Mortal: My name is Ma Liang, and I also possess a magic brush.

Let's rewind to when Ma Liang first entered the tower.

He found himself in a strange space, where Xiang Zhili had vanished without a trace.

He propelled himself forward with his spiritual power for a few breaths, when the scene before him suddenly changed.

The next moment, the water completely engulfed him, and he fell directly into the water.

Caught off guard, Ma Liang choked on several mouthfuls of water and hurriedly conjured a protective shield to keep the water out.

He coughed violently twice, wiping the water from his face. "What's going on? How come such a beautiful tower has this body of water hidden inside?"

Jingzhe, hidden in his clothes, poked its head out and spat out several mouthfuls of water. Its round eyes were full of panic, and it was clear that it had also choked quite a bit.

"Go back to your spirit beast pouch and stay there. This place is too dangerous."

After saying that, he put the Awakening of Insects inside.

Only then did he have time to look around. The water was not dark at all, but rather had a clear light blue color with extremely high visibility, and the distant scenery was clearly visible.

The ball of light emitting a pale blue halo in the center of the water instantly caught Ma Liang's attention.

"Huh? What's that?"

He stared intently and saw that around the large sphere of light, there were many tiny spheres of light arranged in concentric circles, in a well-ordered manner, which was definitely not formed naturally.

"Could it be some kind of treasure?"

The thought had just crossed his mind when he forcibly suppressed his curiosity and first turned around in place to carefully examine his surroundings.

After seeing the scene clearly, he immediately concluded that he was still inside the tower, because he could vaguely see the outline of a wall several hundred meters ahead.

He knew very well that this place must have been expanded by spatial power.

After all, from the outside, the tower is not very large and could not possibly contain the water area of ​​nearly a mile in radius in front of it.

He looked around again and found nothing unusual except for the corals growing everywhere.

He approached the nearest clump of coral, reached out and touched it, and immediately a message came to his mind that the coral was not a spiritual object.

A wave of disappointment washed over him, and without further delay, he slid through the water and headed toward the large ball of light.

It seems that the only thing that might be hiding treasure in this body of water is that mysterious ball of light.

He arrived at the circle of small spheres of light first, and only when he got closer could he see them clearly.

These small orbs of light were being supported by a coral platform, and within the orbs, the outline of an object could be vaguely seen.

"It truly is a treasure!"

Ma Liang was overjoyed, but he didn't dare to reach out rashly. He knew the tower was dangerous, so he first broke off a section of coral and threw it at the ball of light.

With a loud "bang," the coral shattered instantly the moment it touched the outer edge of the light sphere!

Ma Liang was startled and quickly retreated several steps. "I didn't expect the restriction outside this sphere of light to be so aggressive!"

Ma Liang retreated a little further, condensed a water arrow, and shot it towards one of the small orbs of light.

To everyone's surprise, when the water arrow collided with the light sphere, it was not only not shattered, but was completely absorbed by the light sphere.

"Hey, what's going on here?"

He stared at the ball of light, frowning in thought, then looked at the large ball of light in the center.

The light sphere was so intense that its interior was completely obscured, making it impossible to see whether any treasures were hidden inside; all that could be seen was a thick mass of blue light.

He scanned the surrounding waters and suddenly realized: this layer was originally a water layer, filled with pure water-attribute power, and the water arrows he had condensed were of the same origin, so they would naturally be absorbed.

With this guess, and considering that he mainly cultivated water-attribute techniques, Ma Liang immediately understood.

He roughly guessed where Xiang Zhili had gone. The other party was probably teleported to a floor with a different attribute. After all, this floor was water, and the other floors must also have their own attributes.

The thought flashed through his mind, and he stopped worrying about Xiang Zhili's whereabouts, instead focusing on how to obtain the treasure inside the sphere of light.

He counted the small orbs and found there were twenty-five of them.

"Twenty-five...that's at least twenty-five ancient treasures!"

Ma Liang's eyes widened, and he was so hungry he was almost drooling. How could he miss such an opportunity?

Undeterred, he condensed several more water arrows and shot them at different small orbs of light, but the result was always the same.

The water arrows were completely absorbed by the light sphere, without even causing a ripple.

"Since water can be absorbed, can fire be used to control it?"

