Chapter 226: The Lightning Chaser

Boom!

A group of rogue cultivators were bombarded by lightning.

Seeing this, Pang Jian charged in head first, with only a thin, green protective shield for defense.

A rogue cultivator stared at him in horror. The rogue cultivator, Qin Le, was the same one who had previously advised Pang Jian to maintain his protective shield at all times.

He found it unbelievable that a maniac like Pang Jian would voluntarily throw himself into the fray of the white crane's attacks.

Crackle!

Bolts of lightning penetrated Pang Jian's green protective shield Pang Jian and struck his body.

At first, it was only one or two bolts, then two or three, and eventually...

Pang Jian's protective shield shattered.

His skin glowed a faint silver as lightning surrounded his body. Gritting his teeth, Pang Jian endured the continuous barrage of lightning.

"This man..." Qin Le looked at Pang Jian like he was out of his mind.

Soon after, the white crane, having depleted the surrounding lightning in the area, glared at Pang Jian before flying away.

Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!

Pang Jian's eyes lit up as tiny lightning bolts flickered across his silver skin.

Lightning seemed to flash deep within his pupils.

There it is!

Strands of fine, thread-like lightning slowly converged in the depths of his spiritual sea, and a small lightning vortex was starting to take shape.

The small lightning vortex was neither explosive nor turbulent as it was not fully formed.

Pang Jian had a feeling he would finally make headway in his cultivation when this lightning vortex fully formed.

"Brother..." Qin Le went to check on the disheveled Pang Jian when he noticed the sword-shaped token hanging from Pang Jian's waist. "The Sword Pavilion!"

Qin Le's expression changed dramatically.

Pang Jian was actually a disciple of the Sword Pavilion!

"The Sword Pavilion!" the other rogue cultivators exclaimed in shock, having also noticed the token. A hint of suppressed anger and resentment flashed in their eyes.

They recently encountered some disciples of the Demon Sect and the Black Valley Sect in the basin. The arrogant attitudes of these disciples from the Second World had left a lasting impression on them.

"Let's go," one of them called to Qin Le, silently telling him that it was best to stay away from those from the Second World.

Qin Le nodded in understanding and the group departed without another word.

He wisely chose not to mention that he and Pang Jian had both arrived together on Wang Ying's Cloud Sail.

Meanwhile, Pang Jian was staring toward where the white crane had disappeared, expression brimming with excitement as he prepared to continue the pursuit.

Suddenly, he felt a faint heat from the bronze door-shaped pendant beneath his clothing.

It had been a long time since the mysterious pendant had last acted abnormally.

Pang Jian's heart skipped a beat. Perhaps the beehive, the final object hidden within the bronze pendant, was on the verge of revealing something extraordinary.

He took out the pendant and examined it closely.

The bronze door remained sealed.

Pang Jian could neither see the swirling bizarre mist inside nor the beehive suspended deep within it.

"Weird," he muttered, flipping the pendant over to examine it further.

A mark had appeared on the very top of the bronze pendant!

Pang Jian was puzzled.

"Could the lightning have struck the top of the pendant, creating this mark?"

After thinking it over carefully, Pang Jian concluded the lightning was not strong enough to leave such a mark on his mysterious pendant.

"Something's not right. I need to pay closer attention."

With that in mind, he once again set off in pursuit of the white crane.

A few hours later, a group of disciples from the Black Valley Sect caught sight of the white crane in a swamp.

"That's the white crane Lu Xiangyi mentioned! It's here!"

"Everyone, be careful! This white crane will attack with lightning on sight!"

"Damn it, it's coming for us!"

The disciples from the Black Valley Sect stood up and summoned their protective shields in preparation for the white crane's attack.

A familiar scene played out once again.

As the white crane swooped down, drawing the surrounding lightning and concentrating it toward the Black Valley Sect disciples, a black-clad youth fearlessly charged into the storm.

The tall youth gritted his teeth and endured the barrage of lightning strikes.

His eyes shone with an excitement that greatly displeased the crane.

The white crane could not help but feel that the unhinged black-clad youth was exploiting it somehow. Though the youth appeared to be seeking abuse, his relentless pursuit hinted at a deeper, unknown intent.

Boom! Boom! Crackle!

Thunder crashed, and lightning scattered in all directions.

Pang Jian deliberately allowed the lightning bolts he could withstand to pass through his green protective shield, silently welcoming them with his Illusory Bone Realm body while also keeping an eye on the pendant on his chest.

