Walker Of The Worlds

Chapter 2809: A Hint From The Saintess

ʼSo I need to be able to create the illusion using my Immortal Sense.ʼ

Now that he had grasped the concept, Lin Mu felt a renewed surge of excitement. His motivation flared to life like a fire stoked by fresh kindling.

Without hesitation, he took out another pinch of the grains and activated them again. But this time, he did more than just observe—he actively channeled his Immortal Sense, focusing it on the blurry images around him.

He sought to understand their nature—not just how they looked, but how they felt. The intent behind their movement. The elusive phantasm beneath the illusion.

Lin Muʼs hunch was right.

After two more weeks of diligent practice, he finally began to understand how the skill truly worked.

The method wasnʼt foreign to him. In fact, it was remarkably similar to how cultivators manipulated weapons or inscribed formation runes. One typically used their Immortal Sense to guide the movement of weapons or to etch precise formations. With the Spectral Phantasm Strike, he needed to do something similar—only instead of controlling an object, he needed to recreate the illusion of movement itself.

ʼItʼs in the flow… itʼs all in the flow of Qi,ʼ Lin Mu realized.

He shifted his focus.

Rather than relying on the Spectral Mirror Stones, he began practicing his techniques without them. He scrutinized every tiny movement—how Qi surged and swirled, how energy fluctuated with motion, how even the reflection of light played along the edge of a blade.

The more he observed, the more he uncovered hidden layers within every technique. There were so many subtle phenomena at work—fine disturbances in the air, soft shifts in light, the flutter of robes, the gleam of a blade in motion.

These were things most cultivators ignored, deeming them too insignificant. But for this skill, they were everything.

Lin Mu began replicating the flow of Qi using his Immortal Sense first, as that was the easiest part for him. Given his high proficiency with sense control, it only took him a couple of days. He split his Immortal Sense into branching strands, flowing them outward in patterns that mirrored the natural movement of Qi during an attack.

Soon, it bore fruit.

When he threw a punch while projecting these threads, it felt—viscerally and visually—as though a second fist was moving alongside the first. There was no actual object there, but if a blind cultivator were fighting him, they might very well think two strikes were incoming.

Still, it wasnʼt enough.

In a real battle, sighted cultivators would easily distinguish between illusion and reality. The fake projection was transparent—lacking the visual cues that completed the deception.

The next step was to replicate those cues: sound, light, presence.

Sound came next.

Lin Mu realized that if he used his Immortal Sense to disturb the air in the same rhythm and force as an actual strike, he could recreate the sound of a blow—even if the strike wasnʼt physically there. That illusion was subtle, but it worked.

Light, however, was far more difficult.

Controlling how light reflected, how it bent or refracted, was an entirely different challenge. No matter how hard he tried, he couldnʼt replicate the visual trail—the illusion of form and motion.

A week passed, and Lin Mu hit a wall.

He sat in the courtyard, brow furrowed, caught in a spiral of frustration—until a familiar voice echoed in his head.

”Is this the skill you talked about before?” the voice asked.

”Ah, yes, Saintess,” Lin Mu nodded, recognizing her immediately.

He had told her about the Spectral Phantasm Strike before. She had taken interest in his efforts to master it.

”From the looks of it, youʼre stuck on replicating the reflection of light?” the Saintess asked, her insight as sharp as ever.

”Yes, Saintess,” Lin Mu admitted. ”I was able to replicate the sound and the Qi flow, but the reflection of light is proving difficult. And creating a full image—an actual illusion—is even harder.”

”Hmm,” the Saintess mused. ”For reflecting light, I do know a method. It might not be the most straightforward, but Iʼve become quite proficient in manipulating light and reflections.”

”You can use the Light Element, Saintess?” Lin Mu asked, surprised.

If the skill required mastery over a whole elemental path, it would be far more difficult than the manual had ever implied.

”No,” she said with a soft chuckle. ”I donʼt have proficiency in Light.”

”Then how…?” Lin Mu blinked, puzzled.

”But I do have knowledge of another element that influences light,” she explained. ”Air.”

”Air?” Lin Mu raised an eyebrow—then the realization struck him. ”Of course! Light travels through air. Depending on the density and movement of the air, the reflection and refraction can change!”

”Exactly,” the Saintess said with a hint of pride in her voice. ”Learning the Air element fully might be too much, but youʼve already cultivated techniques like the Bending Wind Fists and Cloud Dragon Stride. So grasping a portion of its properties should be within your reach.”

She continued, ”If you apply those insights to your skill—especially through silk-like control of wind—youʼll be able to influence how light behaves. With that, you can distort and even refract light just enough to form a false image.”

”That makes sense!” Lin Mu exclaimed, feeling like he had just stepped into a beam of sunlight after a long tunnel.

”Continue practicing as you have,” the Saintess instructed. ”But this time, use what you know of wind.”

”Yes,” Lin Mu said firmly, confidence returning to his voice.

He resumed his training with renewed energy, applying what heʼd learned from his wind-based techniques.

After all, what was wind, if not air in motion? They were two faces of the same coin.

And sure enough, after a few days of focused practice—adjusting airflow with delicate Qi threads—he finally did it.

SHUA

The wind curled and twisted around his fists, stirred by invisible strings of Qi and sense. Though no actual second fist appeared, a faint silhouette shimmered in the air.