Lex was extremely interested in the offer, which is what presented him with an issue. He was occupied with the forge right now, and he didn’t want to distract himself from that. The Go board was increasingly becoming a liability he could no longer support. The way it could ruin things for him at the critical moment made it dangerous for him to take on any additional tasks.

Take, for example, the Defiler hunt. He needed a Defiler heart, but getting one was far from easy - as far as he knew. Lex had never personally come face to face with a Defiler, only the Profane, who were subjects or pawns of Defilers.

The only frame of reference he had for them was that almost any powerful civilization he had come across made it a point to eliminate all Defilers as quickly as possible. To adopt a mindset like that wherever they went, the Defilers were probably very dangerous. To take up a challenge like that with the threat of the Go board hanging over his head was asking for trouble.

"When exactly do you want to go hunt a Defiler?" Lex asked, not answering directly. "Although I have to go hunt one, I have matters keeping me occupied at the Inn that I cannot skip. I will need some time to see them through - only then can I join you for your hunt."

Giselle frowned just a little, but recovered quickly.

"Well, that’s not exactly a deal breaker. It’s not like I have a Defiler ready to hunt, I still have to go find one. I have a few leads, and I was hoping to bring you along during the scouting, but I can do it on my own as well. I’ll let you know once I have a lead.

"But you should be mentally prepared - I’ll have to test your strength before I can truly bring you along to hunt. Defilers are extraordinarily difficult to deal with, and anyone not up to par will only be a liability rather than a strength."

Lex had to stop himself from laughing, although he did not suppress his amused smirk.

"Test away, my lady. You’re not the only one at the ninth level of the Earth Immortal realm."

In truth, Lex was surprised by her level of strength. Last he met her, she was not nearly at this level of strength.

Then again, she had gone to that tower that the Jotun empire was overseeing, and Emperor Jotun himself had gained a lot from that tower. Anything Giselle might have gained from there was not to be overlooked.

"Do you think just being at the ninth level is good enough?" Giselle asked, feeling like she was being looked down at.

Lex cleared his throat, and then held out his hand, as if to shake hers. The suggestion was clear.

Almost feeling offended, Giselle clasped Lex’s hand. For a moment, the two had only locked eyes and held hands, amusement in Lex’ eyes and stubbornness in Giselle’s.

Sure, Lex had proven himself stronger than her before her recent gains, but if he thought she had been standing still, he was sorely mistaken.

Then, the silent battle began. At first, it was only a battle of pure strength, and Giselle came nowhere close to affecting Lex at all. That was fine, she specialised in finesse, not brute strength anyway.

Then came more complex, subtle means. There was a clash of spiritual energies, of wills and techniques, but Lex remained an unmovable wall. Anything she threw at him disappeared as if being absorbed by an abyss, causing no reaction at all.

But then again, this much was still expected. Lex was a man who had surpassed even her high standards, so it would honestly be disappointing if he couldn’t even handle this much. So then, Giselle started to use more powerful means.

At first, she directly used her tenets against his, as if trying to snatch the strength of his arm directly from the laws attached to his body. But Lex’s own tenet had a firm grasp on all the laws around him, without as much as letting a single one waver.

Giselle’s eyes narrowed. She could progress step by step, going into Lawcrafts and then special abilities, but she felt it was pointless. If she wanted to get the best of Lex, she had to unleash her trump card - the very card she had gone into the tower to polish off.

"Be careful, I can’t control this fully," Giselle whispered, before her eyes took upon an ethereal look.

Giselle’s aura suddenly changed, becoming ancient and unquestionable, becoming puissant and unquestionable. Around her body, Lex could almost see grains of sand, reminding him of their shared experience within that Temple of Frozen Dawn. She had gained time affinity there, had she not?

As if to answer him, Lex suddenly felt the irresistible corrosion of time, eating away at the strength in his arm. His defenses, his strength, his energy, all of it began to wane, as if coming into a natural decline after the passing of countless eras.

This was not a tenet or a technique - Giselle was directly utilizing the law of time against him, something he had never seen anyone else do! Even Dao Lords did not casually mess around with the laws of time, and yet Giselle seemed to have turned that into her focus entirely!

For the first time, Lex was losing the minor battle, but that only intrigued him instead of worrying him. It was finally interesting.

Now it was his turn to test himself against the law of time. Even if time itself was the one undeniable truth of this universe, that did not mean Giselle could utilize it to its full effects.

He began with Domination. The dragons could bend the universe to their will. He wondered if that included time as well.

When Giselle felt Lex’s Domination, she was shocked, though she hid it. His aura had grown endlessly unfathomable, and the entertained twinkle in his eye made it look like he was playing a game instead of actually taking this seriously.

It seems they would find out just how effective he really was.