William Thompson didn’t care about the little mouse, but he was quite dissatisfied with his own performance in the recent fight. In fact, that African rhino wasn’t particularly strong; it was just a bit faster when it charged. As long as he could move faster than it, he would be invincible. If he could be even quicker, he might have been able to kill it on the spot. Today, it was just a single rhino—what if there were two, or three? Was he supposed to run away every time? That was not William Thompson’s usual way of doing things.

However, today’s battle also made William Thompson put away his arrogance. No wonder his master had said that even he didn’t know what was hidden in this forest, and had warned him not to go too deep, fearing he might encounter danger. It turned out he was only a little stronger than when he had first arrived in the Immortal Realm. Today, a random immortal beast had jumped out and left him with no power to fight back—what about in the future?

Thinking of his master, William Thompson smacked his lips. It had been at least ten days since he’d left his master. He wondered if his master’s anger had subsided. He speculated to himself, trying to predict what would happen if he went back, but the outcome he imagined was too miserable to bear. William Thompson shivered and decided to stay out and enjoy his freedom a while longer.

He took out a jade slip from his ring, used his spiritual sense to inscribe a message, and sent it to his master to let him know he was safe.

In the days that followed, William Thompson roamed around looking for solitary spirit beasts to spar with and hone his skills. If he couldn’t win, he’d stall; if he couldn’t even stall, he’d run away, and after recovering, he’d go back to trouble the beast again.

The deeper he went, the higher the level of spirit beasts he encountered. William Thompson kept training himself through these battles, and before he knew it, his cultivation broke through to the mid-Nascent Soul stage. Thinking of how his master would surely scold him again when he returned, he stuck out his tongue in secret. He had also collected dozens of immortal cores—green, gold, white, red, yellow, all sorts of colors. After some research, William Thompson found that green represented the wood attribute of immortal beasts, and the others were gold, water, fire, and earth, respectively. The strangest were a black and a silver immortal core—one of each. The black one was filled with a kind of spiritual energy that made William Thompson extremely uncomfortable, while the silver one was the exact opposite. William Thompson guessed they represented the attributes of darkness and light.

But these kinds of immortal cores were extremely rare, leaving William Thompson completely puzzled.

Chapter 10: The Illusion Array

William Thompson calculated the days and realized he had been in this forest for over a month. He figured his stingy master’s anger should have subsided by now, so he packed up and prepared to head home.

William Thompson had it all planned out: if his master was still angry when he got back, he’d just give him all the spoils from this month to make up for the loss of those refining materials. Surely his master wouldn’t really kick him out, right? After all, he was the master’s first and foremost disciple.

But things didn’t go as smoothly as he’d imagined. After following the compass on his watch for three days, William Thompson stopped beside a pile of ashes from a long-burned-out campfire.

Staring at the familiar campfire, the scattered bird feathers, and the gnawed bird bones beside it, William Thompson broke out in a cold sweat.

In the entire Immortal Realm, probably no one but William Thompson would roast birds over a fire to eat.

I’m lost. That was William Thompson’s first thought—and he was going in circles.

He raised his hand to look at his watch. The compass needle swung left and right with the movement of his wrist, but no longer pointed in any fixed direction.

Damn it! William Thompson cursed inwardly. The compass had probably been damaged in one of his battles. If only he’d put it in his storage ring, he thought with regret.

There was no sun, no moon, and no stars in this forest. The sky was a vast expanse of white, and towering trees were everywhere. Now, William Thompson had no idea which direction the Immortal Lake was in.

Summoning his Cold Light sword, William Thompson flew up into the sky. All he could see was endless forest, with no end in sight. William Thompson began to grow anxious.

The only thing he could do now was try to find a way out of the forest. Determined, William Thompson mounted his Cold Light and picked a direction to fly straight ahead. He figured, no matter how big this forest was, it had to have an end—he’d just fly out of it.

But reality gave William Thompson another hard slap in the face.

He didn’t know how long he’d been flying when, by chance, he glanced to the side and saw that all-too-familiar scene again: the burned-out campfire and the gnawed bird bones.

William Thompson felt a chill in his heart. He was now certain he was going in circles, and in a very small area at that—otherwise, how could he have run into the same campfire again?

An illusion array! Only an illusion array could confuse the mind and make someone keep circling in a small area!

Cold sweat broke out on William Thompson’s forehead. When he was learning about arrays from the Celestial Guide, he had seen how highly the Celestial Guide regarded illusion arrays. Attack arrays were for killing, defense arrays for protection, but neither could match the effectiveness of illusion arrays in confusing the enemy’s mind.

It was said that among the Ten Great Immortal Lords, the Lord of Illusions, Charles Bennett, had earned his place by specializing in illusion arrays. His mastery of illusion arts and arrays was unmatched in the entire Immortal Realm—even the Immortal Emperor admitted inferiority. His signature move, the Immortal-Vanishing Maze Array, was said to be so formidable that even the Immortal Emperor would suffer if he entered it.