Chapter 240: Insight into Weakness

Li Hu's brain crashed.

He stared blankly at the giant beast, at the four snarling, as if erased by a cosmic eraser, voids on its chest, and at the black crystals and bone spines that were sprouting from those voids in a manner that defied physics, logic, and every damn common sense.

"Lao Zhang's…" his Adam's apple rolled, his voice dry as if about to smoke, "I've got something to tell you, don't be scared."

Zhang Mei clutched the two children tightly, her face pallid, but her gaze fixed on the battlefield; she squeezed a single word from between her teeth: "Speak."

"I think… this is no longer a battle we can comprehend." Li Hu massaged his temples, feeling his worldview being ground against the ground repeatedly, "That old man, Old Wang, seemed to have taken the opponent's top birdmen's technique as a snack. Did you see? He ate it! Not only ate it, but judging by his expression, he seemed to think it wasn't flavorful enough, so he added some cumin and chili powder, giving himself a second upgrade!"

Zhang Mei ignored Li Hu's ramblings, but her slightly trembling shoulders revealed her inner extreme unrest.

"Brother!" Wang Zhitao's roar pulled everyone's attention back. He stared at his grandfather's grim visage, his heart in knots, yet the massive formation's force pinned him to the spot, forcing him to watch helplessly.

Yet Wang Zhize, at the eye of the storm, remained unusually calm.

Grandfather blocked a certain‑death strike for him.

This mountain‑heavy guard didn't break him; instead it acted like the most potent tranquilizer, instantly clearing all stray thoughts. The Black Jade Slip in his hand, now warm rather than cold, felt like a beating heart.

Buzz—

Only he could hear the slip's faint hum.

Before his eyes, the world changed.

It was no longer Shuijingdongxue, no longer monsters and enemies. Instead it was an ocean of countless slender, fragile threads, each flashing different lights. Those threads were the "laws" of this space.

And just now, those four lethal attacks, in his eyes, were four wildly braiding black lines tangled with the overbearing wills of "Termination," "Withering," "Isolation," "Oblivion," forcibly stabbing into this ocean.

Now, grandfather, that giant beast, using its own body, literally "swallowed" those four black lines.

Wang Zhize can "see" that inside his grandfather's body is no longer flesh and blood, but a more chaotic, more primal storm of laws. He is tearing, chewing, digesting those four black lines in an incomprehensible way.

And in that process, in Wang Zhize's "vision," the four Shadow Guards again activated their Magic Artifacts, becoming crystal clear.

He saw!

Those four black lines representing their attacks, at the moment of formation and launch, were not flawless. To maintain their own "concept" stability, a minute, almost negligible repulsive force existed between them, like four magnets forced together; even when bound, the like poles always retain a repulsive "gap."

That gap is the loophole!

A loophole that under normal circumstances could never be exploited, a theoretical one.

But now… it's different.

Wang Zhize said nothing; he simply used the Black Jade Slip in his hand to convert the coordinates of that "gap," the tiny "flaw" at the law‑interweaving point he "saw," into the purest intention and sent it out.

The receiver was his grandfather.

"Huh?"

The massive body of the beast Wang Shan paused slightly, and in its chaotic beast eyes, a flash of insight seemed to pass. It wasn't the light of wisdom, but more like a top predator finally instinctively recognizing its prey's most lethal weakness.

"He's done for! His body is collapsing!" the Shadow Guard captain saw the twisted wounds on Wang Shan and took them as signs of the opponent's imminent death, a cruel grin spreading across his face, "Now! With all force! Erase him completely!"

The four Shadow Guards, suppressing the Counter‑Devouring backlash from their Magic Artifacts, again drained their mana and activated their respective "concepts"!

"Termination!"

"Withering!"

"Isolation!"

"Oblivion!"

Four invisible death laws howled out once more!

This time, the beast Wang Shan didn't hard‑receive.

He moved.

The movement looked absurdly clumsy, just the massive body shifting ever so slightly… to the side while staying in place.

Like a person, to dodge an oncoming mosquito, unintentionally tilting the head.

Yet that very motion made the whole battle turn absurd in an instant.

The iron nail imbued with "Termination" had originally aimed at Wang Shan's heart. But as Wang Shan shifted, its target in front became the invisible barrier attempting to "Isolation" Wang Shan from Wang Zhize.

Puff!

A light sound.

The "Termination" iron nail precisely "terminated" the "Isolation" law.

The Shadow Guard who released the "Isolation" law's body jolted, as if his link to the world had been abruptly severed, spitting out a spray of blood mist, his gaze instantly vacant.

"Old Three! What are you doing!" the Shadow Guard captain roared.

The Shadow Guard called Lao San looked bewildered, having no idea what had happened!

Before they could react, the battle on the other side grew even stranger.

The "Withering" leaf drifting toward Wang Shan was lightly flicked by a newly grown bone spine. On the spine clung the lingering aura of the "Oblivion" law he had just "digested."

The two brushed lightly.

The "Withering" leaf seemed to instantly "forget" its mission to wither all things. It lost all its luster, becoming a truly ordinary dead leaf, drifting lightly to the ground.

The Shadow Guard manipulating the leaf felt a "buzz" in his mind, as if an important memory had been ripped away, staring blankly at his hands, for a moment unable to recall what he had just intended to do.

"Bastard! What the hell are you doing!" the Shadow Guard captain was on the brink of madness.

One of his subordinates inexplicably attacked another, while the other stood like a fool, staring blankly.

Only his own attack, the "Oblivion" finger bone, still steadfastly shot toward the beast.

But the beast merely stretched a massive claw and swiped it away in front of him.

That swipe happened to sweep the "Termination" iron nail, whose power had been greatly reduced after Counter‑Devouring a companion, toward them.

"Oblivion" met "Termination."

The two equally overbearing concepts collided silently in midair, vanishing.

The Shadow Guard captain, as if struck by lightning, staggered back several steps, his hand gripping the finger bone trembling violently, his palm split open, blood gushing.

The entire battlefield fell into a strange silence.

Four late‑stage Golden Core Shadow Guards launched a coordinated lethal strike, not even grazing a single hair of the opponent, but their side devolved into a chaotic mess, with everyone wounded.

From afar, Li Hu opened his mouth wide enough to fit an egg.

"I… I… damn…," he choked out after a long pause, finally managing two words, then turned his head toward Wang Zhitao, "Your brother… is he cheating backstage? He's reporting points to your old master! Aim and strike! No, that's not aim and strike, that's making the other side hit themselves!"

Wang Zhitao couldn't comprehend the subtlety, but he sensed a strange link forming between his brother and his grandfather. The great array's operation, due to the Shadow Guards' Counter‑Devouring of the law, was not weakened; instead it absorbed the stray chaotic energy, becoming even more solid!

"No… not right…"

The Shadow Guard captain finally snapped out of his shock, staring intently at the youth standing in the center of the great array, his face pallid and a streak of blood hanging from his mouth.

He finally understood.

It wasn't the monster that had become clever.

The monster was still the same creature that only knew destruction and protection.

It was that youth!

He was the one commanding!

He was not only directing the monster; he was also directing the space, directing the laws they were unleashing!

This seemingly most fragile Foundation Establishment cultivator was, in this dire place, the true… master!

"Kill him!" the Shadow Guard captain mustered all his strength and let out a hysterical scream; he no longer stared at the mountain‑like, insurmountable beast, but pointed his already cracked finger bone toward Wang Zhize.

"Ignore that beast! Kill the little one first! He's the Array Eye! He's the source of all our trouble!"