This was a well-planned attack.
If it had been in the past and if he had been caught off guard, Ding Hao might have been hit and gotten injured without using his Divine Senses to scan the surroundings.
However, it just so happened that Ding Hao had entered the Three-apertured Great Grandmaster realm; his magical power increased and qualitative changes took place in his body. There were no more blind spots of vision and perception for him, so he immediately noticed the attack. When the white lightning was an inch away from his body, a thought flashed through his mind, and “Spring Sword Intent” came out of his body.
“Ding!”
There was a soft sound.
The white lightning was broken into pieces like shards of glass.
Ding Hao’s eyes blasted out silver light columns, piercing through the water curtain. In an instant, he captured a very obscure figure who was moving rapidly in the sea. With a slight shout, he sent out flashes of “Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter Sword Intent” in succession, which could cut into the surrounding black sea.
Someone let out a muffled groan.
But soon, peace returned; there was no longer any fluctuation.
“He’s running away so fast!”
Ding Hao released his strong Divine Senses.
Soon, he confirmed that there were no longer any living creatures within a radius of five or six kilometers in the sea.
The lightning just then was very magical and sharp. It was obviously the magical fighting technique of the Human Clan or the Demon Clan. It was definitely not something released by the savage beasts of the Untainted Land. This was a well-planned assassination, and it was definitely not a coincidence.
“Who the hell is he?”
Ding Hao guessed that it should not have been done by the superpowers who held the stone tablets with the map.
The reason was very simple. Those forces clearly knew about their strength and prepared accordingly. Moreover, they had a profound foundation and had all kinds of means. With a large number of people, if they really wanted to lay down a death trap, they would surely set up a perfect one. There would be a lot of people participating to ensure the kill was successful, instead of a one-on-one action.
“So who was the attacker?”
Ding Hao thought about it for a while and finally came to a conclusion—
He was likely to be a single martial artist or a demon other than those few superpowers.
Although those superpowers had many people and resources, apart from them, it was possible that there were some exceptional talents among the scattered people.
Perhaps they didn’t have a stone tablet map, nor a prominent reputation. Moreover, they had been keeping a low profile all the time in the Highest Heaven. But it didn’t mean that they weren’t dangerous. They were like venomous snakes hidden in the dark, waiting for an opportunity to bite you suddenly.
“This person must have noticed that I was alone and with a low Qi cultivation. And my combat strength is average if I don’t activate Beast Transform. Hence, he thought that he had a chance and decided to ambush me on the second ancient path. Judging from the timing of his attack and the power of the white lightning bolt, he was probably at the high-level Martial King Realm, even if he had not reached the Martial Emperor Realm.”
If he failed with one strike, he would be able to escape thousands of miles away.
“This person had an outstanding escaping skill, so he dared to come to provoke me.”
In Ding Hao’s mind, there was another mysterious man that had opened up Eight Forbidden Lands besides the “White Jade Courtyard” and “Sky Holding Ancient Villa”.
And there was also another person—the mysterious expert with a stone tablet who was covered in red flames and seemed to be from the Demon Clan.
After her appearance at the altar gathering, this mysterious person had never appeared again. She didn’t even show up when people besieged and killed the “Zhuhuai” giant beast. Her whereabouts were very mysterious. It was certain that she had been on the ancient road all the time, but no one knew her whereabouts.
Those were all mysteries.
“It seems that I and Song Que, as well as the top experts of the Demon Clan, have ignored these ambitious people who are hiding among these scattered martial artists. The power of these people can’t be underestimated. If at a critical moment these guys suddenly appear…. It’s very likely that they’ll be able to turn the tables on us!”
Ding Hao was kind of in awe of them.
As time went by, Ding Hao was getting closer and closer to the third section entrance of the ancient road.
What puzzled him was that there wasn’t even a living being in that vast dark green ocean.
At first, Ding Hao thought that there might be horrifying underwater beasts or the Surviving Species of the Untainted Land, but on his way, no matter how turbulent the waves were and how violent the storm was, Ding Hao didn’t find any signs of life in the sea, not even a small shrimp.
“Is there something wrong with the water?”
Ding Hao used a space container refined casually by himself to fetch some ink-colored seawater. It was odorless and placid.
He tried to consult Saber Master and Sword Master.
It was a pity that since the two old monsters watched and memorized “24 Moves of Swordsmanship” and “24 Moves of the Saber Technique”, they had been in a state of silence. They didn’t speak. Ding Hao was a little worried about whether the two old monsters disappeared because of the excessive consumption of soul power. If it was the case, the loss would outweigh the gain.
After traveling for a long time, they finally reached the end of the second section of the ancient road.
The endless sea had finally reached its end.
There was a beach that was only dozens of meters long, and there was a layer of chaotic dust in the distance. The space was like jelly, and there should be a fault of the wall. It was a very terrible place. Even an expert at the realm of Martial Grand Emperor realm would be exiled endlessly once he was stuck in it, and he would be lost in the vast space from then on.