Ma Liang tried to condense a fireball, but as soon as the fireball appeared, it was extinguished with a "hiss" by the dense water-attribute spiritual energy around it, leaving not even a spark.

Undeterred, he tried several more times, but the spiritual energy at his fingertips was completely suppressed as soon as it transformed into fire attribute.

He gritted his teeth, took out a magical artifact, and shot it towards the small ball of light.

This time it wasn't absorbed, but as soon as the artifact touched the outer edge of the light sphere, it exploded into dust with a "whoosh," being directly dispersed rather than knocked away.

Spiritual energy of the same attribute will be absorbed by the light sphere, while spiritual energy of different attributes cannot be condensed at all, and even physical magical artifacts will be shattered.

"As expected of a technique left behind by ancient cultivators, this restriction is incredibly ingenious!"

"Since the small light sphere doesn't work, how about trying the large light sphere?"

Ma Liang dared not get too close, and only tried from a distance, and the result was exactly the same as the small ball of light.

He started circling the cluster of light spheres, but after several laps, he still hadn't found any useful clues.

Just as he was struggling with this problem, the large ball of light in the center suddenly burst out with a dazzling blue light with a "hum," and the surrounding waters instantly surged with turbulent waves. Caught off guard, Ma Liang was directly thrown away by a tremendous force!

The moment the immense force struck, Ma Liang had no time to react and was thrown backward uncontrollably.

Seeing that he was about to collide with the small ball of light behind him, he became extremely anxious. In the nick of time, Ma Liang had no choice but to suddenly summon his magic brush and slap it towards the small ball of light!

"Bang"

The ball of light suddenly exploded, and the violent water elemental power transformed into a surging shockwave that swept across the surroundings!

Ma Liang had no time to react. He was thrown into the air, and with a violent jolt, he spat out a mouthful of blood. The scarlet blood droplets mixed into the water and were instantly washed away by the current.

He tumbled in the water and eventually crashed into the rocks at the bottom.

The spiritual energy shield he had just condensed had been torn to shreds by the shockwave, and icy water was pouring into his mouth and nose, choking him and causing pain in his internal organs.

He suppressed the suffocating feeling, took out a talisman from his storage bag, and patted it on his chest.

The talisman flashed with golden light, and a golden barrier completely separated the water around him.

Only then did Ma Liang hunch over and cough violently, spitting out all the water mixed with blood and foam that had entered his lungs. He slumped onto the cold rock, panting heavily, his vision blurred from blood loss.

Just when he thought the crisis was over and was about to catch his breath, a tearing pain exploded from the depths of his mind!

Ma Liang's face turned deathly pale. He pressed his forehead tightly, feeling his sea of ​​consciousness churning. The divine pen connected to him had dimmed by more than half of its spiritual light, and the originally calm absorption speed of his divine sense suddenly increased several times, as if it was trying to pull his soul out.

Ignoring the excruciating pain in his chest, Ma Liang took out a handful of Soul Nourishing Pills from his storage bag and stuffed them into his mouth. The bitterness of the pills exploded on his tongue, but he didn't even bother to chew them, swallowing them whole.

One, two, three... until the fifth Soul Nourishing Pill was swallowed, the medicinal power spread and surged into the sea of ​​consciousness along the meridians, finally relieving the excruciating pain of the soul being torn apart, and the spiritual light of the divine brush also stabilized a little.

He slumped to the ground, staring at the divine brush in his mind, a wave of fear washing over him.

Once the pain in his mind finally subsided, Ma Liang's muddled consciousness cleared.

In the instant the orb of light exploded, he was so focused on defending against the impact that he forgot what was hidden inside the orb!

He forced himself to stand up and looked at the spot where the ball of light had exploded. Sure enough, on the underwater rock layer not far away, he saw an object that glowed with blue light, shaped like a scale, embedded in the crack of the rock.

Ma Liang remained cautious, condensing a thin water arrow and shooting it towards the object.

When the water arrow struck it, the scale-like thing merely twitched slightly, without any unusual reaction.

Only after confirming it was safe did he swim over and reach out to pick it up.

The moment the brush touched the cool, scaled surface, a message came from the divine pen in my mind.

This item is not scales, but an ancient treasure called the Frostwave Scale Shield.