Sanctuary Paradise

Chapter 877 Failure and Improvement

"So that's how it is! So that's how it is! The feeling of letting 'intuition' surpass 'thinking'!"

A burst of exhilarating laughter, as if suddenly enlightened, echoed from the pitch-black space, spreading along the dark boundary line to the distant horizon.

In the darkness, the black-haired youth laughed maniacally, as if he were venting all the frustration that had been building up in his heart.

"Phew... That's really true. Just like what 83203 said, there's absolutely no way to explain it with any logic other than relying on intuition."

More than ten minutes later, Xin Lailai, who was in the dark space, gradually calmed down. She looked down at the non-existent ground in front of her and a very complicated look appeared in her eyes.

'intuition'

This is the key to transforming the Star Realm into Star Intuition.

It wasn't a simple premonition, but a subtle feeling that even they themselves couldn't explain or articulate, and for which they couldn't find any reliable logic to explain it.

If I had to describe it, it's like feeling that you can do it, but not being able to explain why you can. It's something that, even if you describe it, you can only grasp through repeated experiences.

"As expected, the compatibility between a mage and their techniques is truly remarkable..."

Xin Lailai shook her head and sighed helplessly.

The boundary between life and death.

The Tower of Death's ability allows them to endlessly repeat the feelings they experienced during certain near-death moments, and amplify all their senses dozens of times. Even so, it took them a full 14 hours to capture that indescribable feeling.

Or rather, for them, who are mages, to be in a state of perfect mental clarity and force them to seek out a feeling that they themselves cannot even describe is simply too much to ask.

Fortunately-

"We finally succeeded... It was the opportunity to transform the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition."

Xin Lailai murmured, looking at her palm, her five fingers clenched tightly, a burning light flashing in her dark pupils.

Xingluo is intuitive.

They have now undeniably grasped that feeling, so all that remains is...

"Practice...?"

"Lai Lai, are you planning to transform right here?"

"Well, there are still six hours left before the maximum time limit for the Tower of Death expires, so it's a good time to verify whether our feeling was wrong."

"OK then……"

Xin Lailai said, and Ling Yuzi obediently nodded upon hearing this, then entered the spirit fusion state with her again, sat down cross-legged in the shared perception, and closed his eyes.

[Hint: "Star Realm" has been launched]

The next second, an invisible domain unfolded, encompassing an area within a radius of 6.5 kilometers into the minds of the two. Xin Lailai was experiencing this wonderful sensation while taking a deep breath. With a thought, the soul energy deep within her soul body surged rapidly.

Calm down, no, that's not right. What's needed now isn't calmness, but 'impulse'.

Focus, and focus again. Don't try to understand the information from the Star Luo Realm; instead, discard it all and replace thinking with intuition.

Don't overthink, don't overthink, empty your mind, feel yourself, imagine them as an omnipotent individual, use your instincts to manipulate the released 'senses', 'call back' and 'collect' them back.

In the pitch-black space, as Xin Lailai moved, an incredibly mysterious aura gradually rose from her body. She seemed to merge with her surroundings, slowly 'disappearing' from 'before our eyes,' until that aura reached its peak…

It's now! ! !

Om-! !

In an instant, Xin Lailai, who had been keeping her eyes tightly closed, suddenly opened them. At the same time, an extremely intense wave of soul energy began to ripple outwards, giving the impression that something had suddenly boiled over. A bright light also appeared in her eyes.

But in the next instant, the excitement in his eyes suddenly froze, transforming into an incredulous, bewildered, and blank look, followed immediately—

"puff!!!"

A crimson mist of blood bloomed, and Xinlailai coughed up a mouthful of blood. Within the soul body that was in the state of fusion with the elf, an extremely chaotic soul fluctuation suddenly erupted, and the aura of the person instantly weakened to the extreme.

"Cough cough...cough cough! There's actually...such a big difference?"

A violent coughing fit rang out. In the pitch-black space, Xin Lailai, whose seven orifices were constantly gushing blood, bit her eye and looked at the blood-stained vision in front of her with disbelief in her eyes.

Failed.

Without a doubt, they have grasped the key to transforming the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition, as evidenced by the phenomena just now and the 'intuition' he generated in Ling Yuzi's mind.

The key point is that, just now… after they actually tried to put this idea into practice, Xin Lailai suddenly realized that even if they found the right path, the process of transforming the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition was inherently difficult…

—It was far more terrifying than they imagined!!!
Yes, it wasn't just difficult, it was terrifying.

When they tried to transform the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition, the pressure at that moment and the endless, long process were like suddenly extending a person's senses by tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of times while they were being roasted by a raging fire. In just a few minutes, their willpower, which was already as high as 157 points, was worn down to the point of almost turning them into idiots. In the end, they could only rely on self-harm to forcibly break free from it.

