Chapter 184

Chapter 184: Caught

In the distance, massive starforce gathered into a single line, swelling like a tidal wave, then surged toward them.

“Ju Gui Formation!” someone screamed. “Dodge!”

The sweeping starforce hit like a runaway train. The earth collapsed. People vomited blood and fell unconscious. Even the air split visibly, the tear racing outward, carving and reshaping the land in an instant.

Wang Jie threw himself prone as the starforce swept overhead. The pressure was so great he felt he might be torn from the ground and flung away.

He lifted his head just enough to see the spectacle: starforce condensing, swelling, then lashing outward in countless lines, as if the sky had been strung with luminous threads.

Ju Gui Formation.

He recognized its function immediately—a formation that forcibly drew in an enemy’s starforce, absorbing attacks before they could travel far, bleeding them of power.

It wasn’t difficult to set.

Then a harsh light stabbed his eyes.

Wang Jie jerked his gaze away and ducked.

Light-avoiding Array Scroll.

Darkness spread as if poured over the world, swallowing brightness whole.

At the heart of the formations, a furious roar thundered. “Wen Yuan! I know it’s you! No one else on star-devourer could set this many formations so fast. You despicable bastard—show yourself!”

The darkness and the Ju Gui Formation worked together perfectly. The man’s attacks couldn’t travel, and in the black he couldn’t even find a direction to flee.

Wen Yuan’s voice drifted from everywhere at once, calm and faintly amused. “Brother Li, since you already know it’s me, you should understand you can’t run today.”

“They’ve been searching star-devourer nonstop for Wang Jie. I know everyone’s position like the back of my hand.”

He chuckled softly. “I chose the timing to strike you. No one can help you.”

“Yield. Give me the jade stone. I’ll even give you a little soup to drink.”

“Dream!” Li Cai roared. “You think a few formations can beat me?”

Red lightning flared. Li Cai’s thunder pattern rose like a burning shield. He thrust a long spear with savage force, using the sound of his own attack to try to judge Wen Yuan’s location.

The spear struck nothing.

Wen Yuan sighed theatrically. “Brother Li, are you truly going to take it to the end?”

“Break my thunder pattern and stacked sky light first!” Li Cai snapped.

“Fine,” Wen Yuan said. “Then please, Brother Li, enlighten me. Star-bewildering Formation.”

Seal-chen stone lifted into the air—one, then many—spreading like a net thrown wide. The starforce running through them was strange starforce, refined and unfamiliar.

Wang Jie’s eyes narrowed.

A formation expert could use strange starforce as a foundation.

And Wen Yuan’s speed was terrifying.

Someone nearby shouted, voice tight with fear, “Retreat! One side is Li Cai, the other is Wen Yuan! Wen Yuan is the strongest formation disciple in Zhi Study Valley—who knows what he has prepared? Don’t get dragged in!”

Those still conscious fled at once, scrambling beyond the seal-chen stone’s range.

“Brother Qiu!” someone called through the comm. “Are you out yet?”

Wang Jie glanced at the terminal and didn’t answer.

“Brother Qiu?”

Still no response.

He wasn’t leaving.

Wen Yuan wanted the jade stone.

So did he.

And right now, the enemy was exposed while he was hidden. The timing was perfect.

As seal-chen stone released starforce, the sky filled with intersecting streams that behaved as if guided by a meticulous hand. One line of starforce broke another, disassembled it, redirected it—until the entire battlefield shimmered with sparks, like fireflies spilling across the world.

Wang Jie stood within the Star-bewildering Formation’s range, but he wasn’t the target. He could afford to watch.

Using One Gaze, Three Thousand, he saw the truth behind each “spark”—intricate combinations of starforce, layered and complex beyond ordinary technique.

In the distance, Li Cai’s red lightning surged higher. Stacked sky light formed ring after ring around him, a luminous halo straining to push back the dark.

The firefly starforce suddenly recombined, spiraling through the void into strange, nearly invisible attacks. They slipped past the darkness and slammed into Li Cai’s thunder pattern.

Li Cai’s roar never stopped.

He was being battered without respite.

And Wen Yuan’s position remained hidden.

Wang Jie began moving along the ground—light, controlled.

He couldn’t see Wen Yuan either, but unlike Li Cai, he wasn’t trapped inside the Light-avoiding Array Scroll. He wasn’t the target. He could search.

The obvious assumption was that the concentrated direction of the attacks marked Wen Yuan’s location.

But Wen Yuan was a formation expert. He would anticipate that.

So Wang Jie went the other way—toward the direction no one would expect.

Thunder spears of starforce stabbed down from the sky, detonating with deafening cracks. But Ju Gui Formation kept dragging the starforce inward, weakening it before it could reach full lethality.

Even so, the ground was being shaved away layer by layer, terrain gouged and rewritten.

Wang Jie concealed his aura and kept moving, careful not to dodge too violently, afraid even a ripple might alert Wen Yuan.

Then the world brightened.

Stacked sky light blazed, forcing instability into the Light-avoiding Array Scroll. Seal-chen stone trembled, some cracking under the strain.

“Wen Yuan!” Li Cai bellowed. “If I find you, I’ll beat you to death!”

Wen Yuan’s voice came from all sides. “Brother Li, you don’t think I only prepared this much for you, do you? That would be insulting.”

More seal-chen stone rose—some reinforcing the darkness, others strengthening Ju Gui Formation.