Of course, Ding Hao was not interested in trying that kind of exile.
The second part of the West Journey to the Ancient Road was a dead sea. There was no life, nor was there any sign of the existence of any treasures, Magic grass, nor mines. There should be nothing to gain. His eyes fell on the purple whirlpool door above in the white beach.
That was the gate leading to the third part of West Journey to the Ancient Road.
Before stepping into the gate, Ding Hao suddenly turned his head and looked at the beach in the distance.
There were thirty to forty corpses lying there.
Among them were martial artists of the Human Clan and experts of the Demon Clan. What caught Ding Hao’s attention was that they died in similar conditions. Their hearts and brains had been dug out, and their bodies were withered like mummies. Their whole bodies’ essence had been sucked away, as if they had been dried for thousands of years. Only the blood on the beach had yet to become completely clotted, which meant that they had died not long ago.
“Boom!”
The thick gray fog around him suddenly condensed into a zombie-like warrior with a divine spear in his hand. He thrust out the spear, and the surrounding air was suffocating.
Ding Hao held the “Wen Qing Saber” in his hand and knocked the spear away backhand. Then he used the “Seven Black Cut· Horizontal Cut” to cut the warrior condensed by gray mist into halves.
The two parts of the grey body spread out like a collapsed sand sculpture and then turned into a thick gray fog.
Ding Hao continued to move forward.
That was the third part of the West Journey to the Ancient Road.
A world composed entirely of gray fog.
The body was surrounded by gray fog. Even if Ding Hao used his full vision, the range of his vision was only about fifty meters ahead of him. The ground under his feet seemed to be hard rock, and there had never been any change. Although the fog was thick, it did not affect his breathing. The air was still very fresh, which was a very strange illusion.”
For Ding Hao, such an environment was extremely terrible.
He was a complete idiot on the road because he lacked sense of direction.
The ground was completely flat and hard without ups and downs. Looking up, the sky was grey and filled with fog. There were no sun, moon, stars, nor coordinates as reference. It seemed that he was indeed walking in a maze. It was very likely that he had walked for more than two hours and he was circling around.
Ding Hao had completely lost his sense of direction at this time.
It had been a whole day since he entered that world filled with gray fog. Ding Hao didn’t know how far he had walked. Even if he released his Divine Senses, he could only sense a wider area, but he could not pinpoint the direction. Along the way, Ding Hao tried his best to work out a plan, but unfortunately, the end of the third section of the ancient road still needed to be seemed to be still far away.
That was not the only reason why the world was so terrifying.
What was even more frightening was that the gray fog around him could condense into a mad warrior, a moving skeleton, an irritable beast, or even a god with gray flames which would suddenly attack him at any time. The seemingly weak fog had a terrifying attack power after the transformation. The fog claws or a long sword could easily break the defense of a Martial King Realm expert.
During this day, Ding Hao had already gone through hundreds of combats of different sizes.
No one knew how many times he had been injured.
These fog condensed attackers were elusive as ghosts. They often appeared silently and attacked. Ding Hao had not entered the three-apertured Great Grandmaster realm and had yet to capture the attack as soon as possible, without the sight and sensing blind spots around his body. Even so, he had been injured many times. Fortunately, his physical recovery ability was extremely strong, and ordinary injuries could be recovered in an instant.
After a day, Ding Hao felt mentally exhausted.
Even the Fat Cat, Evil Moon, and Adorable were almost pierced through several times.
Such a series of constant attacks was also a kind of practice. It made Ding Hao want to get more and more fighting experience, to increase my reaction speed. Later, Ding Hao decided to treat those attackers as whetstones, constantly testing his various ideas of martial arts. He even tested the various saber techniques and sword techniques left by the two mysterious beings in the second floor of the “Heaven Sabre – Peerless Sword Tower”…
That kind of progress was not the direct increase in Qi cultivation, but it was also very important for Ding Hao.
Step by step, Ding Hao felt as if he was walking in an ancient battlefield full of danger. He was constantly fighting and tempering his nerves. Along the way, he fought against the enemy with saber techniques and sword techniques. His understanding of the saber and sword, especially his study of the “Seven Black Cut,” improved by leaps and bounds!
In the blink of an eye, Ding Hao had lingered in that strange misty world filled with danger for two days.
He could no longer remember how many fog condensed warriors and fiendish demons he had killed.
Even with Ding Hao’s physical strength, there were also signs of swelling and pain due to the extended period of wielding the sword. According to the frequency at which he drew the sword and saber every second, it was estimated that he had at least made millions of moves.
In the end, a wonderful change occurred.
Ding Hao felt that the rusted sword and the Wen Qing Saber in his hands had become parts of his body. He had never felt so flexible and free to wield them. As long as his palms touched the handle of a sword or a saber, his whole body had an eagerness to try, and his blood began to boil.
