CHAPTER 217: 217

After stepping out through the door to the cultivation fields, Michelle saw what she was expecting. Ivona was sitting on the ground, waiting for someone to show up, and Tenether was nestling next to her after delivering the message to the boss lady of the information guild.

"Michelle, where’s everyone else?" Ivona asked, standing up.

So Michelle explained what had happened while Ivona was still cultivating and asked her whether she wanted to join the fighting.

When Ivona agreed, Michelle led her into the fields. There, Ivona joined Anastasia and Pete. In other words, Pete gained another student to teach combat.

But unlike Anastasia, Ivona wasn’t starting with no combat experience at all. Since she was a child, she had been secretly cultivating and learning martial arts, so she had the basics of combat without any spirit energy.

Being three to fight the monsters, the group had to rearrange. Pete finally decided that Ivona and Anastasia would fight while he only observed everything from the side and instructed them.

And if especially powerful monsters appeared, he would interfere.

In the next few days, the space proved itself able to sense the number of people inside, because the power of the monsters suddenly became much stronger.

That meant Pete’s original plan had to be completely changed. Most of the time, the three had to work together to kill the monsters.

Some of the monsters that appeared could even use ground attacks, so the three had to constantly watch each other’s backs even though they weren’t surrounded.

But one thing remained the same: the monsters appeared in pairs of two every third day.

Even so, the group still had little time to rest, because sometimes the fights would drag on even to the next day. And in such fights, they usually got hurt, making them put in effort the next days to recover, so they weren’t exactly well-rested.

Meanwhile, Michelle was cultivating with bloodsuckers stuck to her all over. Even while her mind was sinking into the world of ice element spirit energy, she was still able to recognize the smell of blood in the air and notice it was getting stronger each day.

Once in a while, she would open her eyes, only to see the elegant white snow disappearing from around her. It was mostly covered by blood, both the monsters’ and the group’s.

Still, a white circle of untouched snow remained around Michelle, protected by the spirit energy swirling around her from how fast she was cultivating. Whenever blood flew at her, the spirit energy would push it away, not letting it stain her or the snow.

That all lasted for over a month until the group decided to go out. There, Kieran was waiting for them. He had just come out of his cultivation space the day before after he had reached the Divine rank. So everyone except Pete was on the same level. Michelle, too, was still a Divine Junior, because cultivating in the lower realm for three months wasn’t efficient enough for her to break through into the Apprentice level.

When the group came together, footsteps came from the hallway. Everyone guessed it would be Lavreth, but a young man appeared from behind the corner instead.

He swept his gaze over everyone and nodded at them in greeting. "I’m a disciple of the sect. William. Follow me." Then, he turned around and walked back in the direction from which he had come.

So Michelle and the rest followed him.

William led the group through the maze-like hallways until they reached the barrier of Heavenly Law. He passed through easily and waited for the rest to come through.

Everyone passed through easily and marveled at the abundance of spirit energy all around.

Only Michelle stayed behind. She still remembered how she ended up with a nasty wound on her forehead when she crashed into the barrier between the lower realm and the Land of Exile.

To prevent something like that from happening, she quickly put both her soul and spirit energy to work before pushing her hand through.

The barrier showed some ripples but let her pass through safely.

Seeing how Michelle had to use a special method to pass through, William narrowed his eyes. "It’s rare for someone to have such high affinity with creatures other than humans," he commented.

Michelle gave a light nod. Her Spirit Soul Blood had increased her affinity with monsters and beasts, so the barrier of Heavenly Law was mistaking her for a monster.

William led the group through a few more hallways before they reached a wide hall. "Here, you will take the disciple test. If you fail, you die."

Michelle stared into the hall and raised a brow. In the middle was a huge, invisible array formation. "Do we go one by one or all at once?" she asked.

William shrugged. "It doesn’t matter. The array will separate you."

The group looked at each other. Since the moment they entered the sect, there was no going back for them. So they had to proceed into the array formation.

Pete stepped forward first. He had no fear of death. He had been working under Alexander for far too long to fear something like that.

The rest followed him.

Until they walked into the middle of the hall, nothing happened. But once they were there, their gazes were blinded by light, and they lost consciousness.

When the five people fell to the ground, William walked out of the hall.

At the same time, two figures in an office were sitting in front of five spheres, each portraying a different scene. "Let’s see how well they do..." Mavreth was confident that all of them would pass the test. He just wanted to know how well they would do.

Sitting next to him, Lavreth was a bit skeptical. "Don’t cry if they all die there! And even if they don’t die, they can end up crippled and better off dead."

But Mavreth didn’t listen to him. Something else had captured his attention.

When Anastasia woke up, she found herself in a dungeon of sorts, with her leg connected by a long chain to a wall.

She looked around for a moment and froze when she saw a person standing in front of her cell. "Michelle?" she exclaimed in shock.

But Michelle showed a cold smile. "I have a new skill I want to test on you!" she said, making cold shivers run down Anastasia’s spine.

Anastasia understood something.

The person in front of her wasn’t the real Michelle Grace. It was a puppet created based on what she knew about Michelle.

It was terrifyingly similar to Michelle, but at the same time completely different.

Michelle and Anastasia were friends, so Michelle would never act like that toward Anastasia.

The Michelle in front of her was acting like the real Michelle would act toward her enemies: cold, ruthless, and ready to extort them.

Even though Anastasia knew it wasn’t the real Michelle, she still felt an unexplainable sense of fear.

To quickly get out of the situation, Anastasia tried to summon her soul energy but realized she couldn’t feel it. It was like her body had returned to the time before she started cultivating.

She wanted to try again, but before she could do anything, the strange Michelle opened the cell door and entered. "Then excuse me, please!" she said with a cold smile and placed her hand on Anastasia’s forehead.

The next moment, Anastasia felt a foreign spirit energy invade her brain, making her recoil in pain. "Stop!" she screamed, but the spirit energy didn’t stop flowing, making her feel like she would go crazy.

In the end, she fainted from the pain.

When she woke up, she saw Michelle again, wearing the same cold expression.

Before Anastasia could try to retaliate, Michelle placed her hand on her forehead again, and the pain returned. It wasn’t as terrible as before, but it was still tormenting.

Anastasia was unable to resist. She could only recoil in pain and wait for the sweet salvation of fainting.

And the process repeated. When she woke up, she was forced to undergo the process again and again. But with each repeat, the pain lessened a bit.

When the pain was bearable, and Anastasia thought the cycle was finally about to end, she suddenly felt the spirit energy hit her consciousness. Right after, images started filling her mind.

Memories of her life before entering the Imperial Palace in the Land of Exile.

Memories of being the old Emperor’s unfavored concubine.

Memories of plotting with the Crown Prince to get rid of the Emperor.

Memories of how Michelle took down both the Emperor and the Crown Prince.

And finally, the memories of being a death-row prisoner until Michelle decided to test her memory manipulation skill on her.

Overwhelmed by the new information and knowledge, Anastasia curled up on the ground. Staring up at the strange Michelle above her, she remembered that the real Michelle used to look at her the same way in the prison in the Land of Exile.

But one thing was still different. The real Michelle’s eyes were different. They were dancing with flames of war, but the Michelle in front of her had eyes devoid of emotion. It couldn’t replicate how the real Michelle looked at her.