Shang moved diagonally downward. Based on the trajectory of the arrow, the silver-haired man's rival had been one of the ones that had been charging downward instead of slowly moving forward.
Shang followed the arrow for a couple of minutes.
Eventually, he finally saw something other than water.
The ground.
'Sure enough, it truly is over 10,000 kilometers deep. That's crazy,' Shang thought.
By now, Shang could also feel the intense pressure and gravity in the surroundings.
The pressure felt about as strong as the pressure a mortal would feel when freediving to a depth of around ten meters.
Definitely not easy for an average person to do, but not a problem for a professional.
Meanwhile, the gravity just required Shang to use a bit more power to move his body.
However, considering the power of Shang's physical body, this was already crazy.
'If I were at the Peak Fusion Realm without my Void Break, I would only be able to survive for a limited amount of time here,' Shang thought.
Naturally, staying at such a depth was also troublesome for the Mages.
While Late and Peak Ancestral Mages could stay here indefinitely, weaker Ancestral Mages had a slower Mana regeneration than what resisting the pressure used up.
This meant that they needed to surface a bit from time to time.
How deep was the Eternal Ocean here in total?
Maybe about 12,000 kilometers deep.
And since the Magic Circle went up to 10,000 kilometers, this meant that the Clouds could surface to a depth of 2,000 kilometers.
Naturally, the pressure wasn't nearly as deadly at a depth of 2,000 kilometers compared to a depth of 12,000 kilometers.
Like that, they could regenerate their Mana.
All of these thoughts also shot through Shang's mind, and he was quite intrigued by the choice of battlefield.
The Wilderness Hunt had turned out quite different from what he had thought.
Initially, he thought that they would be traveling through forests and mountains.
But instead, they were here, and all the parameters for usual battles had been completely changed by the environment.
Fighting at the bottom of this area could be extremely risky but also extremely beneficial.
Based on the strength of the combatants and how long they had been at the bottom, one combatant might start with 90% of their total Mana while the other only had 70%.
Even more, surfacing would also prove to be quite dangerous. After all, if one surfaced, it meant that they felt it to be too dangerous to remain in the depths, meaning that they had already been weakened.
So, what if someone fully rested created an ambush halfway to the top?
Staying in the depths was dangerous.
Surfacing was dangerous.
Honestly, the only place that wasn't dangerous was staying at the surface while already fully rested.
Of course, there were also some Clouds that didn't care at all about the pressure.
Someone very skilled in Gravity Magic could create an anti-pressure field around them, which meant that they didn't need to resist the pressure with their Mana Shield.
Metal and Earth Affinity Clouds could probably also just create a very hard isolating barrier around them, even denser than the surrounding water.
'The people that are stronger under normal circumstances might actually be significantly weaker here.'
'It's chaos.'
Eventually, Shang landed on the ground.
'So, that's why it's called Deep Crevices.'
At the moment, Shang could feel a couple of crevices in his limited Spirit Sense, and he couldn't even sense the bottom of some of them.
Some were barely a couple of meters wide, while others were so wide that Shang couldn't even feel the other side.
Initially, Shang believed that he had reached the ground, but after seeing all these crevices, he felt more like he had landed on the top of a small mountain or plateau.
Shang moved his feet around a little bit and noticed that he didn't need to increase the density of Mana beneath his feet.
The ground was so hard and dense that Shang could walk around without any problems.
And then, Shang started to run in the direction the arrow of the emblem was pointing.
The more he advanced, the more Shang could see the arrow move around, which meant that he was getting closer.
Eventually, Shang saw the arrow point into one of the crevices, and he also entered it.
The crevice was vast and deep, and Shang couldn't see the end of it.
Shang continued descending even more, but he couldn't find his target.
He saw the arrow move more and more into a horizontal orientation until it eventually was completely horizontal.
This meant that Shang was at the same depth as his target.
Shang followed the arrow, but just after a couple of seconds, he frowned.
There was a wall in front of him.
Shang looked at the arrow, which pointed directly at the wall.
Then, Shang ascended and checked if he had actually entered the correct crevice.
After looking around for a couple of minutes, he was certain that this had been the correct crevice.
He went to the same spot again and looked at the wall.
Eventually, Shang noticed a couple of hidden Magic Runes, which formed a complex Magic Circle.
Naturally, Shang's knowledge of Magic wasn't even near enough to understand this Magic Circle.
However, he didn't need to.
This simply confirmed that Shang's target was inside the ground, which meant that there was most likely an empty space within the crevice.
BOOOOOOM!
Shang punched the sandy wall!
BOOOOM!
BOOOOM!
BOOOOM!
Shang kept punching the wall, and the dense sand was blown in all directions.
Shang kept punching forward as his body moved to fill the gap he created with every punch.
Eventually, Shang was completely submerged beneath the dense sand, but that didn't matter to him.
It was just a bit more pressure.
Shang kept punching and moving forward.
BANG!
Suddenly, Shang felt like he had hit something solid. Well, "solider" than the ground around him.
Shang moved the sand to the side, allowing his Spirit Sense to see the thing in front of him.
It was a Magical Barrier.
Shang slowly put his hand on the barrier.
And then, his body began to atrophy.
Shang was creating Death Mana.
After all…
He had used up his storage of prepared Death Mana a couple of minutes ago.
