Fu Qinglan was apologetic. "Even two illusory cores couldn't help me progress much. I'm sorry, Senior Brother, I'm not very gifted."

Not very gifted? Luo Chen shook his head. How could someone who had formed her Nascent Soul at the age of three hundred be called "not very gifted"? In the end, it was because the illusory cores contained too little spirit energy to last a cultivator until they finished grasping a natural Law. What truly frustrated him was time—or, rather, the lack thereof!

Luo Chen extended his hand toward Fu Qinglan and said to her confusion, "Let me take a look at your illusory Go stone."

Despite not knowing what he wanted to do, Fu Qinglan handed him the stone. Luo Chen examined it and saw that the black light staining the white stone had covered roughly two or three percent.

In this pocket world, the Mirage Dragon's power would corrode the contestants' Go stones. The deeper the corrosion, the shorter the time they could remain inside.

But this situation is really odd…

"You used up two illusory cores, yet it's only corroded this much after one year. Does this mean we'll have to stay in this pocket world for decades, or even over a hundred years at this rate?"

This was the main reason why Luo Chen could not accept their situation. He couldn't possibly devote nearly a hundred years of his life to someone else's cultivation trial. This also differed greatly from what Fu Chaosheng had told him, which was that the Dao Sect's grand competition...