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.

couple of pieces of marble shot past

that he had entered a hallway with a stairway that went upward,

again and

Diagonally down.

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

noticed that the angle was different,

that this stairway

kick diagonally down when he suddenly

He realized something.

arrow again and oriented himself perfectly

didn't need to adhere to the planned layout if he was

and the more he advanced, the more the arrow

moving but that

prepared himself for a battle as he punched

Yet, nothing was happening.

the arrow started to move rapidly when Shang was just moving

Shang realized that his target was essentially directly in front

could already

moved his arms forward and

then, he

small cube of

wasn't particularly surprised about

permanently resist the pressure at the

spot was even deeper

more brutal

probably

her Mana Shield

had already been

had killed her and

was the body of

Not very strong.

about as strong as Shang's body had been

to Shang,

under quite

imagine how a Mage's body

of the cube

'Pretty good,' he thought.

of Grade Seven

meat to the side

layout of the trial and kept checking what kind of material he was

while, Shang noticed that he wasn't destroying marble anymore and turned

couple of minutes, Shang kept searching through the highest layer of the

for a bit and noticed that it led to an inconspicuous

This was the exit.

the exit, Shang turned around again and followed

opening it, he began to dig more