feet!
These motes of light contained the final imprint of the ancient guardian, "Starlight," as well as the faint trait of the Origin Resonator as a symbol of some kind of authority.
And this Order crystal fragment had likewise come from some ancient creation or world of high Order and complete laws.
Between the two existed some distant, faint connection, one belonging to the categories of "Order" and "ancient."
That was what Ming Xin was gambling on! He was betting that the instinct lingering within this fragment of Order
would give a faint "response" to the ancient aura of authority from the same source, one representing "guardianship" and "recording"!
"Bzzzt—!"
Just as the dark-red spear was about to pierce the Shadow Fiend Fragment, the surface of the pale-blue crystal beneath Ming Xin's feet
suddenly lit up with a ring of pale-gold patterns, brighter and more solid than the surrounding glow!
Centered on Ming