The Fairy: From the Traveling Merchant

Chapter 944 Labyrinth Intelligence
"The Taixiao Secret Realm? This is the Taixiao Secret Realm?!" Zhao Chen's eyes narrowed slightly, his surprise instantly triggering an important thought:

He entered this place after defying the prophecy of "retreating upon encountering fire"... In other words, if he had followed the Empress's calculations exactly, he might have missed the divine power of the "Taixiao" Daoist.

"This shouldn't be the Empress deliberately trying to trick me... Well, either the Empress's calculations were interfered with, or seeking the Taixiao Divine Power is indeed a relatively difficult path, and this secret realm is extremely dangerous!"
Therefore, "retreating" is the better outcome...

"Furthermore, among those who are pushing my destiny forward, there is clearly someone who wants me to go down this path. Otherwise, they wouldn't have let me meet Danfei and escort her into the blessed land inside the volcano, and I wouldn't have met this 'Mysterious Ice Fire Lotus' in front of me!"

As Zhao Chen was lost in thought, Su Xuanbing continued, "The Taixiao Secret Realm is actually a projection of the 'special world' in which the Taixiao Dao Lord attained enlightenment within the Xuantian Heaven. Its purpose is to test cultivators who enter the secret realm by chance, and then issue corresponding rewards based on the results of the trials."

"But the difficulty of this trial is not fixed. Some are relatively mild, and even if you fail, you will only feel depressed for a while. Others are quite dangerous, and there are quite a few cultivators who perish in them or get lost in other dimensions!"

“We’re lucky. The room we’ve entered is a ‘safe house,’ with a 15-minute window of absolute safety. The doors on the four walls lead to different ‘trials,’ so we need to choose carefully.”

Having been stationed on the islands of the East China Sea for many years, she was no stranger to the "Taixiao Secret Realm." So when she saw that Zhao Chen didn't know much about the place, she immediately told him some information. After all, she was seriously injured and would probably have to rely on the masked man in front of her to get out alive.

She deliberately withheld some relatively important information as leverage, so as not to be abandoned by the other party.

Upon hearing this, Zhao Chen snapped out of his daze and asked in surprise, "The Taixiao Secret Realm is a projection of the 'special world' where Taixiao Daojun attained enlightenment within the Xuantian Heaven? In other words, all the 'Taixiao Secret Realms' in the East Sea area actually lead to this place?"

This is somewhat different from the intelligence he had previously gathered.

Su Xuanbing guessed what he was wondering about, which was a common misunderstanding among cultivators outside the Eastern Sea. So she patiently explained: "Because everyone who accidentally enters the 'Taixiao Secret Realm' has a different initial room and encounters vastly different spatial styles, they may think that they have entered a different 'secret realm'."

"But in fact, this 'other-dimensional labyrinth' is extremely large. Even a True Monarch who has reached the 'Ascension' level has entered here and failed to complete the entire labyrinth. Ordinary cultivators can only access even less of it."

I see… Zhao Chen nodded. Although he was somewhat concerned about the name “Otherworldly Maze,” he still asked the most crucial question first: “How can I pass the trial and get the ‘reward’?”

“Generally speaking, including the initial room, you will pass through at least three rooms and at most nine before arriving at a ‘settlement trial’ room. There, you can choose to claim your rewards and leave the ‘Taixiao Secret Realm’, or you can choose to accumulate your rewards and continue the trial.” Su Xuanbing did not hide this point, but simply said, “The rooms you encounter in between are all kinds of things, and it’s hard to explain them all at once. We’ll discuss them in detail when we encounter them.”

Zhao Chen knew that she was trying her best to demonstrate her value, but he didn't mind. This showed that she was sensible and knew when to advance and retreat, and at least wouldn't do anything stupid or hold him back at a crucial moment.

And he did indeed need to rely on the other party's "experience".

Seeing that the fifteen-minute safety time was about to expire, Zhao Chen naturally couldn't heal her wounds any longer. So he pointed to the four doors in front, behind, left, and right and asked, "Captain Su, which door do you think we should go through?" Su Xuanbing also took out a magic artifact cloak from her storage bag and put it on. Even though people from the martial arts world don't care about formalities, she couldn't keep dressing so revealingly in front of strange men.

"Do you recognize me?" Su Xuanbing gave the other party a meaningful look before shaking his head and saying, "What's behind the door is unknown until you open it and go in, so just choose one randomly."

She paused for a moment, then added, "There's also a saying that if you have something you clearly want, you can follow the guidance of fate."

Guidance from the unseen? While thinking about the "Sky-Gazing and Earth-Measuring Divine Mirror," Zhao Chen sensed the surroundings and indeed found that the door on the left-hand wall was more attractive to him than the other three doors.

He pondered for a few seconds, then stepped toward the room on his left.

Su Xuanbing quickly followed. Although she was still recovering from serious injuries, as a martial artist, she still had basic mobility and was even capable of fighting if necessary.

However, she did not conjure her own "Fire-Tipped Spear" at this moment, but instead held an oval-shaped shield with rune patterns engraved on its surface in her hand.

Zhao Chen glanced at it but didn't pay any attention. Instead, he pushed open the door before the 15-minute safety time expired.

The next moment, Zhao Chen and Su Xuanbing were swallowed by a white light. When they came to their senses, they found themselves on a vast ocean. If it weren't for the "walls" at the end of the surrounding space, Zhao Chen would have thought he had returned to Xuan Tian.

This room is more than a hundred times bigger than the "safe room"... Just as Zhao Chen thought of this, a monster more than five meters long, shaped like a shark but covered with tentacles, leaped out of the water, spewing out a thick cloud of blood-red mist from its gaping maw full of sharp white teeth.

Upon seeing the monster, Su Xuanbing quickly transmitted her voice, "This is the sea monster 'Vortex Bloodbeard,' with extremely strong regenerative abilities and a 'Blood Mist Puppet'-like divine power, which can..."

However, before she could finish speaking, she saw the masked man's sword flash like lightning, emitting an eerie cry, while a brown light landed on the monster's body.

"Gnarled branches obscure the sky and block out the sun and moon; a single blade cuts through the cycle of reincarnation!"
With just one sword strike, the creature called "Vortex Bloodbeard" was cleaved into thousands of pieces, and its so-called powerful regenerative ability was completely useless!
This is precisely the "Demon Wood Severing Sword Qi" from the "Nine Swords of Demon Wood"!
As an inner courtyard sword technique of the Demonwood Academy, Zhao Chen has not yet fully mastered this move and cannot reach the level of "gnarled branches covering the sky". However, it is still quite easy to "sever" the "life" of a mere sea monster that is only equivalent to a low-grade divine power.

Moreover, he was using the "Crimson Dragon Sword" from the "Crimson and Azure Dragon Scissors," and even without using sword techniques, the sheer power of the flying sword itself was enough to kill it.

(That's all for today. I'm almost better. I should be back to my usual routine by tomorrow.)

(End of this chapter)