Stacked sky light dimmed immediately.

Chen art was built on starforce. If starforce was continuously absorbed, its power naturally waned. If Ju Gui Formation was strong enough, it could forcibly disperse stacked sky light entirely.

Wen Yuan had prepared far too much.

This was the terror of a formation expert.

Once you fell into a trap set by someone like Wen Yuan, escaping was agony.

“Despicable!” Li Cai shouted. “Fight me head-on!”

Wen Yuan laughed softly. “I’m a formation expert. Since when do formation experts duel to the death with brute force? Stop struggling, Brother Li.”

Wang Jie’s eyes locked onto a direction.

There.

When Wen Yuan reinforced the formations, the qi in that region spiked—a brief, telltale surge.

Wang Jie lowered his breathing, sank his presence, and closed in.

Ju Gui Formation intensified. Stacked sky light dimmed further. Li Cai’s thunder pattern began to fracture, cracks spiderwebbing through the red lightning shield.

Under the relentless assault, Li Cai staggered back, blood spraying. Firefly starforce rained down like a storm, crushing the ground, splitting stone, sinking the land.

Then, with a sharp, brittle snap—

Li Cai’s thunder pattern shattered.

Li Cai took a direct hit and reeled, coughing blood, barely holding himself upright.

Wen Yuan’s voice returned, smooth as silk. “Brother Li, thank you for yielding.”

Li Cai’s chest heaved. He glared into the darkness, then—forced by sheer attrition—flung the jade stone away. “Take it and get lost!”

Wen Yuan chuckled. “Don’t be angry, Brother Li. When we return, I’ll treat you to wine.”

Li Cai bared his teeth. “Wen Yuan—don’t let me find an opening.”

“Thank you for the reminder.”

The jade stone cut through the darkness toward Wen Yuan’s hidden position.

Toward Wen Yuan…

and toward Wang Jie.

Wang Jie stepped in, raised a hand, caught it—

and ran.

For a heartbeat, the formations stuttered, as if the battlefield itself blinked.

Only a few kilometers away, Wen Yuan’s expression shifted from triumph to fury. “A rat!”

His voice cracked with genuine anger. “Get out here!”

Star-bewildering Formation slammed toward Wang Jie’s direction without the slightest delay. Seal-chen stone shifted, converging to block him.

Wang Jie used Jia Eight Steps, dodging in tight, controlled bursts. He wasn’t trapped inside the Light-avoiding Array Scroll. He still had space.

He flicked a finger at a seal-chen stone.

It didn’t break.

Wang Jie’s eyes narrowed. The stones were reinforced beyond ordinary standards.

He switched immediately—qi-qi convergence. Force burst from his fingertip, and the seal-chen stone shattered.

He struck again, again, again, breaking a path through the converging net.

Wen Yuan’s eyes widened. His seal-chen stone had been strengthened by countless methods, meant to withstand strikes at two hundred thousand combat power.

If this thief could shatter them…

Then this thief was roaming-star realm, at minimum.

Trouble.

Wen Yuan had beaten Li Cai only because Li Cai was trapped in his formations. Without the trap, Wen Yuan wasn’t Li Cai’s match.

And now this thief wasn’t sealed by Ju Gui Formation or the Light-avoiding Array Scroll. His combat power was high. His mobility was intact.

Stopping him would be hard.

Wang Jie ran, shattering seal-chen stone as he went—but he kept his strikes precise, careful not to disrupt the formation imprisoning Li Cai. Releasing Li Cai would turn the battlefield into a three-way disaster.

Li Cai, battered and trapped, sensed the chaos outside and actually smiled.

He didn’t want Wen Yuan to have the jade stone.

If someone else stole it? Even better.

“You shameless bastard!” Wen Yuan roared. “Who are you, hiding your face like a rat?”

Wang Jie didn’t answer.

More importantly, he didn’t dare reveal lockforce.

If he did, he’d draw every hunter on the planet to his location. Let them stay scattered. Let them keep searching. That chaos protected him.

“You think you can escape?” Wen Yuan’s voice went cold.

He stepped out.

In battle, a formation expert revealing himself was taboo—an admission that the trap was no longer enough. But Wen Yuan couldn’t help it. This theft was too disgusting.

“You think I wasn’t prepared?” Wen Yuan snarled. “I saved this for Li Cai.”

He spread his hands. “Now you can have it.”

The earth erupted.

Seal-chen stone burst upward in a far wider range than before, forming a massive pattern that swallowed the land.

Wang Jie’s eyes widened despite himself.

There was more?

How much had Wen Yuan prepared to kill Li Cai?

Wen Yuan’s own combat power hovered around two hundred thousand, but the formations he’d laid could grind down experts at three hundred thousand and beyond.

Starforce surged from the seal-chen stone—simple, ruthless—forming a cage of heaven and earth.

Lock-Chen Formation.

Similar to eightfold strong lock formation, but simpler—made terrifying by Wen Yuan’s roaming-star realm strength and the strange starforce embedded in each stone.

Starforce webbed around Wang Jie from all sides.

He lifted his gaze.

A gap remained—high above.

Sword steps.

Swords shot from his storage ring and streaked skyward. Sword rig. One-line sky.

Steel flashed toward the opening.

In the distance, Wen Yuan caught sight of the movement—and then saw the face beneath the disguise.

Qiu Chou.

Wen Yuan’s eyes went wide with rage. “You—”