Chapter 86: Lost in Darkness

The silence was suffocating.

Li Feng's eyes fluttered open, but there was nothing—only an infinite expanse of darkness stretching in every direction. He was floating, weightless, his body stripped of sensation. For a brief moment, he wondered if he had died. The thought didn't scare him. He had already given everything in the fight against Shen Longwei. Perhaps this was the price he had to pay.

Then, the whispers began.

Voices swirled around him in ancient tongues, words fragmented and eerie, laced with sorrow and rage. He tried to move, but his limbs refused to obey. His body no longer felt like his own, and a cold, invisible force dragged him deeper into the abyss.

A faint blue glow flickered across his vision—the Coiled Dragon's presence? He reached out instinctively, but there was nothing. The power was gone. He was alone.

A flicker of panic set in. Was this the fate of those swallowed by the Abyss? To drift endlessly in this eternal void, forgotten and nameless?

"No," he whispered, forcing his mind to stay sharp. "I refuse to end like this."

The shadows responded.

They coiled around him, tightening like invisible chains, their whispers turning into laughter. They knew his name. They called him "pretender," "thief," "unworthy."

Li Feng gritted his teeth. He had fought demons, men, and even fate itself—he would not be consumed by voices in the dark. With every ounce of willpower, he tried to move, but the abyss yawned wider, pulling him into its endless maw.

Then, a voice—one different from the whispers—cut through the void.

"You do not belong here."

The words were neither kind nor cruel. They carried an ancient weight, as though spoken by something that had existed long before the world itself. The darkness recoiled slightly, and Li Feng felt a strange warmth spread through his chest.

He turned, searching for the source, but the voice came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

"Who are you?" he demanded, his voice hoarse.

The silence stretched, then the voice spoke again.

"That is not the question you should be asking."

Before he could respond, the abyss convulsed. The whispers turned to shrieks as the force dragging him downward began to shift. Something was changing.

Meanwhile, in the Collapsing Battlefield…

Mei Lian's breath came in short, ragged gasps as she darted through the wreckage. The once-magnificent ruins of the Jade Abyss had been reduced to nothing but crumbling stone and flickering embers. The battlefield was eerily silent now, the celestial alignment beginning to wane.

Yet, there was no sign of Li Feng.

Yan Shun stood a few feet away, his sword hanging limply at his side, his expression unreadable. He had not spoken since the final clash between Li Feng and Shen Longwei. A part of him looked as if he had already accepted the worst.

"We have to find him," Mei Lian said, her voice edged with desperation.

Yan Shun's gaze flicked to the chasm where Li Feng had vanished. A swirling vortex of darkness lingered there, the remnants of the Abyss still hungry, still waiting.

"If he's still alive," Yan Shun muttered, "how do we reach him?"

Mei Lian clenched her fists. "We don't leave him behind. We've come too far."

A weak cough pulled their attention. Zheng Wei, barely able to stand, leaned against a broken pillar, blood staining the ground beneath him.

"There's… a way," he rasped. "An entrance to the Abyss, hidden beneath the ruins. I saw it… before the collapse."

Mei Lian's heart pounded. Hope. A chance.

"Where?" she asked urgently, kneeling beside him.

Zheng Wei forced a smile despite the pain. "You're not going to like it."

Back in the Abyss…

Li Feng's body twisted as unseen hands grabbed at him, shadows clawing at his skin like tendrils of smoke. He tried to fight, but every movement was sluggish, his energy drained.

"You can still choose."

The voice again.

Li Feng swallowed, forcing himself to remain calm. "Choose what?"

"To fade… or to embrace what lies beyond."

The shadows trembled at those words, as if recoiling in fear.

Li Feng's chest tightened. He had no strength, no power left to fight—but he still had his mind. He had made it this far on sheer will alone. If this was another trial, then he would not break.

"I choose to live," he said, his voice steady.

"Then step forward."

His body suddenly felt weighty again, the sensation of gravity returning. And before him, the shadows parted, revealing a narrow path of light in the endless void.

He hesitated for only a moment before moving forward, leaving the darkness behind.

Just as he steps forward, the void around him trembles, and a familiar presence stirs—a figure emerging from the Abyss. Shen Longwei.