After being reborn, all I want to do is run away.

Chapter 70 Crisis of Trust

As he stirred his palm in the mist, Shen Xu carefully felt the feedback from the mist around his hand. He certainly wouldn't have been able to do this before.

But after experiencing the world of water droplets, his sensitivity to the slightest disturbances in the mist increased even further. Therefore, he could clearly feel the direction of the mist's flow after being disturbed by his palm.

Because the tiny water droplets in the fog are in a special state, they are not connected to each other, but are connected as a whole in a special way. Every external disturbance will cause the whole to flow. The stronger the disturbance, the stronger the flow of the whole, and vice versa.

Some of the subtle movements were invisible to the naked eye, but Shen Xu, who possessed the essence of water, could clearly sense them. He guessed that the young man in white was predicting his movements and attack direction by observing the changes in the direction of the flow within the mist.

Although the principle is simple, there are still many difficulties to overcome in practice. First, he needs to concentrate to clearly perceive the change in the direction of the fog's flow, but he cannot maintain such a high level of concentration on the fog during a battle with the young man in white.

Secondly, even if he sensed the change in the direction of the fog's flow, it would take some reaction time to accurately judge this information as the opponent's attack intention.

But one must take things one step at a time. His first priority was to buy himself time to decipher the information hidden within the mist amidst the white-robed youth's attacks. This required him to constantly familiarize himself with the youth's attack methods and hone his own swordsmanship…

Having set his goal, Shen Xu no longer hesitated and walked toward the white-robed youth with his sword in hand.

Each failure, each time feeling the threat of death.

At first, Shen Xu thought the young man in white wouldn't kill him, so he thought of using a life-for-life exchange method to fight him, but later he realized he was terribly wrong.

During the battle with the white-robed youth, he sustained countless bloody and gruesome wounds. If it weren't for the presence of the Blood Intent, he would have bled to death.

Moreover, on several occasions, he had to use his Yuanqi sword technique to disperse the white-robed youth in order to escape danger.

This led Shen Xu to approach each exchange with the mindset of risking his life; every move felt like a step towards the gates of hell. He also couldn't always manage to unleash his Yuan Qi sword techniques.

It's unclear how much time has passed, but Shen Xu's entire body is now covered in wounds. His once-flowing robes are now tattered and stained with blood and dust; horrifying wounds crisscross his body, making him look utterly wretched; even his once flowing long hair has been cut off without hesitation by his sword to avoid hindering the fight, leaving him with a messy head of short hair.

Even in his disheveled state, Shen Xu's eyes gleamed with extraordinary excitement. Holding his longsword, he fearlessly met the menacing white-clad youth's attacks time and again, his sword flashing like lightning, creating gusts of sharp wind.

In an instant, white mist billowed and churned throughout the circular arena, sword light flashed and dazzled, sword shadows flew and intertwined, dazzling the eyes, and in the blink of an eye, the two sides had already clashed seven or eight times.

With each change of move and each counter-move, Shen Xu used the shifting mist to predict where the white-robed youth's next sword strike would appear. But Shen Xu was not the white-robed youth; even with the ability to read the information within the mist, there were times when he couldn't react in time.

As the white-robed youth's sword flashed through the air like lightning, Shen Xu, though already on guard, was still a beat too slow. As a result, another deep sword wound appeared on his body, instantly staining his clothes crimson with blood.

He was now wounded on top of wounds, old injuries not yet healed and new ones added, but this pain was less than a tenth or a twelfth of what he felt when he first entered the Cloud Bamboo Realm, especially with the added boost from the Blood Intent. Even if it meant trading blows, he could kill the white-robed youth, but the problem now was that the white-robed youth was also using the mist to predict his movements, making it difficult for him to hit him.

It was a complete level of dominance. His swordsmanship was far inferior to that of the white-robed youth. Even though they both used the "cheat" of mist, he was still often at a disadvantage in their fierce battles.

