After thinking about his options for a while, Shang decided to walk along the bottom of the Eternal Ocean.
If he could find an entrance to a trial, he could earn a lot of money.
As long as he actually won the trial fairly, his rewards wouldn't be destroyed.
He walked along the ground of the Eternal Ocean and focused on all manners of fluctuations around him.
There were no beasts or humans around him.
There was only the deep darkness and pressure of the Eternal Ocean.
There were no streams at the bottom of the Eternal Ocean, making it feel dead.
Shang just kept walking through the darkness and pressure.
It was like he had been transported to a different world.
When he reached a crevice, Shang jumped down and inspected the entire thing.
Some crevices were small, while others were huge.
Yet, everything seemed to be the same, and Shang found no traces of strange fluctuations.
But he also hadn't expected to. After all, the Deep Crevices was a huge wilderness, and Shang's Spirit Sense wasn't that big right now.
The Early Ancestral Mage from earlier had probably known about the location of the trial before she had even jumped into the ocean.
The Clouds weren't stupid, and they even used information as resources.
Just pay a couple of Mana Crystals, and we will tell you where you can find one of the trials in the Deep Crevices. If you get lucky and get sent to the Deep Crevices, you will earn far more, and if you don't, there's always next time.
No one wanted the others to earn money without them getting a cut themselves.
As for people that weren't willing to purchase the locations of trials, they had to search for them on their own, and the chances of them finding one weren't very high.
After all, the trials were well hidden, and the wilderness was vast.
Nevertheless, Shang continued slowly searching through the crevices.
He moved methodically and efficiently.
Several days seemed to pass in the blink of an eye.
The surroundings hadn't changed.
However, Shang had changed.
Shang's body was losing a bit of blood through a couple of cuts, and his skin didn't seem as healthy anymore.
It looked like Shang's body couldn't permanently stay at the bottom of the Endless Ocean without slowly deteriorating.
But Shang didn't seem to mind.
A couple more days passed, and Shang's body released a bit more blood than before.
CRK!
Suddenly, Shang's left arm broke, and as soon as it did, it was compressed into a small tendril of meat.
Shang gritted his teeth in pain as his head faced his left arm.
Then, Shang jumped and started to ascend.
He had to recover in shallower waters.
WHOOOM!
Suddenly, several claws made of Darkness Mana appeared around Shang.
Oh no!
An ambush!
Just when Shang was at his weakest!
WHOOOOM!
In a single instant, Shang's entire body healed, and all the Mana in the surroundings vanished, leaving a void and the claws of darkness behind.
Shang couldn't absorb Mana that had someone else's will on it.
Yet, there was one other spot.
There was one spot in the void that was also filled with Darkness Mana that wasn't used to attack Shang.
Shang's recovered arm immediately grabbed his Subsis and slashed at one of the claws.
DING!
As soon as the Subsis hit the claw, it vanished.
At the same time, Shang's body atrophied slightly.
But there was one more thing.
Shang's Subsis now had a long edge made of Darkness Mana.
BANG!
Shang used the foreign Mana inside himself to avoid the other claws of darkness.
As Shang shot to the side, he pointed his darkness-filled Subsis at the one spot in the void that wasn't without Mana.
BANG!
The darkness-filled blade shot out of Shang's Subsis at incredible speeds and hit the opponent before they could react.
BANG!
The blade hit the target and scattered. It was like someone had launched a glass at a steel plate.
And then, the piece of Darkness Mana vanished.
All the Water Mana from the Eternal Ocean filled the void, and Shang faced a certain direction.
The opponent had retreated.
They had believed that Shang had been at his weakest, but that had been a trap.
As soon as they had seen Shang recover in an instant, they decided to retreat.
However, Shang still managed to hit them with the blade of Darkness Mana.
Luckily, that attack wasn't too powerful.
Yet, the attack's speed had been scary!
It was way too fast!
This was one of the attacks Shang had designed to finish off a Mage after they deactivated their Mana Shield due to Infection.
It didn't have a lot of power, but it was the fastest attack Shang could launch.
Shang called it Needle.
Needle was made to work with Infection.
However, it didn't need to be used after Infection had taken hold.
Shang's expression didn't change as he shot forward.
Needle could also be used to "infect" the target.
At the moment, Shang felt a clear trail of Death Mana.
Shang summoned Ice and Fire Mana and exploded forward.
Shang was using Comet to shoot forward at rapid speeds.
This was the fastest way Shang could move without wasting resources, and it was faster than average Mid Ancestral Mages could move without Mana Step.
Naturally, Clouds were quite a bit faster, but that also wouldn't be a problem.
Shang knew where his opponent was.
His opponent didn't know where Shang was.
After less than a second, Shang saw half a sphere of Death Mana rapidly moving away.
The sphere suddenly changed directions, and Shang followed it.
It changed directions a couple more times until it completely vanished again.
Mana Step.
Yet, even Mana Step didn't help.
Shang could still feel the trace.
He just kept charging after his target.
Four seconds later, Shang saw the sphere again.
SHING!
And it vanished again.
This spiel repeated a couple more times.
Eventually, the two of them reached rather shallow depths.
When Shang saw the sphere again, it quickly vanished again.
But this time, it reappeared right in front of him with an insane amount of Darkness Mana between it and Shang.
It was an extremely powerful Spell.
Obviously, the Mage had been thrown into a panic and had decided to go all in.
WHOOOOM!
The Darkness Mana vanished as all the Mana around Shang turned into Neutral Mana.
At the same time, Shang's legs vanished but were healed in an instant.
Domain of Entropy!
The next moment, all the Mana in the surroundings vanished again.
The Mana moved through Shang's body, was transformed, and was pushed into Shang's Addum.
And then, the Addum hit the enemy's Mana Shield.
CRACK!
The Mana Shield broke apart, and Shang could see a beautiful black-haired girl.
For just a moment, she looked at Shang with teary and terrified eyes.
And then, Shang's Subsis stabbed through her, and her terrified expression vanished as she turned into a dried corpse.
'Another Initial Ancestral Mage,' Shang thought. 'They're really underestimating me.'
Shang noticed that her Focus was still in one piece and pocketed it.
After that, he looked into her Space Ring.
'It's okay. Probably around 40 or 50.'
A second later, Shang moved to the ground of the Eternal Ocean again and continued searching for trials.
And as his search continued, his body was slowly becoming weaker and injured again.
He sure hoped that nobody would ambush him while he was injured.
