Ryu rose from his position, feeling refreshed. He swept a gaze toward Mae who had drifted off into a land of dreams and eventually decided on something. With a flip of his palm, he took out some beddings and pillows before laying her on the ground.
As far as he was concerned, she was his woman now even if she wasn't his wife, and as such he wouldn't be so callous as to ignore her comfort. He didn't need to love her, but so long as she didn't betray him, anyone wanting to do harm to her would die beneath his wrath. This was simply his pride and his Dao Heart as a man seeking the pinnacle the world.
Ryu turned toward the center of the room once again. Despite the intensity of their "two" battles, this place was practically unharmed outside of a few scratches. Considering the fact both Ryu and Mae had battle prowess bordering on a Fragmented Sky God of the Third Heaven, the fact that this room could remained untouched meant that the origin of this Sect was almost assuredly beyond the Third Heaven.
This made sense. Although the Ruins of the Heavenly Path were usually less valuable than the Inheritances, they wouldn't be shabby either. While Ryu didn't have affinity with them, none of the other Ruins that he had cleared until this point could be considered to be weak. In the hands of the right person, they could display quite a bit of strength.
Once again, Ryu found himself before the three jades. Before, he was only a bit confident, but now he was even more so. It could be said that Mae's boost to his soul had come in timely fashion.
There was only one major realm separating the two of them with Mae being at the Lower Divine Pedestal Realm. Even so, the benefit Ryu had gained from her was not small, although not as exaggerated as he was used to. Who asked Ryu to have bedded so many women who were so much more powerful than himself?
Another reason he had benefitted greatly was because Mae was already in the Lower Soul Ascension Realm, a leap upward from Ryu's current Soul Refinement Realm. If she had been conscious enough to take note of Ryu's soul strength, she would have been shocked to realize that the two of them weren't at the same realm of the soul like she had always assumed.
Ryu found his position in front of the jades and exhaled a breath. Suddenly, his gaze sharpened and a strong pressure descended all at once.
Before the situation seemed to change and the ripples spread very far, Ryu snatched out three times in succession with lightning quickness.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Every time he reached out, he did so with such quickness that the air exploded beneath his might.
Just like that, all three jades appeared in Ryu's palm, a sneer curling his lips. Since this Ruin wanted to play games, he could play games too. The Time Affinity was so impossibly rare that most mechanisms simply didn't have contingencies for them. Just standing within a time distortion would probably allow Ryu to bypass 99% of all formations in existence.
Even amongst exceptionally powerful formations, the amount of extra resources, and especially rare resources, that would be needed to deal with the manipulation of time simply wasn't worth the cost given the risk associated.
Ryu wouldn't be surprised if he could count the number of time manipulators in all of existence on just a single hand. No matter how powerful this Sect or Clan, the likelihood that they would be prepared for Ru was minimal, and he was proven correct.
Before Ryu looked at any of the jades, he did a quick check to see if there were any extra mechanisms in place. It would be a shame if he got this far just to fumble it all at the finish line, but luckily there was nothing remaining so he finally took a peek at the first jade.
Ryu's gaze remained placid for a long while before it flickered with a peculiar light. This Sect was indeed quite… special.
This Sect was known as the Unbalanced Art Sect. This first jade did nothing else but introduce the Sect and its core tenants, or at least that's what it seemed like on the surface. Considering the unorthodox nature of how this Sect did things, Ryu wasn't ready to just accept everything at face value just yet. There was a good chance that he had missed something.
The second jade, however, was even weirder. Rather than talking about the history and the establishment of the Sect, it was nothing but a set of calligraphy pinups, but the issue with this calligraphy was that… They lacked any air of refinement at all.
Ryu wasn't sure about his standard in comparison to the True Martial World, but back in Sacrum, he was most definitely a calligraphy master. Even if things weren't so exaggerated here, he should still be able to tell the difference between good calligraphy and bad calligraphy, and this… this was horrible calligraphy.
Not only did it lack any air of refinement, but even the letterings were amateurish. Although they couldn't be said to be ugly, they weren't nice either. Even a mortal could do better, let along an immortal with perfect control over their bodies.
The final jade was the only one that seemed to have something useful. It was filled with formations, but these formations seemed to be completely unorthodox, but likewise extremely powerful. In addition, they seemed to be able to achieve things that other formations could not. As someone who could also be considered a Formation Master, Ryu was greatly intrigued as well. However, there was still nothing groundbreaking.
Still, the situation was too odd.
Could it be that the first two jades were entirely useless? That would make sense if the person crafting this place wanted to rely on Karma as the final test, but even so, why not keep the jades blank, then? Did someone so powerful really have such a poor sense of humor?
How did this history lesson, this bad calligraphy, and this catalogue of formations link together?
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