The sky went dark.
The moment the endless shadows emerged, all the Star Rulers who had their eyes on Gu Nan's Divine Kingdom felt as if the sky instantly darkened, turning from day to night.
Fang Chaoyun looked up. This kind of abnormal phenomenon capable of altering heaven and earth instantly raised his vigilance to the highest point.
In fact, he didn't need to be on the alert. The shadows flowing crazily through Gu Nan's fist made the power of this punch very clear.
The "suppress" character finally collided with Gu Nan's punch. The technique used by Fang Chaoyun, a Tier 10 Star Ruler, unexpectedly failed to suppress Gu Nan. On the contrary, the shadows grew stronger.
Gu Nan's punch didn't directly shatter the character, but the shadows on his fist seeped through, almost dyeing the "suppress" character black.
Sylvia once said that Gu Nan's shadows were very different from her own. The shadows from her knowledge were quiet and secretive, while Gu Nan's shadows had a bit more tyranny and madness bordering the edge of secretiveness.
A law's aura was influenced by the cultivator himself. Fang Chaoyun's characters were righteous and upright, but when it met Gu Nan's unreasonable shadows, there was the feeling of a scholar meeting a soldier.
Fang Chaoyun's gaze turned slightly grave as he stopped looking down on his opponent, waving his hand to write out another character.
This was clearly the character for "kill"!
Confucians respect heaven and earth, keep their distance from ghosts and gods, and walk the great Dao of humanity, so the Confucian "kill" represents the great momentum of the human world!
This character was created with Fang Chaoyun's full strength. Wherever the character went, it was as if a god had arrived. Gales swirled continuously, and the world changed color. But Gu Nan still responded with a punch.
Only this punch consumed even more shadows.
Fist and character collided again, and the "kill" character was also quickly dyed by shadows, turning pitch-black. The character for "kill," which carried the great force of heaven and earth, finally made Gu Nan suffer some injuries.
A faint crack appeared on his neck and rapidly expanded. Gu Nan looked like he was made of ceramic as his body began to shatter.
But Gu Nan seemed entirely unaware of it and followed up with another punch without a second thought, this time aimed at Fang Chaoyun himself.
Fang Chaoyun couldn't keep the look of disdain from his face.
'He's actually able to fight with me by relying on the power boost from his astral world; this is indeed a very astonishing thing. But if he believes that it's possible to defeat me just because of this, then that's a complete joke.'
'Although I used my full strength in that character just now, I can write hundreds of characters at full strength without any effort, but how long can he last?'
'It's clear that his astral world is just starting out. How much of his astral world's power can he afford to lose?'
After all, he was a powerful Star Ruler who lived for tens of thousands of years. Fang Chaoyun had experienced countless battles in his life, so his judgment of the situation couldn't be clearer.
However, he failed to notice that his two contaminated characters were still floating in midair, even now. They merely became transparent and indistinguishable, but they never disappeared.
Not only did they not disappear, these two characters even formed an inexplicable connection with the shadows in the sky. It's just that the momentum behind Gu Nan's punches was so strong that he didn't notice the anomaly.
Fang Chaoyun was very patient. Since he decided to wear the enemy down in a battle of attrition, he even switched his focus from offense to defense.
For every punch Gu Nan threw, he leisurely wrote a character to deal with it, and every character was different.
If not for the fact that Gu Nan was still able to use his astral world's power to give him slight pressure, this Elder Fang could've written an entire poetry essay.
Throughout the whole fight, it seemed like Gu Nan was fighting with all his might with every punch, while Fang Chaoyun was firmly holding the upper hand while looking like he was simply going for a stroll.
This was also in line with people's understanding of the two sides. That Gu Nan used offense in place of defense to last for this long under Fang Chaoyun's attacks was already quite good.
Only existences at Xue Ren's level or even higher could see the dark cloud over the two's heads darkening even further.
Thus, a soft sigh rang out from the depths of Academic Heaven, reaching every corner of the Myriad Heavens.
Fang Chaoyun clearly also heard this soft sigh, so he looked up suddenly, only to realize that the dark cloud above his head was clearly giving him an intense sense of foreboding.
'To think I actually failed to sense such a threat hanging right above my head and had to be reminded by my teacher all the way back in Academic Heaven?'
Fang Chaoyun suddenly felt chills on his back. He finally realized that Gu Nan was gradually increasing the power of his attacks, so much so that he was forced to constantly devote more energy to the battle in order to maintain his upper hand.
It was precisely because of this that he didn't even notice the great danger approaching him.
Fang Chaoyun's reaction couldn't be described as slow. He understood Gu Nan's entire plan in the blink of an eye, but unfortunately, Gu Nan, the one who set it all up, was inevitably faster than him.
As early as when the sigh rang out, he'd already brought all his movements to an abrupt stop, and the shadow in the sky suddenly fell down.
At the same time, the characters previously written by Fang Chaoyun lit up one after another, except they were all pitch-black and gave off a sinister aura.
Fang Chaoyun was instantly surrounded by hundreds of black characters; all his laws were sealed by the shadows, and the cloud of shadows fell down on his head.
Elder Fang could only face this inescapable blow head-on.
Both of his eyes glowed red, and he finally couldn't resist using his astral world's power to write a huge "seal" character with his raised hand.
The character for "seal" rose to the top of the sky, seemingly pushing the cloud of shadows away, but Gu Nan revealed a sneer.
He waved his hand, and the cloud of shadows suddenly broke apart on its own. Like all-pervading shadows, they passed through the "seal" character's surroundings, chinks, and gaps, blasting Fang Chaoyun.
Secretive and ever-changing—this was one of the most important qualities of shadows.
It took a while for the shadow bombardment to come to an end, and the black characters suspended in midair dimmed one by one.
Fang Chaoyun's hair was disheveled, and a cloud of crimson mist was in front of his chest. Clearly, he couldn't hold back a mouthful of blood.
However, Gu Nan actually wasn't in a hurry to attack anymore. Even with an astral world's backing, killing a Tier 10 Star Ruler in one fell swoop simply wasn't realistic.
Especially since the shadow cloud wasn't able to accumulate to its limit yet before someone interrupted the attack, while Gu Nan himself also didn't have much energy left—of the 1,050 divine power, he had only a little over 300 left.
But likewise, Fang Chaoyun's injuries would probably also require a few hundred years of recuperation to fully recover.
Such a battle was enough for Gu Nan to make a name for himself, so that everyone who wanted to come to his Divine Kingdom to cause trouble would think twice after seeing the consequences.
A green light lit up from the depths of the void and slowly shone onto Fang Chaoyun's body as a figure appeared beside him.
The visitor had the appearance of a young man, only his expression seemed particularly gentle, with less of the sharpness characteristic of youths.
"Teacher." Fang Chaoyun, who was quite heavily injured, struggled to get up after seeing the visitor and bowed respectfully.
The young man accepted his bow in its entirety before holding Fang Chaoyun and gently sweeping his student behind himself. He then looked towards Gu Nan. "Little Friend has injured my disciple. Care to give me an explanation?"
Academic Heaven's Song Fei, the most overprotective person in the Myriad Heavens.