Shang noticed that the barrier before him started to distort under the pressure.
Shang pulled his hand back and healed himself to his peak.
He had filled the barrier with an unreal amount of Death Mana, and it wouldn't stop absorbing Mana anytime soon.
Shang watched the barrier distort more and more until…
BANG!
The barrier shattered.
WHOOOOOOM!
As the entire barrier around the trial vanished, all the wet ground surrounding it suddenly imploded, filling the spots that had been filled with normal air until now.
In the short moment when the barrier had been destroyed but the earth hadn't yet filled in the empty space, Shang had been able to feel his surroundings with his Spirit Sense.
The image Shang had seen was of a rather large room with several pitfalls, several Magic Circles, and several platforms.
Shang assumed that this had probably been some kind of trial where people had to find out how the Magic Circles worked to divine the correct way across the platforms and pitfalls.
But now…
As soon as the barrier broke, all the earth rushed into the room, destroying the platforms, filling the pitfalls, and disrupting almost all the Magic Circles.
Shang remained standing on his spot for a couple of seconds until all the ground around him had calmed down.
Then, Shang took out the emblem and looked at the arrow.
Diagonally down.
Shang hadn't seen his target in the brief moment before the earth had filled in the gaps, which meant that his target was inside a different challenge within the trial.
Shang remembered where one of the doors had been and dug towards that spot by punching more dirt.
None of the pitfalls, platforms, and Magic Circles worked anymore.
Some seconds later, Shang reached the doorway, and one punch later, the door opened slightly.
WHOOOM!
The door immediately exploded outward, and the earth around Shang rushed into the opened doorway.
Shang simply continued punching forward.
BANG!
After one particular punch, Shang noticed that he had destroyed something that wasn't the normal kind of ground.
A couple of pieces of marble shot past him.
Shang realized that he had entered a hallway with a stairway that went upward, and he had just now punched through the stairs.
Shang took out the emblem again and looked at the arrow.
Diagonally down.
Then, he turned around, punched through the door, through the room, and then through the other door.
Shang punched through some marble again, but he noticed that the angle was different, which meant that he had just punched through the slanted ceiling.
This meant that this stairway led down.
Shang was just about to kick diagonally down when he suddenly stopped.
He realized something.
After that, he looked at the arrow again and oriented himself perfectly in the arrow's direction.
Shang realized that he didn't need to adhere to the planned layout if he was already accidentally destroying the walls and stairs.
Shang punched forward, and the more he advanced, the more the arrow was moving left and right.
This didn't mean that his target was moving but that he was getting closer to it.
Shang prepared himself for a battle as he punched forward.
Yet, nothing was happening.
Eventually, the arrow started to move rapidly when Shang was just moving the emblem around.
After moving it around a bit, Shang realized that his target was essentially directly in front of his chest.
His arms could already move behind the target.
Shang moved his arms forward and dug more carefully.
And then, he saw his target.
It was a small cube of bloody meat surrounding a Space Ring.
Shang wasn't particularly surprised about that.
Early Ancestral Mages couldn't permanently resist the pressure at the bottom of the Eternal Ocean.
This spot was even deeper than that.
Additionally, the pressure underground was even more brutal than the pressure in the water.
On top of that, the Cloud had probably been taken by surprise while undertaking the trial.
Maybe her Mana Shield had been deactivated.
Maybe her Mana had already been low.
Anyway, the brutal pressure of the sudden explosion of earth had killed her and compressed her into this tiny cube of meat.
How strong was the body of an Early Ancestral Mage?
Not very strong.
Such a body was probably about as strong as Shang's body had been at the Mid True Path Stage.
In comparison to Shang, it was pitiful.
Shang's current body was already under quite a lot of pressure.
One could imagine how a Mage's body would fare.
Shang dug the Space Ring out of the cube of meat and inspected it.
'Pretty good,' he thought.
He guessed that the contents were worth quite a couple of Grade Seven Mana Crystals. Way better than the beggar from earlier.
Shang threw the cube of meat to the side again and punched upward.
He kept a mental map of the layout of the trial and kept checking what kind of material he was destroying.
After a while, Shang noticed that he wasn't destroying marble anymore and turned around.
For the next couple of minutes, Shang kept searching through the highest layer of the trial until he found one single hallway that led upward.
Shang followed that hallway for a bit and noticed that it led to an inconspicuous spot at the bottom of the Eternal Ocean.
This was the exit.
After finding the exit, Shang turned around again and followed the hallway deeper.
Eventually, he found a door, and after opening it, he began to dig more carefully.
Some minutes later, Shang found a highly compressed cube of metal.
This should be one of the rewards for clearing the trial.
This cube of metal probably used to be some kind of artifact.
Obviously, it wasn't worth as much anymore as it used to, but Shang believed that the materials should still be worth something and pocketed the cube.
Shang searched around and found a couple more rewards, but the extreme pressure had turned most of them into useless chunks.
But one of the rewards had survived.
It was an emblem.
Shang read through its contents and snorted.
Free access to a high-grade area for comprehending Concepts for 500 years.
Anyone else would be ecstatic about this reward, but due to his status, Shang already had access to basically everything.
'Hope I can sell this back to the Lightning Manor.'
Shang pocketed the emblem and punched upward.
Some seconds later, he punched through the last layer of ground and reached the Eternal Ocean again.
Shang's Spirit Sense could finally expand to a radius of ten kilometers again.
Then, Shang stopped on the ground of the Eternal Ocean.
"I have a question regarding the rules," Shang said by creating more air in his lungs.
"What is your question?" one of the Bolts asked Shang via voice transmission.
The Bolts were always watching, and if someone had questions, it was their duty to answer them.
"If I kill someone but can't retrieve their belongings, what happens to them?" Shang asked.
"If you are truly the one responsible for their death, we will retrieve the belongings for you," the Bolt answered.
"Okay," Shang said as he slowly lifted his right arm.
"Then, can you retrieve this?"
Shang snapped his fingers.
At that moment, far away from Shang, the Bolt's eyes widened in extreme shock.
What the fuck had he just witnessed?!
It took him several seconds to recover.
Some seconds later, a small portal opened in front of Shang.
A Space Ring was coming through it.
