Chapter 335: Sword Prison

Li Fei walked into a stretch of darkness.

On the surface of his body, there remained a protective barrier formed by the 'Dream-Commanding Order', making his entire person appear blurred and indistinct.

This protective barrier could help him mask heavenly secrets and hide his identity.

It could also keep him in a relatively invisible state within this subconscious world.

As long as he did not make contact with the existences in this subconscious world and did not go exploring secrets hidden deep within, it would be very difficult for him to be discovered.

This was also the strategy Li Fei had adopted when exploring subconscious worlds previously.

He was like an invisible man, walking quietly through someone else's subconscious, then leaving just as quietly, without leaving behind the slightest trace.

But that would not work this time.

This time, Li Fei was determined to stir up some commotion in this subconscious world; only then would he have a chance to pin down the one who was following closely behind.

He entered through the prison gate, passed through a dark corridor, and arrived at a great hall.

There were eighteen corridors in the hall, and at the gate of each corridor stood a guard holding a sword.

These guards were the 'vigilance' of this martial arts grandmaster's subconscious.

Not everyone's subconscious 'vigilance' took the form of guards; some might be a certain type of monster, or a trap.

And not every type of 'vigilance' would be very strong; it depended specifically on their realm.

The higher the realm, the stronger the spiritual power, and the stronger the control over one's self-consciousness, so the subconscious 'vigilance' would also be stronger.

This was also the reason why Li Fei had never infiltrated the subconscious of a martial arts grandmaster before.

At this moment, when he walked into this great hall, those eighteen sword-wielding guards did not look toward him, because he was still in an invisible state.

Li Fei looked around, chose a corridor at random, and walked straight toward it.

Just as he turned sideways to pass by the guard stationed at the corridor entrance, the opponent turned abruptly and drew their sword!

Swish—

A bright flash of sword light lit up in the dim corridor.

This was an excellent sword move; the sword technique, sword intent, and sword momentum were all top-tier!

It was just that, in Li Fei's eyes, this sword strike was too slow.

The sword light ultimately pierced into empty air, piercing through the afterimage Li Fei had left behind.

Li Fei ran toward the corridor without looking back.

With his current virtual thought intensity, combined with the Dream-Commanding Order, he could maintain the combat power of the Foundation Establishment stage in the 'Dream Realm', but he could not unleash Blood Soul Skills, and his physical strength, extraordinary abilities, and force were only about seventy percent of his original body's.

Fortunately, he could still use the Ten Thousand Blood Bead to bear damage for him; this was also the source of his confidence in daring to enter this subconscious world.

The corridor was very narrow, allowing only one person to pass.

On the left and right sides were rows of prison cells.

Li Fei's intent stirred, and a Ghost-Slaying Blade appeared in his hand. As he passed the cells, he casually slashed and shattered the gates of these prison cells!

What he wanted was to make a big scene and create trouble for that True Person from the Nightmare Sect behind him.

He did not know what was being held in these cells, but he figured they wouldn't be any 'good things'. If the pursuers behind wanted to chase him, they would have to face these 'things' first.

Rumble—

After Li Fei ran a certain distance and slashed open the gates of more than a dozen cells, the ground suddenly began to shake, and the entire prison emitted a massive roaring sound.

He felt something, looked up, and saw that the prison gates ahead had all opened!

A massive amount of malice was released from within these cells. Li Fei felt as if he saw an infinite sea of blood surging out from the deepest part of the cells, sweeping toward him!

The next second, the sea of blood vanished, and sword-wielding swordsmen appeared in front of Li Fei.

These swordsmen had strange and varied appearances, with different body types, the only similarity being that everyone exuded killing intent.

When these swordsmen appeared, Li Fei discovered that the force within his body had vanished, his implants could no longer be used, and his physical strength was also significantly weakened, probably only slightly stronger than an ordinary person.

This was the rule of this subconscious world.

Being in someone else's subconscious world meant having to abide by the rules of this world; this was also the greatest danger of infiltration, equivalent to fighting on someone else's home turf.

When the power within his body vanished, the rules of this prison, or rather this subconscious world, were clearly and plainly laid out before Li Fei—

Fight for your life with the sword!