Explosive lightning rained down on him.

Crackle

!

One of the lightning bolts caught Pang Jian's keen eye.

Although it looked no different from the other bolts of lightning, he noticed that it appeared to have sliced through space itself.

An incredibly fine crack appeared in the lightning bolt and bizarre mist swirled ominously inside.

"It’s not just lightning—there’s a strange spatial disturbance!"

Pang Jian was astonished.

At that moment, the strange lightning bolt pierced through his green protective shield, breaking it with ease!

It was the only lightning bolt Pang Jian had not deliberately allowed in!

The lightning bolt shot straight toward his chest, striking the bronze pendant beneath his clothes before disappearing.

To the outside observer, it was no different from the other lightning bolts striking Pang Jian's body.

But Pang Jian knew it was different.

Eventually, the lightning storm subsided.

Two Black Valley Sect disciples with lower cultivation realms lay rigid on the ground, unable to move.

Tiny sparks flashed at the corners of their eyes, a clear sign they were beyond saving.

Pang Jian was long accustomed to such scenes and silently watched as the white crane flew away before continuing his relentless pursuit.

𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

The surviving Black Valley Sect disciples showed no hint of sorrow at their comrades' deaths. Instead, they nonchalantly took out pills and swallowed them before staring in the direction Pang Jian had disappeared.

"That's the outer disciple from the Sword Pavilion that Lu Xiangyi mentioned."

"Yes, his name is Luo Yuan. Recently, he's been chasing the white crane."

"Or rather, he's been chasing the lightning."

The Black Valley Sect disciples had already learned about the Sword Pavilion outer disciple named Luo Yuan's relentless pursuit of the white crane through their communication talismans.

This man frequently placed himself in the sinister white crane's explosive lightning storms.

"What a strange guy."

After a brief discussion, the group salvaged the spatial pouches from their fallen comrades and divided up the spoils.

Pang Jian came to a stop ten li away. After glancing around to check that there were no others around, he took out the bronze pendant from under his clothes.

Flipping it over, he found a second mark!

"A unique lightning bolt with a crack that contains a dense, bizarre mist..."

Pang Jian's expression turned contemplative.

As the days went by, he continued to roam Cloud Lightning, always in pursuit of the malicious white crane.

Sometimes, he endured the fury of the lightning alongside other rogue cultivators; other times, it was with disciples of the Demon Sect, the Black Valley Sect, and the Celestial Lagoon Sect.

He soon realized the concentration of the lightning in the basin did not correlate with the depth.

Some areas around the basin's edge also had terrifyingly powerful lightning capable of killing cultivators.

As he endured the violent onslaughts of lightning, he occasionally noticed special lightning bolts with a strange crack.

These lightning bolts consistently broke through his protective shield before slipping into the bronze pendant and infusing it with a beam of spatial energy.

Soon after, a new mark would appear on the back of the pendant.

One day, Pang Jian stared at the back of the pendant in shock as he stood among the charred remains of three Innate Realm rogue cultivators.

The marks from the special lightning now clearly depicted the character for "Gate."

The character only took up one-quarter of the pendant's back, suggesting that more characters had yet to be revealed.

Driven by immense curiosity, Pang Jian continued his pursuit of the white crane.

A few days later, the characters "of" and "the" appeared on the pendant's back, only stimulating Pang Jian's excitement.

"Almost there! Just one more character left—this should reveal the pendant's true name!"

Four days later, standing among the remains of yet another group of rogue cultivators, Pang Jian once again examined the back of the bronze pendant.

The last character had finally appeared.

Abyss.

Gate of the Abyss!

This was the true name of the bronze pendant!

After all this time, Pang Jian finally knew the true name of the door-shaped bronze pendant.

It could transport him to the black turtle, the World Eater Vine, and the Giant Abyssal Serpent, enabling him to traverse the layers of the Abyss. Li Yuqing had previously told him in Eight Trigrams City that their five-layered world was known as the Abyss.

Gate of the Abyss was a fitting name for the pendant's form and function!

"So, this is your true name—the Gate of the Abyss."

Pang Jian excitedly clutched the bronze pendant and repeatedly examined it. The more he looked, the more he realized the Gate of the Abyss concealed endless mysteries.

The characters "Gate of the Abyss" revealed the pendant's profound nature. After all, the pendant allowed Pang Jian to traverse between and connect to the worlds within the Abyss.