Chapter 3684: Stone Guardian

The stone man moved even from a distance. It could be seen fighting with a cultivator, who desperately attempted to defeat it. However, no matter how much the cultivator tried, they failed to do anything to the stone man.

"That’s not a person, is it?" Ronron asked from far away.

"No, it looks like something made out of stone," Helen said. "That should be a puppet, right?"

Alex couldn’t tell what it really was. From far away, it looked like a real person, just giant, nearly 10 times the size of every other person standing there. That obviously wasn’t possible at all.

As they got close, they finally saw the thing in all its majesty. At this distance, it was easy to notice the minor imperfections around its body, making it very apparent that this was a creature carved out of stone.

As for how exactly it was alive, that could be the result of a formation or an artifact.

The cultivator who was fighting the stone being gave up and left the battlefield. With no one there, the guardian crossed its arms and remained upright, waiting for its next fighter.

Alex made his way toward the front to see things more clearly and noticed what was written on a large yellow banner.

Defeat the Stone Guardian. Win 30 Stars.

"That simple, huh?" Alex thought.

He called over the others to see what was going on, and they read the information too.

"Stone Guardian?" Liz called out. "We have to defeat that thing? How strong is it?"

Alex could only shrug. The Stone Guardian gave no aura of its own, and from the looks of it, it was more physically strong than anything. So unless someone fought it directly, they would have no idea how strong it was.

"It’s at least strong enough to fight an Immortal Transcendent 2nd realm cultivator with ease," Alex said. That was the cultivation base of the person who had just lost. "Well, it doesn’t look like it fights back very much, so do you guys want to give it a shot?"

Alex turned around to see Helen trying really hard to find an excuse, but she knew she had none. She could only sigh in the end and agree.

There was a queue of people ready to try and win against the stone guardian. Each person had to step on a small rectangular slab of stone with their star to register for the fight, and there were close to 30 people in line already.

Many seemed aware of their own shortcomings and had decided to just stand to the side, watching the others fight. Some simply watched to see if they could find any secret method to defeat the stone guardian, which they had yet to find.

With Alex’s suggestion, Helen, Liz, and Ronron registered for the battle as well. Alex and Battlesage decided that they would rather not take part in something that they could very likely easily win, considering their physical strength.

Alex did wonder if he was wasting time by not going to the other red locations around the secret realm, but he quickly gave up on that idea. They had a year’s time to reach every location, and they didn’t necessarily need that many stars anyway. He had to force his family somewhat to get them to become better at handling other cultivators in a fight, and there was nothing better than the threat of being thrown out of the secret realm right at the start.

They would have to try their hardest.

The stone guardian fought each cultivator for the time being, never faltering in the slightest. The deftness with which it fought was close to being perfect for what was only just a stone puppet.

Its strength was also quite high, making it impossible for any of the cultivators that arrived to win.

By now, even cultivators in the Immortal Spirit realm had fought the guardian, each one using their Spirits during their attacks, and somehow not a single one of them had managed to win against the thing at all.

Alex couldn’t help but wonder just how one was even supposed to defeat this thing. Was one even meant to do so at all?

’Maybe it’s just here to waste our time,’ he thought. The 30 stars it gave for defeating it could be just bait to keep them here. If that was indeed the case, then many of the cultivators there were being lured by it.

Alex only didn’t think much of the situation since he was knowingly staying there to watch the other three fight.

Helen’s turn came first. With her Immortal Origin realm cultivation base, no one there expected her to win at all. No one even expected her to reach a draw using any sneaky means. The only thing they all waited for was to see how long she would last against this thing.

The stone guardian didn’t strike hard, so she wouldn’t be injured. Still, if she got hit more than a few times, it was obvious that she had lost.

Helen raised her hand, water coalescing around her, quickly freezing into large icicles. As the icicles spun, they made their way toward the stone guardian with great speed.

Alex looked at his mother’s Heavenly Ice Spear technique and made a strange face. His own technique had been improved to become the Heavenly Yin Ice Spear, which used his strong Yin spirit root to make the attack stronger than it normally could be.

His mother didn’t have that. She only had what he had taught her before letting her come to the upper world with his sister.

He worried she really may have egregiously neglected that part of her cultivation. What if she didn’t have many strong techniques at all?

Helen changed her attacks to release some more techniques, and when nothing worked, she finally pulled out her spear.

Alex raised an eyebrow. He had told Pearl to teach her how to fight with a spear long ago, but he hadn’t followed up on that command to see how things had gone. How good was his mother with a spear now?

The spear itself looked quite horrible. It was originally meant to be her Creation that she was going to use as a spear, but since she didn’t have the formation-carving pen yet, she used a regular spear.

Against the giant stone guardian, Helen stabbed around, throwing out bursts of spear attacks, each one hitting the stone guardian accurately. All of her attacks held Pearl’s teaching at some level, but she hadn’t been able to replicate it to the same level as he had.

That likely had to do with his mother’s talent when it came to fighting. She had a strong mind for learning new things that were more theoretical in nature than anything, which was why she was so good at making pills and talismans. But the moment that became physical, her talent seemed to be severely lacking.

That was not to say she was bad. Just that she needed to put herself through many more years of training before she could confidently use the spear.

The stone guardian gently swatted at her like a man swatted at an annoying fly. Helen tried to block it and was instead sent flying to the side. She went back in to try and get more hits in with her spear, but she had to give up not long after as she made no progress.

She landed down next to Alex and the rest with a somewhat dejected look. "I’m sorry," she said in a meek voice. "I tried, but I’m not really good at it. Clearly."

"That’s fine, mother," Alex said. "You tried. I can already see Pearl’s influence in your fighting style. If you continue with this, you will be just as good as him. It will just take a much longer time."

Helen nodded. "I thought of using my talismans against that thing, but... I need to learn how not to rely on that, right?" she asked.

Alex raised an eyebrow. "Could you have won if you used your talismans?"

Helen looked back at the giant thing before slowly shaking her head. "Probably not. That thing is far too durable. Even my strongest talismans would struggle to make a dent in it."

Alex expected as much.

Ronron stepped forward. "I’m next."

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