Li Fei did not use a sword; he only had a Ghost-Slaying Blade in his hand.

He charged forward holding the blade.

A burly man with a face full of scars held a sword and thrust toward Li Fei. His expression was ferocious, he wore coarse linen clothes, his eyes were filled with killing intent, and he thrust with both hands holding the sword, as if he had poured all his strength into this one strike.

No regard for anything, no path of retreat!

Li Fei calmly swung his blade in a horizontal slash, hitting the middle section of the sword body, deflecting the strike. Then, the blade pressed tightly against the sword body, pushing forward rapidly, and Li Fei took the opportunity to close the distance with his opponent.

The next second, the upper half of the blade tilted forward, and the tip of the blade pierced into the opponent's neck.

Mountain-Pushing Style.

This was one of the two basic blade techniques Hao Yi had taught Li Fei back then, one being the Rolling Thunder Style, and the other the Mountain-Pushing Style.

After killing this swordsman, a segment of memory automatically flooded into Li Fei's consciousness:

This was a fragment of a young disciple wearing the Daoist robes of the Great Daluo Sect practicing sword techniques; the sword move he was practicing was exactly the move this swordsman had just used.

This memory did not affect Li Fei's thoughts; he continued forward.

Next, Li Fei advanced more than ten steps in a row, killing seven people in succession!

These swordsmen each mastered different sword moves; some were grand and open, some were exquisite and varied, some were treacherous and cunning, and some were indomitable.

And no matter what sword moves these swordsmen used, Li Fei only responded with two moves:

One Rolling Thunder Style, one Mountain-Pushing Style.

These two blade techniques Hao Yi taught him were meant to build his foundation, not some profound ultimate skill.

However, Li Fei had walked step by step to this day, experienced so many battles, and fought against so many powerhouses; he was no longer what he used to be, and even using only the most basic blade techniques was enough to resolve many opponents.

He was almost one-blade-one-kill, quickly resolving the swordsmen he encountered.

And every time he killed a swordsman, a segment of memory related to sword techniques would appear in his consciousness.

According to the rules of this world, fighting for one's life with the sword, Li Fei could obtain a segment of memory for every person he killed in this world.

However, the further he went, the strength of these swordsmen also began to increase:

The sword moves became increasingly formidable, and their physical fitness became stronger, gradually advancing from the level of being slightly better than ordinary people to the level of Body-Breaking stage martial artists.

Correspondingly, Li Fei's physical fitness also improved along with it.

But he could no longer manage to resolve an opponent with a single move.

Without using force, the two blade techniques Li Fei mastered were not considered very formidable, and he himself had not spent much effort studying pure combat techniques, so he gradually fell behind the appearing swordsmen in terms of technique.

However, the protective barrier brought by the Dream-Commanding Order was still on Li Fei; this protective barrier was like a suit of armor that had no weight and could provide all-around protection, which naturally gave Li Fei a massive advantage!

He was still advancing at an extremely fast speed, and as he obtained more and more memories, he finally knew whose subconscious this was—Master Qingxie.

It was precisely that martial arts grandmaster who had been ordered to pursue True Person Qingyu and ultimately beheaded him!

As one of the peak masters of the Twelve Peaks, True Person Qingyu's strength was already at the forefront among the True Persons of the Great Daluo Sect; since Master Qingxie could be sent out by Tai Yu to pursue True Person Qingyu alone, his strength was naturally not ordinary.

This martial arts grandmaster was proficient in sword techniques and primarily cultivated the Great Daluo Sect's "Great Prison Sword Scripture".

This was an ultimate martial art that pursued "performing the Dao through technique"!

Dao force was the unity of a martial artist's "essence, Qi, and spirit"; the vast majority of Dao force was the power of intent, which meant that "spirit" occupied the dominant position.

But the "Great Prison Sword Scripture" had "Qi" occupying the dominant position, pursuing the ultimate changes in force.

This sword scripture's pursuit of technique had reached an extremely perverted level!

"Controlling Qi by spirit, intent scatters and technique manifests."

This was the main theme of the "Great Prison Sword Scripture".

Ordinary martial arts all used the mind to dominate force and push the changes of force; the "Great Prison Sword Scripture", however, went against the grain, completely letting go of control over the mind, using the changes of force to guide the mind to change along with it.

