The smoky wave of willforce slammed into Adrian's invisible barrier, and the space between them warped beneath the pressure generated by the collision of two Anchor-stage wills. The technique writhed and twisted like a living fog, grinding its concentrated intent against Adrian's mental wall while searching relentlessly for a fracture, a weakness, or even the smallest gap through which its threads could seep.
To the naked eye, the dimly lit chamber remained seemingly untouched, but on the metaphysical plane, the clash was nothing short of apocalyptic.
Adrian stood his ground, his Source Eyes fully activated. Beneath it, the attack was stripped of its mysterious appearance. He did not just see a cloud of fog; he saw the truth of the technique.
Billions of microscopic threads of intent had been woven into an extraordinarily complex structure. Each thread was individually weak, almost insignificant, yet they overlapped in countless layers, supporting and concealing one another as they spread across the target's defenses.
The threads were designed to seep into the microscopic gaps between a cultivator's thoughts and suffocate their neural pathways, paralyzing their mental functions and rendering them a living statue trapped within their own mind.
In less than a fraction of a second, the entire blueprint of the attack was engraved into Adrian's mind. He memorized the flow of the technique, the frequency required to sustain its threads, the positions of its structural anchors, and the method through which billions of separate strands were made to behave as a single wave. He also noticed the minute imperfections that would appear if even one portion of the weave lost synchronization.
The grinding pressure of both their wills reached its peak. The surrounding chamber walls, forged from high-grade materials and layered with defensive runic arrays, began to form hairline fractures.
Androxus's technique was relentless, straining against Adrian's Willforce Wall, but every microscopic thread that touched the barrier was repelled before it could find a path inside. Realizing the futility of his assault, the smoky wave finally began to destabilize.
Before Androxus could even adjust his stance to prepare his next attack, a powerful fluctuation of willforce erupted from the opposite side of the chamber.
Thousands of needles made of willforce materialized around Adrian. With a slight tilt of his head, they slammed toward Androxus.
Androxus's silver eyes widened fractionally when he saw the willforce needles coming at him. His mind reeled, momentarily stunned by the undeniable familiarity of its construction.
This willforce technique was the exact same structure that his master Damian had taught him. It was actually the Yiphraen race's ancestral willforce technique, and not some different, parallel kind of willforce manipulation that merely appeared to shape intent into needles.
Navira's warning suddenly echoed in Androxus's mind: "He copied my willforce technique after seeing it once!"
When Navira had first told him this, Androxus had dismissed it. Willforce techniques were forged within the cultivator's mind. They were shaped within one's consciousness with pure intent, and then projected outward. Because this intricate process of weaving intent and setting structural anchors happens entirely within the mind, the other party cannot normally observe or steal the technique simply by watching it.
So at that time, Androxus assumed Adrian was merely using a similar-looking technique. But seeing it directed at him now, executed down to the most minute structural anchor, the truth slammed into him.
A cold bead of sweat formed on Androxus's brow. The battle lust that had gathered within him only moments prior dispersed completely.
"He isn't just powerful," Androxus thought, "This hidden faction… whoever stands behind him… they are breaking too many rules of reality. I need to retreat. I need to let my master know about this."
Reacting through pure instinct, Androxus compressed his willforce into a defensive wall. The barrier formed before him just as Adrian's first wave of needles arrived.
The impact shook the central golden spire.
Thousands of condensed attacks hammered against Androxus's defense, and the pressure released by the collision tore through the remaining structure surrounding them. The already fractured chamber walls exploded outward, entire sections of the reinforced building breaking apart as debris scattered into the artificial sky. Floors collapsed, support pillars snapped, and the concealed level where Androxus had been hiding was exposed completely to the rest of the Providence Hub.
Across the Hub, countless cultivators turned their gazes toward the central golden spire as the explosion echoed through the artificial atmosphere. The reporters stationed throughout the Outer Commercial Continents immediately redirected their recording artifacts toward the destruction, eager to capture whatever new event had erupted following the fall of the Ethereal Providence Sect.
