Sword God in a World of Magic

Shang noticed that the barrier before him started to distort under the pressure.

Shang pulled his hand back and healed himself to his peak.

He had filled the barrier with an unreal amount of Death Mana, and it wouldn't stop absorbing Mana anytime soon.

Shang watched the barrier distort more and more until…

BANG!

The barrier shattered.

WHOOOOOOM!

As the entire barrier around the trial vanished, all the wet ground surrounding it suddenly imploded, filling the spots that had been filled with normal air until now.

In the short moment when the barrier had been destroyed but the earth hadn't yet filled in the empty space, Shang had been able to feel his surroundings with his Spirit Sense.

The image Shang had seen was of a rather large room with several pitfalls, several Magic Circles, and several platforms.

Shang assumed that this had probably been some kind of trial where people had to find out how the Magic Circles worked to divine the correct way across the platforms and pitfalls.

But now…

As soon as the barrier broke, all the earth rushed into the room, destroying the platforms, filling the pitfalls, and disrupting almost all the Magic Circles.

Shang remained standing on his spot for a couple of seconds until all the ground around him had calmed down.

Then, Shang took out the emblem and looked at the arrow.

Diagonally down.

Shang hadn't seen his target in the brief moment before the earth had filled in the gaps, which meant that his target was inside a different challenge within the trial.

Shang remembered where one of the doors had been and dug towards that spot by punching more dirt.

None of the pitfalls, platforms, and Magic Circles worked anymore.

Some seconds later, Shang reached the doorway, and one punch later, the door opened slightly.

WHOOOM!

The door immediately exploded outward, and the earth around Shang rushed into the opened doorway.

Shang simply continued punching forward.

BANG!

After one particular punch, Shang noticed that he had destroyed something that wasn't the normal kind of ground.

pieces of marble shot past

realized that he had entered a hallway with a stairway that went upward, and he had just now

out the emblem again and looked

Diagonally down.

he turned around, punched through the door, through the room, and

angle was different, which meant that

meant that this stairway

about to kick diagonally down when he suddenly

He realized something.

the arrow again and oriented himself perfectly

to the planned layout if he

advanced, the more the arrow

moving but that he

prepared himself for a battle

Yet, nothing was happening.

arrow started to move rapidly when Shang was just moving the emblem

realized that his target was essentially

could already move behind the

moved his arms forward

then, he saw

a small cube of bloody meat

wasn't particularly surprised about

couldn't permanently resist the pressure at the bottom

was even deeper

was even more brutal than the

probably been taken by surprise while undertaking

Shield had been

Mana had already

explosion of earth had killed her and compressed her into this tiny cube

strong was the body of an

Not very strong.

was probably about as strong as Shang's body had been at the Mid True Path

to Shang, it

was already under quite a lot of

imagine how a Mage's body

the Space Ring out of the cube

'Pretty good,' he thought.

couple of Grade Seven Mana Crystals.

threw the cube of meat to

mental map of the layout of the trial and kept checking what kind of

he wasn't destroying

Shang kept searching through the highest layer

it led to an inconspicuous spot at

This was the exit.

turned around again and followed the hallway

found a door, and after opening it, he began to dig