The whale was unimaginably huge!
Just half its body breaching the surface stretched for two to three thousand meters, like a towering mountain suddenly rising from the sea.
By that measure, its full length must have exceeded five kilometers!
The appearance of such a terrifying beast completely shattered Jing Qian's worldview, leaving him nearly speechless.
With nothing more than a casual movement, the whale unleashed a natural disaster upon the sea.
A single act of feeding stirred up a tsunami a hundred meters high!
And Jing Qian, being the closest to the whale, had no chance to resist. He was instantly swept away by the monstrous waves.
Dragged hundreds of meters beneath the surface, he felt like nothing more than a helpless leaf tossed about by the ocean currents.
His vision was filled with surging waves. In that moment, he truly understood his insignificance before this giant whale; he was but a drop in the ocean, fragile and powerless.
The only thing he could do was act on pure survival instinct; he shot out two strands of white silk toward his wooden raft.
The threads came from his palms, a power bestowed by his Weaver of Souls Life Pattern.
But compared to Qingzhuzi's natural gifts, his control was far more limited. At most, he could command only two threads, a pitifully small effect.
Even so, Jing Qian gave his all. With those two thin yet unyielding threads, he wrapped tightly around the drifting raft.
The ocean's force battered him relentlessly, wave after wave trying to rip him away from his lifeline.
But his hands clung tight, his mind filled with a single thought: Survive!
The raft tossed wildly, sometimes hurled high into the air, sometimes slammed toward the depths below. A lone boat upon a raging sea, it seemed it could be swallowed at any moment.
Jing Qian's body ached from the water's pull, and each breath felt like a battle with death itself. Yet his gaze only grew firmer.
He refused to believe he would die here, lost in this calamity!
Time passed unmarked upon the sea. He did not know how long he endured, only that at last the waves began to settle.
Using the threads' tension as leverage, Jing Qian drew himself little by little toward the raft. Every effort felt like crossing mountains and rivers.
Finally, his fingers touched the raft's edge. In that instant, it was like grasping the very straw that could save his life.
With the last of his strength, he hauled himself aboard, collapsing face-down as he coughed violently, spitting out mouthfuls of salty seawater.
By all accounts, he must have been the most pathetic Life Pattern cultivator in existence.
He had nearly drowned with his stomach full of seawater!
And the cause of his miserable state? That colossal whale, which he etched into memory with bitter resolve.
Once his cultivation grew strong enough, he swore, he would make the beast pay!
Now he finally understood. The seventh-rank Blueblood Island Whale before him had been summoned by his Grandma Qingzhuzi with a forbidden secret art.
It had never planned to return alive. The Island Whale was her final card, meant to perish alongside the Snow Maiden.
Only, she had not foreseen Jing Qian awakening such tremendous strength in so short a time.
Nor that he would abandon his escape, return to the battlefield, and strike down the Snow Maiden himself.
Because of that, the card she had prepared nearly dragged him into death along with her.
At this moment, Jing Qian's body and mana were utterly exhausted.
He lay unmoving on the raft, slowly regaining a sliver of strength.
At last, he had a moment to reflect on the whirlwind path his life had taken since his transmigration.
In truth, it had been only three days since he arrived in this land of Hunzhou.
And in those short days, beyond his desperate cultivation, every moment had been spent fighting to survive.
His survival had been owed, in no small part, to the great help of two grandmothers.
Though their time together had been short, they had already earned a place of highest respect in his heart.
But those dearest to him… had now fallen, one after the other.
The extermination of his entire clan by the Qizhi Island Sect had long since become Jing Qian's mortal, unshakable hatred.
Now, adrift alone on this boundless sea, his future was filled with nothing but uncertainty.
Still, no matter what path lay ahead, the first thing he needed was to recover his strength as quickly as possible.
With a single thought, his consciousness once again sank into the Fate Stele Space.
Compared to the last time he entered, this now much-expanded space had undergone new changes.
Beyond the safe zone, the soul of the Snow Maiden, Aoli, stood plainly in the center!
After killing his enemy with his own hands, her soul had been captured by him and transformed into nourishment for his future growth.
And on the Fate Stele, his information had once more been updated:
Host: Jing Qian
Lifespan: 1/144 years
Life Essence: 2.35 (White Fang)
Life Patterns: Sumeru (Golden Root), Weaver of Souls (Azure Wing)
At this point, he possessed two Life Patterns and two White Fang Life Essences. His strength had advanced by leaps and bounds!
More importantly, when he once again faced enemies within this space, he was finally free from the humiliating state of being completely unable to resist.
No matter his condition in the outside world, whether healthy or battered when he entered the Fate Stele Space, he would be restored directly to his peak state.
And now, drifting across the endless ocean with no one around, the best way to replenish his energy was to "shear more wool" from the three convenient friends in front of him.
Without hesitation, Jing Qian activated his Sumeru Life Pattern.
In an instant, his figure vanished from where he stood.
Under the power of this Life Pattern, Jing Qian slipped into the void, entering a dimension that existed independent of the real world.
Here, light twisted, time and space inverted, chaos and order blurred.
Yet through a crystalline membrane, Jing Qian could observe the scenes of the real world.
He could freely roam within this dimension, unhindered by anything.
Once he reached the place he wished to go, he could simply step back out of the void and emerge instantly at the corresponding point in the real world.
This was none other than space-walking, void-shuttling!
It was precisely by relying on the divine power of his Sumeru Life Pattern that he had crossed the icebound battlefield in a single step, blade in hand, to appear right before Aoli and strike her down with a single sword!
Jing Qian was utterly satisfied with the might of this golden-rank Life Pattern.
Truly worthy of being one in ten thousand! Even though he had only just awakened it and was far from mastering its use, it already unleashed an overwhelming and terrifying power far beyond its level.
Now, as he stepped out from the void, his figure silently materialized behind the short, stocky cultivator like a shadow of death itself.