A Slight Problem

Yaan was yet to fully recover from his battle against the astral spirits, and now, he had been taken to the arena once again.

Typically, most people would decline the proposed time of challenge, instead opting to fight after 24 hours, since this gave them more time to adequately prepare. Yaan's opponent had accepted the proposed time however, meaning that in all likelihood, they were fully aware of his current condition.

Yaan appeared upon the podium, opposite from a woman whose face was covered by a plain white mask. She also wore a loose fitting white robe, partially hiding her figure, and possibly concealing treasures beneath.

Dong!

As soon as the bell rang out, she rushed forwards, as did Yaan.

Bang!

Two swords collided, but neither of them was forced back. Yaan vaguely sensed a hint of surprise in his opponent's aura. Clearly, she had underestimated him, or perhaps she had simply overestimated the difficulty that he would face during his subjugation of the astral spirits.

Truthfully however, Yaan was in a terrible state. Physically, he was not her match right now, so if he wanted to make it out of here alive, he needed to think carefully.

Yaan smirked at his opponent, causing her to leap back. She was cautious, having not expected him to have recovered so much of his strength, so when she saw his expression, she naturally felt alarmed and cautious.

Of course, Yaan was only bluffing, he needed to put this distance between them.

Whoosh!

A white blur shot towards him again. Yaan slashed out in a relaxed manner, yet somehow, he was able to perfectly deflect each and every one of her attacks.

Every now and then, he managed to throw his opponent off balance. Whenever this happened, he would simply stand there with a smile, watching her, as if teasing her, like a beast playing with its prey.

If Yaan thought that he would be able to finish her off when she lost her balance, then he would do so, but he was still in poor condition and his opponent's reflexes were quite impressive.

He was acting as if everything was within his control, but in reality, he was only barely holding on.

The woman became increasingly ferocious, but she also made more mistakes. Yaan suffered from some cuts and bruises thanks to her feisty attacking style, but he had succeeded in his goal - fighting without exhausting himself, whilst baiting his opponent into slipping up.

Thanks to his recovery speed, it wasn't difficult for Yaan to hide the injuries he had sustained until they healed over. Because of this, the white robed woman was getting more and more uneasy.

The pair stopped for a moment and stood opposite from one another. As the woman was beginning to panic in the face of Yaan's amused smirk, Yaan continued trying to subdue to astral spirits.

But unfortunately, life never went as planned.

Having been pushed to her limit, the robed woman drew a second sword and made a dash towards him, giving Yaan twice as much trouble with evading her strikes. With two swords, the strength behind her attacks had suffered, but her speed reached a new level.

Yaan adapted his style to suit his current condition. He fought slowly and methodically, carefully considering each and every move.

As he used this style, he ended up developing it further and further. Yaan found himself minimising the energy exerted in each move, becoming extremely efficient; his steps were small, his strikes were relaxed.

As the woman grew faster, Yaan's flow became smoother. Eventually, he managed to cut in half her mask. Her expression was flustered, clearly, for whatever reason, she didn't want anyone to see her face.

Taking advantage of this moment of hesitation, Yaan plunged his sword towards her one more time. His blade effortlessly pierced through her eye, then he leaned forwards with his body, pushing the blade all the way through. Using his momentum alone and without expending any needless energy, Yaan twisted the blade such that it cut horizontally through her head, destroying her brain and killing her thoroughly.

Her body dropped to the floor and she took her last breath. Yaan stared at her corpse for some time, only straightening up after confirming that she was indeed dead.

"Yaan…I shall remember your name…" Within the audience, a woman hidden behind a grey cloak muttered to herself, before slipping away into the shadows unnoticed.

"Hah…" Yaan exhaled deeply as he found himself back in his residence in the 3rd level. He closed his eyes, planning to rest peacefully. Unfortunately, he wasn't alone.

"Yaan! You- you're alive, you're really alive! But how?! You were still battling against the astral spirits - and 18 of them at that - then you were thrust into a battle against someone on the 4th level! What happened, how did you survive, what did you-"

"Zue Yin." Yaan half turned his head towards her, sighing and barely opening his eyes. She immediately became silent, waiting for his explanation.

"Please be quiet. I need to rest."

"You-! Ah, right, I guess you would be tired, wouldn't you…" Her anger at being told to shut up was quickly quelled when she thought about the ordeal that Yaan had just endured, and how utterly exhausted he must be feeling after going through such a thing. However, just as Yaan was closing his eyes, Zue Yin quickly asked:

"Did you issue any other challenges?"

"…"

Yaan didn't reply, but he opened his eyes tiredly and sighed.

"You did?"

"Hah…" Yaan grimaced, then sighed again as he stood up and directly left his temple home.

"Hey, wait, where are you going? And when is your next fight?"

"In around one hour."

"One hour?!"

"Mm. I'd better hurry."

Zue Yin continued to speak hurriedly and anxiously, but Yaan ignored her for now. He wasn't sure why she cared so much, but he didn't have the energy to think about it right now.

Before long, they reached one of the teleportation portals in the 3rd level. Yaan pushed his way through the que, causing people to scowl at him. Just as he had incited the ire of the crowd, he handed silently put an Astral Crystal into each of their hands as he walked past. With that, their frowns vanished without a trace and they actively moved out of his way to let him through to the front.

Without waiting for anything else, Yaan jumped onto the portal and instructed the spirit manning the formation to send him directly to the 4th level pagoda. When Zue Yin heard this, her eyes finally lit up. She stepped forwards with the intention of following after him, but just before he was taken away to the 4th level, Yaan lightly reminded her that she wasn't yet allowed to enter the 4th level.

