CHAPTER 272: 272

Michelle deeply hoped for the shadow essence to be unable to pass through the ice walls.

But there was no god to hear her prayers. No one to grant her wishes.

When she sensed the shadow essence, she could feel it flowing around like a fluid, passing through the ice walls as if they didn’t exist.

She was in deep trouble.

Quickly, she got back to moving.

Because she had moved far enough from the shadow creature, she had enough time to sense the shadow essence, but nothing more. She had to dodge again.

While dodging, she closed in on the shadow once more.

Her spirit and soul energy couldn’t affect it in any way, so she had to gain back her shadow essence. But before doing that, she wanted to see to what extent her physical attacks could affect the creature.

Michelle swung her fist at the shadow and succeeded in landing a punch on its stomach.

But it just stepped back ever so slightly, not really affected.

An idea popped into Michelle’s head, but before realizing it, she had to dodge another attack, which forced her a bit further from the shadow.

That made Michelle frown. The shadow was a strange copy of herself, so why was it avoiding close combat? She was an expert in close combat. The shadow should have been too.

That could only mean that the shadow had some kind of weakness in close combat.

A smile crept to Michelle’s lips. She had a guess as to what the weakness could be.

Coating herself in both spirit and soul energy, she had them rage within her body, making sure it reached every single place. Then, she stared at the snake-like form flying at her.

This time, she didn’t dodge.

And what happened next was exactly the same as when Michelle tried to slash the shadow with her sickle. The attack just passed through her.

Michelle wasn’t made out of soul and spirit energy, so, going by the rules, it shouldn’t have been possible. The snake form should have struck her hard.

But that could only happen if one didn’t consider the fact that Michelle had a shadow dantian.

When she let her spirit and soul energy surge around her body, she let them stimulate the shadow dantian, so it started trying to suck in shadow essence.

It couldn’t do that because the spirit and soul energy were blocking it, which only increased its suction power.

And when the shadow snake forms got close, the shadow dantian sensed it. The moment it touched Michelle’s body, the shadow dantian tried to suck it in.

That was how it entered Michelle’s body.

But the shadow dantian couldn’t absorb it, because the shadow energy forming the snake form already belonged to someone.

Still, it was already inside Michelle’s body. It wouldn’t just leave.

And with how much momentum it had from flying at Michelle, it continued forth like Michelle didn’t exist, coming out through her back. But she wasn’t harmed in the least.

Michelle knew that if she stopped stimulating the shadow dantian, it would stop trying to suck in the shadow snake form, and it would get stuck in her body, harming her. So she kept her spirit and soul energy on a rampage.

The shadow didn’t exactly understand what was going on, but it understood that its shadow forms couldn’t affect Michelle. So it quickly retracted the one that had gone through. It wouldn’t risk Michelle using it to defeat it.

But Michelle had already cooked up a plan. It wouldn’t kill the shadow, but she would have enough time to cultivate back some shadow essence.

Lunging at the shadow creature, she coated her arm in so much soul and spirit energy that the air crackled around her hand.

The moment she got in front of the shadow, she sent a punch at its chest.

The shadow wasn’t affected in the least. Michelle’s hand passed through it just like the shadow form had passed through her.

But Michelle didn’t stop there.

Once her hand was inside the shadow, she retracted her spirit and soul energy back into her dantian.

When her hand returned to normal, it could affect the shadow.

Michelle couldn’t tell how the shadow felt, but she knew it couldn’t be comfortable. Her hand had formed an opening in its chest.

It was quite clean.

No blood or gore.

Because the hand was there before the opening, it blocked any blood from coming out.

But Michelle didn’t leave it that way. She started jerking her hand from side to side, widening the hole in the shadow.

Then, it became clear the shadow didn’t have blood. Nothing spilled out. But it could definitely feel the pain.

Each time Michelle jerked her hand, it twitched ever so slightly.

To protect itself, the shadow sent a punch at Michelle’s face. It was still under the belief that its shadow forms couldn’t affect Michelle, otherwise it would have struck her with one.

Upon receiving the punch, Michelle jerked her hand within the shadow even more. That was a clear threat.

But the shadow knew that if it let Michelle continue, she would tear it apart from the inside.

So it started sending a barrage of punches at her.

That just led to Michelle widening the wound.

But when it was big enough, the shadow quickly jumped back.

It wasn’t in a condition to fight. It needed a moment to recover. But Michelle was already lunging at it.

It quickly sent her flying with a punch, before closing its eyes to recover.

Landing in a corner of the ice box, Michelle smiled.

That was exactly what she needed. She knew that if she suddenly just sat down to cultivate, the shadow wouldn’t let her. But if she made it seem like she had a hard time getting up, it could overlook her while it was recovering.

Quickly closing her eyes, she started cultivating shadow essence. She needed to break into the Junior rank within minutes.

She was hoping that since she had broken through into that level once, the second time would be easier.

And she was right.

It took about an hour for the gaping hole in the shadow’s chest to close enough for it to move freely, and it took about fifty minutes for Michelle to break into the Junior level.

Maybe it was even affected by the fact that just a while ago, her shadow dantian was stimulated and irritated into sucking in shadow essence but wasn’t able to. So when it got the chance, it showed inhuman speed.

Michelle didn’t mind. She was quite happy. She could finally stand up against the shadow.

The shadow didn’t have the time to think about why Michelle didn’t stand up after being punched.

Unlike Michelle, it didn’t have insane healing abilities. That didn’t get copied into it. So the only thing it could do was mend itself with shadow essence, as if sewing itself shut.

From the start, it knew it would take a while, so when it punched Michelle, it used the knowledge it got from her and struck in a way that would paralyze her for a while.

With Michelle’s healing abilities, she didn’t even notice she was paralyzed.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t paralyzed.

She was, but her body fixed itself while she was cultivating. After the fifty minutes of cultivation, she was already long back to normal.

When the shadow saw Michelle stand up, it quickly stopped healing itself. It was already in a state where it could fight again.

At the moment, Michelle’s bloodthirst wasn’t around.

The shadow didn’t even have the time to notice when it disappeared, because Michelle had slowly retracted it as she cultivated.

But because it was gone, the shadow got its agility back.

It wanted to use that.

Michelle didn’t even have the time to marvel about having her shadow essence back when a black figure flashed past her.

With a smirk, bright red returned to her left eye. Finally something she could enjoy properly.

Blocking the shadow’s strike, she started gathering shadow essence on her hand and around her. And to that, she started pulling in even more shadow essence.

The shadow panicked. It hadn’t noticed Michelle had regained her shadow essence until she showed it herself.

But there was one problem. For the shadow.

It was made to fight those without shadow essence. It was made out of shadow essence.

If the opponent suddenly gained shadow essence, the shadow would end up in dire trouble.

As Michelle felt new shadow essence getting stuck to her own shadow essence, her eyes narrowed.

The red disappeared from her eyes in disappointment. She was hoping for a good fight, but it seemed she wouldn’t get it with the shadow.

Made out of shadow essence, when her own shadow essence started attracting foreign shadow essence, the shadow creature started falling apart. It was slowly getting pulled into the mass of shadow essence gathered around Michelle.