This deadly exchange had been repeated countless times, yet no matter how hard Shen Xu tried, he couldn't budge the white-robed youth even an inch. On the contrary, the white-robed youth kept inflicting new wounds on him, making Shen Xu feel both frustrated and angry.

He wasn't without a way to win the duel, namely by using the "Nine" method of sword fighting, but that would no longer be a fair duel, which would be equivalent to him openly cheating. If he really did that, he would despise himself.

Thinking of this, he decisively gave up the duel with the white-robed youth and came outside the circular area. He had previously discovered that as long as he was not in the circular area, the white-robed youth would return to the center of the area and re-enter standby mode.

His condition today is very strange. In the past, the idea of ​​using the power of blood would never have come to mind during his battle with the young man in white.

Because fighting the young man in white was dangerous, he always gave it his all in every duel. But today he was distracted, and that distraction would allow the young man in white to find an opening. He was no longer fit to continue fighting the young man in white.

The reason was that he had been trapped by the young man in white for too long. As he gradually achieved his goals, defeating the enemy remained a distant prospect, and he no longer knew what he could use to defeat the young man in white.

"Where exactly is the problem?" Shen Xu couldn't help but feel somewhat frustrated.

"Logically speaking, since Master Qingzhu arranged this kind of situation, I should be able to defeat him through the mist. Why is it a stalemate?"

"Stalemate!" Shen Xu suddenly realized something.

Both men use the mist to predict each other's movements. He knows what the young man in white will do, and the young man in white will naturally know what he will do as well. So the situation will soon fall into a delicate stalemate.

This is why, whenever the standoff lasted for a while, the young man in white was always able to keenly spot his weakness and seize the opportunity to attack. This is the root cause of why he was repeatedly injured in his many battles with the young man in white.

Therefore, if he wants to win against the young man in white, he needs to rely on the fog, but he can't rely on the fog entirely. The fog is just an auxiliary means; the key factor in victory or defeat is still the person.

Shen Xu took a deep breath and stepped into the circular area again. His sword instantly transformed into a streak of cold light, shooting straight towards the white-robed youth like lightning.

At the same time, the fog conveyed an important message to him—the white-clad youth had shifted slightly to the left. Based on past experience, this usually meant that the white-clad youth intended to dodge to the left.

In the past, if faced with such a situation, Shen Xu would most likely have switched from rapier to sword swing without hesitation, forcing the young man in white to parry and defend.

But this time, just as he was preparing to swing his sword to the left, his mind shifted, and the power of water spread out, instantly dispelling the surrounding mist.

As the fog dissipated, the view suddenly opened up. Shen Xu's eyes were like torches, locked tightly on the figure of the white-clad youth. The original slashing motion was cleverly changed direction, transforming into a sharp upward sweep.

In an instant, the sword light soared into the sky, whistling through the air as it arrived!

With a clang, the white-clad youth's right hand, which was raised to defend with his sword, was severed along with the sword he was holding.

Without his sword, the white-clad youth was at Shen Xu's mercy. Sure enough, not long after, Shen Xu swiftly and decisively severed the youth's head.

As the head rolled to the ground, the scattered body parts of the white-robed youth transformed into three thick wisps of mist, which quickly converged together. However, these three wisps of mist did not linger for long, disappearing without a trace in the blink of an eye, merging into the vast, boundless mist surrounding them.

Seeing the way the young man in white died, Shen Xu seemed to see the consequences of his blind trust in the mist. This was perhaps one of the purposes of Qingzhu Zhenren's arrangement of this trial—over-reliance on the sense of security brought by the mist would only lead to destruction.

Thinking of this, Shen Xu bent down and picked up the bamboo sword that the young man in white had dropped on the ground. Upon closer inspection, he was surprised to find that there were no numbers engraved on the sword.

Just as he was puzzled by this, the originally thin fog around him suddenly began to churn violently, like surging waves, and once again enveloped the entire circular area.

Suddenly, everything went black before his eyes, and he fell heavily to the ground.