The silver gates slid shut behind the Vanguard Alliance with a sound like a falling drop-gate, sealing off the howling blizzards of the lower floor.
Inside Floor 50, the world was utterly, terrifyingly still.
Spanning five hundred paces in every direction, the Lunar Eclipse Arena was a huge circular tiered arena carved from a single seamless disc of polished black glass. The stone was so smooth and dark that it looked like a frozen lake of midnight ink. It reflected the sky above with mirror-like clarity.
Yet there were no clouds in that sky. There were no stars.
Suspended in the bruised indigo heavens was a single, huge crescent moon. It burned with a cold, blood-silver radiance that washed across the arena in long, creeping shadows. The light didn’t bring warmth. It brought a dense, choking lunar chill that settled over the challengers’ skin like heavy silk. Coiling across the black glass floor were ribbons of pitch-black shadow mist, slithering between the challengers’ boots like living, curious serpents.
Yan Zixuan stood at the center of the formation, his star-iron tower shield planted firmly against the black glass.
Beside him, Han Xue held her frost dress sword at the ready, her breath catching as her spiritual sea registered the surrounding pressure. Xiao Rou stepped close behind Yan Zixuan’s back. Her small hands shook slightly as she drew upon her wood-life-force core. To the left, Chen Yu held three copper formation pins ready to strike the stone. To the right, Liu Tao…
