The people who were charmed by Ria were starting to have their freedom back.
"What's… happening?" they felt like they were a different person just before this, and the facade suddenly shattered.
Ning suddenly turned around and said, "Sorry guys, it's been fun, but it's time you left the realm,"
"What do you me—" A single slash from Ning made everyone vanish.
Ning didn't know how many points he must've gathered, but he assumed it was a lot.
SWISH
Ning tilted his head to the side and let the arrow fly past him. He then turned around to look at his attacker and said, "That's not very nice of you to attack behind my back."
"D-Divine sense. You are a Foundation Establishment realm expert," the man who just shot said..
"Bingo. Nice analysis. But I'm afraid, you must die too," Ning suddenly slashed in his direction and sent a black slash flying towards him.
However, before the slash could even reach him, it hit something mid-air and vanished. "Huh? What happened?" Ning was a little confused.
"Ha— Haha. You scared me for nothing, you idiot. You can never attack me as long as you are stuck in the formation," the man said.
"Hmm… what sort of formation is this?" Ning questioned them, but instead of answers, he got arrows. Each one of them let go of an arrow propped on their bow, sending them all flying towards him.
Ning stopped two arrows with his sword, dodged two, and caught the last one with his bare hands. "Hmm… let me test it," he said and threw the arrow back towards the attacker.
However, same as the attack last time, the arrow was stopped at the barrier.
"Haha, I told you, you idiot. You can do nothing to us as long as we are outside the formation," the man said again.
Ning walked onto the edge of the formation and felt a physical barrier on his hands. "So… this formation allows one free entry, but exit is stopped huh?" Ning asked.
"Yes. As long as you are inside the formation, you can never leave. So, big guy, no matter how strong you may be, you are stuck here with us for the rest of the night. You think you can last our barrage of arrows the entire night?" the man asked.
"Hm, I do have a rib injury, so I can't go on for the rest of the night. But you seem to be mistaken about something," Ning said.
"I'm not stuck here with you," Ning said. The 5 men felt a slight tug on their bodies. Suddenly, the tug changed into a violent pulling force that brought them right in front of Ning.
Ning squatted down in front of the man's face and said, "You are stuck here with me."
"Wh— What? H-How? The formation should stop all Qi from escaping," the men said in fear.
"Well, bad luck for you guys. I don't only have Qi." Ning sent out a black slash to one of the guys and he immediately turned to yellow light before disappearing.
Ning smiled back to the rest of the guys and asked, "Do you think I can last the entire night or not?"
Cries of fear and despair rang out for a few minutes. The 4 remaining men ran up to the barrier and started attacking it to open it up, but none of it worked.
So, they turned towards Ning to hopefully beat him. That was just wishful thinking. In less than a minute, the four of them turned to yellow lights and were sent out of the secret realm.
"Now that that is over, what do I do with the rest of the night?" Ning wondered. He walked up to the barrier once more and placed his hands on it.
"They said it lasted for just 6 hours right? I can try attacking it and see if I can break it. Or… I can just rest here. Seems like the perfect place," Ning thought.
"Aegis, come out," Ning called the Golden Shelled Beetle, Aegis once more.
"Alright, I will cultivate. You look after me, okay?" Ning said.
Aegis did nothing but just stare at him. "Are you going to talk at all this time? You talked this morning," Ning said.
Aegis cocked his head to the side and asked, "Talk?"
It was like he could hear the words but not understand them. His intelligence would still have to increase a bit before he could comprehend sentences.
"Nevermind, just protect me," Ning said and started cultivating.
He had reached a bottleneck and needed time to breakthrough. He tried the entire night, but he couldn't do it. Still, the period wasn't fruitless. He did feel that he had made massive advances and that with just a single more day of cultivation, he could break through.
He opened his eyes to the sun rays in the morning. Dawn had arrived. The final 6 hours of the competition were here.
"Come back, Aegis," Ning said and sent Aegis back to the beast space. He then stood up and went up to feel the barrier, but there was nothing there anymore.
He went to the trees and grabbed the 7 formation flags that were stuck on there. "Once I learn something more about you guys, I will use you," Ning said and put them into his interdimensional space.
He took out a bunch of ingredients and made a pain relief medicine that he drank once more. He didn't want a releat of last time.
He started walking in a random direction away from where he had come from. The first 15 minutes of walking, he thought nothing about the forest.
However, after half an hour of walking, he could feel something, a sense of Deja Vu.
"Have I come here before?" Ning thought as he walked out of the jungle into the grassland. That was when he remembered where he was.
He had been here before. He had cultivated overnight on a piece of rock not far ahead of him. Beyond that was a forest and beyond that…
"That is where the lake is, right beyond that forest. The lake with the Flood dragon… and the Angel's Touch."