But sword techniques were ultimately killing techniques; all changes in force were, in essence, for the sake of better slaughter.

Completely letting go of the mind's control and letting force guide the mind ultimately resulted in the killing intent in the heart becoming increasingly intense and increasingly difficult to suppress!

Therefore, before cultivating the "Great Prison Sword Scripture", one had to first build a "heart prison" to control one's killing intent.

But even so, the probability of suffering from qi deviation while cultivating this sword scripture was very high.

Today, in the entire Great Daluo Sect, only Master Qingxie alone had successfully cultivated this sword scripture.

In this subconscious prison, what was locked away was the killing intent deep in his heart, as well as those tempered and refined killing sword techniques that had pushed technique to the extreme!

When the combat power of the enemies Li Fei faced increased from the Body-Breaking stage to the Qi-Transformation stage, he began to feel the strain.

Opponents at the Qi-Transformation stage could already break through the protective barrier brought by the Dream-Commanding Order.

It was not that this protective barrier was too weak; it was just that it had become weaker under the suppression of the rules.

Without the advantage in defense, it was not easy for Li Fei to defeat his opponents relying solely on technique.

All along, Li Fei had not invested much energy into technique.

His speed of breaking through realms was too fast, and there were too many things to cultivate, which led to his obvious shortcomings in technique.

It was just that Li Fei had the Ten Thousand Blood Bead on him, allowing him to ignore the deficiencies in technique.

When others fought across realms, they relied on exquisite and peerless techniques, while he relied on having thick blood and not being afraid of getting hurt!

Of course, there were also various powerful Blood Soul Skills.

These things were like high walls, surrounding Li Fei.

Before breaking through these high walls, others simply had no way to attack his shortcomings.

At this moment, in this Sword Prison, facing the swordsmen projected by Master Qingxie using the "Great Prison Sword Scripture", facing the ultimate killing techniques, Li Fei truly realized how obvious his deficiencies in technique were compared to these true powerhouses.

Especially after obtaining those memories of Master Qingxie practicing sword techniques, Li Fei understood even more how poor his foundation was and how great the gap between him and his opponent was!

The more memories he obtained, the more he understood, and the more he could understand his own ignorance and weakness!

But there was no help for it; the time Li Fei had spent practicing martial arts was truly too short.

Breaking through realms could rely on the Ten Thousand Blood Bead, but the improvement of technique could only rely on time to slowly polish.

And Li Fei was only 18 years old this year.

His speed of advancing in the corridor became slower and slower, and he could clearly perceive the movement behind him.

That was Shen Zhen, who was chasing after him, and the speed at which she advanced was very fast!

If this continued, Li Fei being caught up with was only a matter of time.

Once caught up with, his identity would inevitably be exposed!

After being forced back by a swordsman with a fierce sword move, Li Fei stopped.

He suddenly realized that he had walked into a misunderstanding and had been misled by the rules of this world.

All along, he had not relied on technique to defeat strong enemies; that was not his strong suit.

Why should he use his own shortcomings to attack the enemy's strengths?

"Heh."

Li Fei suddenly laughed.

The pursuers behind were getting closer and closer, but he had completely relaxed.

He stepped forward, and dozens of sword lights bloomed ahead, like a peacock spreading its tail, exquisite and peerless!

But Li Fei completely ignored these sword lights, not thinking at all about what moves to use to dismantle or block them, and not looking for the flaws in these sword lights.

He simply and crudely plunged headfirst into this sea of sword light!

Letting the sword light pierce through the protective barrier on his body and pierce his vital points, Li Fei calmly slashed a blade at the enemy in front of him.

Swish—

A head flew up.

Li Fei stepped over this swordsman and continued forward.

Under the suppression of the world's rules, his strength was also suppressed, but the Ten Thousand Blood Bead was still there!

Powerful techniques and exquisite moves were indeed a path leading to the strong.

But there was not only one path to the summit.

"When I kill, a flat push is enough; what need is there for technique?"

Li Fei faced the beautiful sword light ahead and slashed up with his blade.

Two more chapters, requesting monthly tickets.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 336 =====