Through the drifting clouds of debris, they saw two figures standing apart from one another inside the shattered remains of the spire.
To most spectators, and even to the highly advanced recording artifacts focused upon the scene, the sight was completely baffling. The two cultivators appeared to be doing nothing more than standing motionlessly while staring at each other.
Yet, a suffocating pressure surrounded them, leaking from the exposed spire and washing over the entire Hub. It was strong enough to distort the very fabric of space and pulverize reinforced walls into dust, yet not even the faintest trace of mana could be detected.
"Affecting the tangible through the intangible," muttered a reporter from the Astral Archive Pavilion.
One of the clearest signs that a cultivator had reached the Anchor stage of consciousness mastery was the ability of their willforce to affect physical reality. At that level, thought and intent possessed enough density to distort space, shatter material structures, and pressure weaker beings without requiring mana or authority.
The reporter adjusted his recording artifact and focused upon the half-transparent silver figure. Every cultivator watching already knew the power of the white-grey-robed man. They had witnessed him erase the Ethereal Providence Sect's army and kill Navira with a single thrust. His Anchor-stage cultivation was no longer in question.
The sudden appearance of another being capable of contending against such a man immediately attracted intense interest. The unknown silver alien was far more interesting.
"Chris, is that Androxus from the Heaven-Eclipsing Pavilion?" asked a female alien, her voice barely a whisper. She and her companion stood among a group of reporters, blending into the crowd by presenting themselves as reporters affiliated with the Heaven-Weaving Pavilion Network.
Chris, a six-armed alien man positioned beside her, stared at the magnified projection for several seconds. His multiple hands deftly adjusted the artifact's focus parameters before he finally gave a nod. "Yes, Daisy. That is definitely him."
"Jackot!" Daisy whispered. "We didn't even need to do anything ourselves to bring the attention of Damian and his disciples here. Master Milan would be highly interested in this. If we submit complete information regarding his presence here and document everything about this unknown cultivator who somehow plunders others' authority and uses the Prime Arcane concept of Null, the rewards will be enormous."
Chris nodded slowly, though his expression remained cautious. "We must proceed carefully, Daisy. For now, let's just act as subsidiary operatives."
Daisy inclined her head in agreement.
For affairs involving lesser galaxies and Major Sects, the Great Sects ordinarily relied upon members of their subsidiary factions. Those factions were trained specifically to act as intermediaries, observers, and field operatives, gathering intelligence without the direct, public involvement of the cosmic titans standing above them.
Chris and Daisy, however, were not subsidiary operatives. Both were official disciples of the Heaven-Weaving Pavilion itself, operating secretly within the Providence Hub for a mission given by their Master Milan. And now, someone else was doing their mission for them.
Deep inside the exposed remains of the central golden spire, the battle between the two Anchor-stage wills continued without pause.
Invisible waves of willforce attacks crossed the distance between them. Defensive walls formed and shattered in the span of a single breath. The sheer pressure from their mental strikes caused reinforced sections of the golden spire to continue breaking apart, massive chunks of architecture tearing away and plummeting toward the ground beneath forces that most of the watching universe could neither see nor comprehend.
Adrian stepped forward, his white-grey robes completely untouched by the swirling debris. He did not know who the silver-skinned alien was. For now, all he knew was that this man had attempted to ambush him, possessed good control over his anchor-stage mind, and was currently trying to escape.
He could feel Androxus's intent shifting. The mental strikes that had been targeting Adrian's consciousness were losing their lethal edge, transforming instead into suppressive bursts meant to create distance. He was preparing to disengage.
Androxus took a step back, the fabric of space bending slightly around his half-transparent form as he initiated a teleportation spell. He poured a massive amount of mana and willforce into it, preparing to tear through the localized void and vanish from the Providence Hub before Adrian could block him.
But as the spatial ripples began to form around Androxus, Adrian's white-grey eyes locked onto him.
"You aren't leaving," Adrian said, his eyes turning cold.