"What...are we trying to do..."

Xin Lailai murmured, wiping the blood from her mouth twice. Her eyes flickered slightly, and for the first time, she felt such a strong sense of unease about Xingluo Intuition.

No wonder he thought that way. Based on his experience just now, if they really wanted to transform the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition, let alone with their current willpower, even if they added dozens or even hundreds of points to that, he felt that they might not be able to withstand the endless scouring sensation that would occur during the transformation process.

This is not something that can be accomplished by human effort alone.

Even without any evidence, that was their most direct feeling at that moment. It wasn't as simple as flipping over an ability; it was as if they were being asked to flip the whole world with their own will.

Can't do it.

This is the only conclusion that can be confirmed.

Even if they have found the right path, they simply cannot accomplish this feat in their current state.

Most importantly, if they are not mistaken, the difficulty of transforming the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition will only become more and more terrifying as their Soul Master and perception abilities increase.

—I need to confirm this with the expert 83203.

Finally, Xin Lailai suddenly raised her head, a solemn look appearing in her dark pupils.

Even if they were slow to react, they could now be certain that transforming the Star Luo Domain into Star Luo Intuition was not as simple as the descriptions they had learned from the documents.

At least, in all the materials he had reviewed, no one had ever mentioned encountering such exaggerated obstacles when transforming domain-based perception into intuitive perception.

Considering that their entire career system was planned by 83203, and that they unusually showed approval when mentioning this to the other party, what they are doing now... may really be touching some unimaginable taboos.

[Prompt: Communication failed. The target device has temporarily disabled normal communication functions.]

[Note: The current communication target has left messages, which have been automatically viewed.]

……

83203 "Auto-reply": "Undergoing experimentation, please do not disturb. Leave a message if needed, or contact us after 34:37:19." ...

"..."

Well, it seems we won't be able to get in touch with 83203 anytime soon.

Realizing that she couldn't contact 83203 for the time being, Xin Lailai withdrew her gaze, temporarily putting aside the matter of Xingluo Intuition, and calmly opened her eyes to look at the point of light at the end of the dark space.

[Note: Confirmation complete. 300000 Paradise Points deducted. You are about to enter the "Life and Death Realm" state...]

The next second, a cold notification sound came down, and the surrounding darkness surged in again, engulfing the black-haired youth's figure.

Although Xingluo sensed that there was no way to make further progress on this side for the time being, they still had nearly six hours left in their stay at the Tower of Death, so they naturally couldn't afford to waste it.

They had just accumulated quite a bit of insight into 'spatial slashing' during their previous 'Life and Death Realm', so they might as well take this opportunity to fill in all the remaining little bit in one go!

……

So, a day and a half later, on the second floor of the Land of All Beings.

Rustle~rustle~!

An invisible breeze, carrying a hint of the salty, damp sea air, swept across the isolated island, causing the trees to sway gently.

On the shallow waters at the edge of the island, a black-haired youth wearing a black and white energy cloak was slightly closed-eyed, holding a jet-black greatsword, sometimes dodging, sometimes parrying, sometimes slashing... as if he were fighting against some unseen enemy.

Moreover, upon closer inspection, one can see that every time the black-haired youth takes a step, several different-looking phantom souls appear on the sea in front of him, repeating his actions in similar but not identical ways.

As the phantoms of the souls multiplied, the black-haired youth's movements gradually became faster and faster. In just a few dozen seconds, the slow, Tai Chi-like movements at the beginning transformed into powerful swings that could stir up fierce winds with every move.

Buzz, rumble—! !

As the deafening roar subsided, and the oppressive aura surrounding the black-haired youth increased with each movement, the island beneath his feet and the sea before him seemed to sense something, trembling slightly under the increasingly heavy sword force.

Gradually, waves began to surge from the sea, transforming into giant waves hundreds of meters high under the influence of the phantom souls. These waves, carrying immense power, crashed towards the black-haired youth, and just as they were about to engulf him:

Zheng! ! !
A sharp, ringing sound, as if capable of splitting the entire world in two, rang out. A silver arc of light bloomed from the crest of the wave, freezing the crashing giant wave and the countless illusory souls in place. The next instant—

Boom——! !

A burst of pitch-black light erupted. As the black-haired youth's sword fell, the space in front of him suddenly shifted as if it had been moved, then rapidly collapsed into a massive spatial rift over 500 meters long and 30 meters wide, swallowing up all the waves crashing towards him.

"call……!!"