Besides, anyone who lacked the power to reach these higher levels would be unable to endure the increasingly powerful gravity and Spiritual Pressure at each subsequent level. The first three levels weren't so bad, but the 4th was ten fold than the 3rd level.

To Yaan, this level of Spiritual Pressure was still not very significant, and besides, he had more pressing matters on his mind right now.

The 3rd level formation flashed with a blindly bright white light, before Yaan vanished without a trace.

Zue Yin stared at the formation for a while, before she shook her head with a complicated sigh. As she left, she clenched her fists and muttered to herself.

"I can't stay like this forever…I need to rely on myself…damnit…"

Yaan reappeared within the 4th level pagoda's teleportation formation.

Yaan didn't waste any time, immediately leaving the formation and making his way into the pagoda's main reception hall. This was a large circular room, with a spiral staircase curving around the sides of the building's internal structure, going up for a total of nine floors.

Immediately, Yaan sought out the spirit who looked over the 4th level pagoda. She was dressed in what looked like a black and gold uniform, she presented her very well, but the way she spoke was not professional in the least.

"Quickly, I need to use the time acceleration chamber!" Yaan urged right away. Time was of the essence, he knew that if he failed to enter a time acceleration chamber soon, then he would be sent into his next match before having enough time to properly recover from his injuries!

"Oho, it seems someone issued a few too many challenges!" The attendant giggled, making Yaan smile wryly. Still, he waited for her to explain.

"The 4th level pagoda is known as the temporal acceleration chamber. This chamber is very costly to run, so the cost of use is also quite high. There are nine floors, with each higher floor providing a greater acceleration of the time within compared to the outside world. For instance, on the 1st floor, time passes by three times faster within the chamber compared to the main 4th Trial Realm!"

After saying this, the spirit went on to explain the level of acceleration on the other nine floors. She saw that Yaan was looking quite hurried at this point, so she kept her explanation as concise as possible.

"2nd floor, 6 times. 3rd floor, 9 times. 4th floor 18 times. 5th floor, 27 times. 6th floor, 36 times. 7th floor, 51 times. 8th floor, 66 times. 9th floor, 81 times. There is also the possibility to link ever floor together and to use the pagoda as a whole but such a thing is far beyond sir's expenses."

She paused briefly, then added:

"The 1st floor costs one 1-Star Astral Crystal every hour. 2nd floor, two crystals. 3rd floor, three crystals. 4th floor, one 2-Star Astral Crystal, 5th floor two crystals, 6th floor, three crystals. The 7th floor is one 3-Star Astral Crystal per hour. 8th floor, two crystals. 9th floor, three crystals. You must also pay a deposit…"

She went on to explain that, annoyingly, using the temporal acceleration chambers required the user to pay a refundable deposit of one 4-Star Astral Crystal multiplied by the floor number, just in order to enter! These chambers were seriously expensive, so the 4th Trial Realm spirits wanted this insurance incase the occupants damaged the chambers during their training.

Even though Yaan had a surplus of money after selling so many of his rewards from the earlier trials, 4-Star Astral Crystals were incredibly expensive!

Regardless, he had no other choice.

"Here's the money and the deposit, I need the 6th floor, I have a fight in 45 minutes!" Yaan said after taking out the funds. Seeing his money, the attendant's expression immediately changed and became extremely serious.

"Of course, sir, right this way, let us not waste a single second longer." With that, she walked at a brisk pace towards the spiral staircase. Yaan looked at her oddly when she actually jumped up three stairs at a time without a trace off elegance in her movement, but with a shrug, he followed after her, copying her actions.

By the time he arrived on the 6th floor, the attendant already had the key in the door. As she turned the lock and opened the door, Yaan quickly stepped in. As he entered, she mentioned one final important point:

"When it's time for your fight, you will be transported directly from the chamber to the battle arena. Following your battle's conclusion, you will return to this chamber should you win. If you have time remaining on your purchase, the door will remain locked until your time is over. If your time has already ran out, then the door will be open and the chamber will be ineffective. If you wish to pay for more time, just tap the formation on the door three times."

Thud!

The door shut behind him. Yaan immediately felt a strange sensation, as if everything had slowed down and distorted, before rapidly speeding back up and returning to normal.

Yaan walked around the room whilst inspecting every wall, floor, ceiling and crevice. In the end, he concluded that it was just a plain and simple wooden training hall, 50 by 50 feet in size.

"There's 45 minutes until my battle….but I have 36 times accelerated time in here." Yaan smiled, finally able to relax now that he had secured this room. With the accelerated time inside this chamber, he had around 27 hours to properly recover before his fight.

"Honestly, that's crazy…turning a rushed 45 minute period, into a day long training session." Yaan shook his head with a deep sigh, before slouching down and pondering his best course of action from here. He would need to rest and recover his energy, but after that, he would have some time to spare for training.

He had accumulated a shocking quantity of cultivation resources, as well as other pills, medicines and ingredients. He had dozens of treasures, techniques, books, and so on…

Yaan wanted to settle down and devour the countless body tempering pills in his possession.

Honestly, he still hadn't fully examined the benefits that his body had received after absorbing the vitality from the spatial vortex.

But right now, he needed to build up his strength as much as possible in a very short period of time. If he assumed that he had 24 hours to fit in all of the work and recovery, then he would still have plenty of time to spare.

It was time to start training properly.