As the spatial rift appeared, the black-haired youth on the edge of the island let out a long sigh of relief and slowly opened his eyes. A cold and sharp gaze swept across his dark pupils, giving one the feeling that just meeting his gaze would result in being cleanly and decisively cut in two.

"In this way, this move can be considered completely perfected..."

After briefly confirming the effect of her previous strike, Xin Lailai looked down at the Abyss Ink in her hand, her gaze shifting slightly.

A spatial slash.

After gaining the last bit of inspiration for the spatial slash by using the "realm of life and death" in the Tower of Death, they came to the Land of All Beings without hesitation, trying to use the environment of the Land of All Beings to hone this slash as quickly as possible.

After nearly twenty hours of effort, they finally succeeded in completely mastering that occasional feeling of swinging and perfecting it to the point where it could be used in actual combat.

[Hint: Naming complete. The currently created technique has been renamed "Entangling Blade - Severing the Void"]

Light blue text scrolled by, revealing the name of the new move.

Entangling Blade - Severing the Void.

This was the name he and Lingyuzi debated for several minutes before deciding on it. It retained a certain air of sophistication while clearly and simply highlighting its characteristics.

"Spatial Slash... With this move, our techniques and moves can finally look somewhat like what a technique-based class should be."

Unlike their previous self-created moves such as Overlord Slash and Heaven Return, this time the Sky-Splitting Slash is created in a way that is extremely close to the process of a technique-based character learning a move.

The whole process revolves around going by intuition; even though they've grasped the concepts, they can't articulate the specific principles behind them.

The only thing that is clear is that its inspiration comes from the spatial suppression of the Void Shield and the energy cutting of the Greatsword Master, but how exactly it is combined into 'spatial cutting' is something that even they themselves can only give a subtle answer: 'It was done by feeling'.

As for the specific theories involved, the processes that occurred, the calculation results that conform to which formulas, and why the sword stance and protective energy can be combined to create a spatial cutting effect, etc., I cannot answer any of these questions.

Of course, these things aren't actually that important to them right now, because...

The most important thing right now is that they have mastered a method that can reliably produce the 'space cutting' effect!

"Spatial cutting... Even if we don't understand the specific principles behind it, as long as we extend our understanding around this point, we can definitely develop a lot of new space-related spells!"

On the sea surface, which had been calmed by the sudden severing of space, Xin Lailai, who had taken the initiative to approach, looked at the rapidly healing spatial rift in front of her with eyes full of fervor.

The spatial cutting effect controlled by autonomous consciousness.

For them, who are mages, simply understanding this fact is more important than anything else.

Even if one cannot explain the specific principles and precise details at the microscopic level, for a sorcerer, not understanding the principles does not mean that one cannot use them.

Just as ancient human civilizations did not understand the nature of fire and the intrinsic principle of friction generating heat, but were still able to develop various ways of using fire based on drilling wood, their attitude towards 'space cutting' is the same.

If they can properly develop and utilize their "Severing Space Slash," they will have essentially mastered the most crucial element of creating "spatial magic"—the ability to stably trigger specific spatial phenomena in a fixed manner—even before they have fully learned the various theories related to "spatial cutting."

"Hmm... Lai Lai! You think this is it? It's that bug that protagonists in novels often get stuck on—'stepping on their right foot and ascending to heaven'!"

Inside the soul space, Ling Yuzi, who was also experiencing a burst of inspiration, brightened up and said excitedly. Xin Lailai, upon hearing this, was taken aback, and her eyes also lit up.

Believe it or not, although it's unbelievable, in terms of the outcome, their current situation really does have a bit of a "stepping on their own feet to ascend to heaven" feel to it!

It should be noted that 'spatial cutting' is a skill that only a fifth-tier mage can fully understand and utilize. For them, who are only third-tier mages, mastering it is not as difficult as climbing to the sky, but it is certainly no easier than perfecting 'Crystal Star Devouring Technique'.

But now, relying on the "I think" mode of the Technique system, they have mastered methods that ordinary mages could not possibly master at this stage, and are about to develop more spells that should not be mastered at this stage based on this. Even in Paradise, this situation is absolutely outrageous.

"A chemical reaction resulting from cultivating techniques and spells simultaneously? Hmm, wait, could it be...!"

Within the Land of All Beings, Xin Lailai was lost in thought as usual, then, as if suddenly realizing something, her breath caught in her throat, and a look of surprise and doubt appeared in her eyes. And just then—

[Notification: You have a new message to view, from sender: 83203]

……

83203 (Academic Sect): "Come directly to the Academic Sect."

83203 (Academic Sect): "Now that you've come this far, it's time to make some things clear to you about your career paths."

……

(End of this chapter)